Rothenburgh ob der Tauber – August 28th 2017
Rothenburgh ob der Tauber had been on my list for months before we left. I have no idea where I first saw information about the town, but the pictures drew me in. Quaint little German town. Looking untouched for many hundreds of years. Coming from a relatively young country, this was the type of culture I wanted to see in Europe.
We arrived middle of the afternoon and after dropping our bags and checking into our adorable hotel (family run and no elevator tells you we were staying in old fashion style!) we walked the 5 minutes to the gates of the old town.
A quick trip through the town revealed what looked like a place that had stood still in time. Store fronts were showcasing all their merchandise in the windows, most shops had handmade goods. No neon signs and glitz and glam here. The city was doing it’s best to preserve it’s old charm appearance. The view from the town down to the valley was super! We found of that the name of the town actually translates to “Over the Tauber”-Ob der Tauber. The Tauber is the name of the river below – makes sense!
We scouted out the town square area as we would be headed back there later at night for the Night Watchmen’s Tour. I had researched this and it looked really neat. I also saw it on my good buddy, Rick Steves travel show. (Ok, so we aren’t good buddies, 😉 )
We explored a bit more of the town, found some awesomely cute shops for the kids to explore. One store was entirely devoted to Teddy Bears. CUTE!!
Later that night we did return to the square. Met our Night Watchman and started the tour. He was dressed and in character to show us around the town. With his lantern, we followed him through the streets where he stopped at certain points to tell us some history of the city. He explained the role of the Watchman way back in the day and why they were so important. We learned a lot of WW2 and how it affected the town and we also learned about other attacks on the town in medieval times.. I loved the tour. LOVED LOVED LOVED it. Wish it was longer, but I guess the town is small and we covered it all. haha
It was time to head back to our cute hotel for the night as we were getting up early for some more fun in the town, plus for the first time on the trip we were staying at a place that offered free (or shall I say, complementary, it sounds more fancy) breakfast!! Couldn’t miss that!!
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