The Romantic Road — Intentional Assets

We left Herrsching am Ammersee and started North on The Romantic Road. This is a series of medieval towns, many very well preserved with city walls and everything! We planned on hitting two highlight towns before spending the next two nights in Rothenburg ob der Tauber.

We visited Nördlingen first on this leg of the journey. It’s a small town, about 1100 years old and has a complete wall around it. One of the first things we did after parking just outside the wall, was to climb up and take a little stroll. The weather was great as an Autumn chill was already creeping into the air in early September.

After our stroll on the wall it was time to grab some lunch. We found a cute little Irish Pub called Bayrish Pub (a take on Bayern or Bavaria.) I ordered an appetizer that was something that my mom served me for lunch many times, leberwurst or liver sausage on bread. Mmmmm! Melissa even ate some of it!!!

We had read that the best view in the area was from the top of the church steeple in the middle of town, so after lunch, we headed off to find the church. It wasn’t difficult to find. And when we got to the top of the steeple, we found the steeple cat who lives up there and regularly walks around the ledge outside!

One interesting thing that geologists discovered several years ago is that Nördlingen sits in the middle of an asteroid crater and is embedded with millions of very tiny diamonds! We didn’t find any diamonds, but thought the city was a gem! (Insert groan here)

After a couple of hours in Nördlingen, we headed north to Dinkelsbühl which had more colorful buildings as well as a full wall around the city.

We wandered around the town for a couple of hours as well, taking in the beauty and age. We don’t have anything like this in the US, so it was a new experience for me!

And then there was Rothenburg ob der Tauber…I was a little concerned about going there because all of the travel guides said it was overrun with tourists…and it was. But it was amazing!

If you were to look up medieval towns in the dictionary, Rothenburg is probably the one you’d find pictured. Even though it was packed with tourists, it still retained an amazing amount of charm. The brightly painted buildings stood out brilliantly against a gray sky that didn’t really change while we were there. Incidentally, the only reason why there are no tourists in the picture above is because I woke at 6:30 to beat them out!

Everywhere you turned, there was something magnificent to see down a narrow street. Most of the houses are in good repair which is amazing considering their age. The hotel we stayed in, the Gotisches Haus, was built in the 13th century!

We climbed up the Rathaussturm (City Hall tower) on the left of the picture below on a dreary, rainy morning to have an amazing view over the town and surrounding countryside. On a side note, it think it’s interesting that they call City Hall the Rathaus.

Rothenburg has an intact city wall, although you cannot walk all the way around on it like you can in Nördlingen. My favorite part of the wall are the watch towers!

Rothenburg ob der Tauber was one of the highlights of the overall trip. Lesson learned - there’s a reason why so many tourists visit the town and don’t let that stop you from visiting. Just like Asheville, I guess! A few more photo highlights below…

Food for thought (Ironically, it’s written in English in Germany)

Stay tuned for the next installment where we’ll head over to Baden Baden and the Black Forest!!! If you’re not signed up for updates, you should definitely join the hundreds of others who have.