Our train wasn't until 10:00 a.m. so we had time to linger over breakfast at our hotel in Freiburg. Awwwwww, isn't vacation wonderful?
We had breakfast, finished packing and requested a taxi to take us to the train station. That all went very well and we arrived at the train station in plenty of time. Today was going to be a long day of trains (5 hours) and we had to change trains 3 times! At the first station we had 7 minutes to change trains and at the second station we had 4 minutes. But it all worked out and we enjoyed our ride very much.
We arrived in Rothenburg right on schedule and David checked with the Information Desk to see how far our hotel was to decide whether or not we would walk or take a taxi. The woman told him it wasn't very far and to just go out the door of the train station, turn left, and it would only take us about 10 minutes to walk there.
So off we went. It was easy walking on nice sidewalks. We knew our hotel was in the "old city" and as we walked we thought it was looking more and more rural. We stopped on the street so David could take a look at his map and a man pulled up in a car and asked if we were looking for a place to stay. David told him we had a hotel reservation but we weren't sure how to get to the hotel. The man looked at the name of our hotel and told us we were walking in the complete opposite direction! He offered to drive us to the hotel which was VERY nice of him . . . especially considering he owned two B&Bs in the old city and was trying to drum up business!!! He dropped us off in front of our fabulous small hotel and although he refused David's offer of a tip for a few minutes, he finally relented and accepted it.
Our hotel owner, Uhle, greeted us warmly and invited us out to the garden and offered us drinks -- everything from champagne to juice. It was only 3:30 p.m., so we just had a Coke Light. While we were visiting with her, our bags were delivered to our room. David picked this hotel after receiving an e-mail advertising it as one of the top ten "most romantic" hotels in the world for 2013. It only has 4 rooms and 4 suites and all the rooms we saw were gorgeous. Ours was the Golden Apple room and it was very, very nice and very big. The bathroom was luxurious as well.
The building is over 1,000 years old and one of the oldest preserved residential houses in Germany. We have never had service like we received at this hotel in our lives! It was almost as if they offered you things before you even thought about asking for them.
After settling in our room we took our first walk around Rothenburg and it is an amazing area. The old city is almost completely "walled" except for a small portion of it. You can enter the old city through three gates. It is very popular for tourists and we understand why. There are many, many shops and lots of restaurants and cafes with outdoor seating. Think about what the perfect Bavarian town would look like and that's Rothenburg!
For dinner we went to a casual restaurant also owned by the people who owned our hotel. It was very small and charming. It's name is Zur Hoell which translates to "To Hell." It is in the oldest house in Rothenburg and is kind of tavern-y. We ordered a cheese board and the cheeses were outstanding. I had veal schnitzel and homemade spatzle (egg noodles). David had a curry vegetable dish with rice. We had wonderful German wine with it. It was quite good!
A friend of mine who shall remain nameless (Steve) mentioned today that there seems to be a fixation with food throughout my blog. Really? Has he met us????
That was it for our first day in Rothenburg. We walked back to our hotel and climbed into our huge bed with the fluffy, wonderful comforter!!!
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