Schwäbisch Hall, Germany

Thursday, April 11, 2024

Our day began in Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Germany at Hotel BurgGartenpalais. This was a pretty comfortable place to stay the night, except for the hourly chimes coming from one of the town’s many clocktowers. “That clock isn’t going to go off all night long, is it?” Andi asked when we went to bed around 11:00pm.

Yes, yes it did. Every hour, on the hour.

Neither Tory or Aden have been feeling very well this week, so I went to check on them sleeping early this morning. I laughed when I saw Tory’s toes sticking out the end of her bedding. The style of bedding here in Germany is different than the United States. Most beds have a fitted sheet around the mattress and a down comforter folded on top. There is no flat sheet and the bedding isn’t tucked underneath the mattress. There’s also no such thing as queen or king beds; only twin beds pushed together.

One benefit of this bedding arrangement, I suppose, is that everyone has their own blanket. It’s impossible for your feet not to stick out the bottom of the blanket, as was the case with Tory this morning!

All four of us were awake and ready for the day around 8:30am. Hotel BurgGartenpalais provided a very nice breakfast spread in the hotel restaurant for its guests. We enjoyed a selection of freshly baked breads and pastries, sliced cold cuts and lots of different cheeses and spreads in tiny packages, yogurt, made-to-order eggs, fresh fruit, juices, coffee, and hot chocolate.

Andi and I loaded our plates with a sampling of every food, and I noticed two French women sitting at the table next to ours with only a hard boiled egg and piece of fruit on their plates. Oops! I guess it’s safe to say that Americans love a good breakfast buffet.

The most interesting thing we ate during breakfast was liverwurst. Our waitress at breakfast was an American-born girl who now lives in Rothenburg, and she told us that it’s very common to see liverwurst and other spreadable meats on Germany breakfast tables.

Tory and Aden both seemed to be feeling better this morning, but neither of them would eat anything other than bread for breakfast.

After we ate, we checked out of our hotel room and loaded our backpacks into our rental car parked in the hotel parking lot. We decided to keep our car at the hotel for a few hours while we explored Rothenburg’s charming streets and shops. The three main roads in town are Klostergasse, Herrngasse and Schmiedgasse, and fortunately they all connect to Rothenburg’s main market square.

It was a nice spring morning with the sun shining and brisk temperatures in the low 60’s. Andi and I decided to take our family for a walk along Rothenburg’s iconic town wall — a must-do when visiting the city, according to the night watchman on last night’s tour. Several different staircases lead up to the walking path on top of the town wall, so it’s possible to walk for a bit or follow the wall entirely. The total distance is almost two miles in length.

We walked along the street until we came to the wall surrounding the town, and then ascended one of the staircases to the top. From this vantage point, we could see beautiful views of the town’s rooftops. I read later that visitors can pick up a “Turmweg brochure” at the tourist information building in the market square for a map of the entire town wall route with notable sights and details.

It was fun to imagine town guards watching over & protecting Rothenburg from this viewpoint. We walked along the stone walkway and curiously admired engraved stones placed in various parts of the wall. Parts of the town wall were destroyed during WWII so the city of Rothenburg asked for donations to help repair it. People from all over the world purchased meter-sized blocks of stone to repair the wall, and the names of those generous donations are now displayed on the wall today.

After visiting the town wall, the four of us walked to a famous intersection in Rothenburg where Schmiedgasse (Smithy Lane) turns into Spitalgasse (Hospital Lane). This is the most photographed spot in Rothenburg, and perhaps in all of Germany. The name, Plönlein, refers to the yellow, crooked-timber house at the corner of the intersection.

Next, we continued walking toward the market square. We stopped into one of the many bakeries along the cobblestone street to try Rothenburg ob der Tauber’s famous schneeballen pastry. Schneeballen (snowball, in English) is a deep-fried pastry covered in powdered sugar. We decided to split one ball between the four of us, and picked the traditional flavor to try.

Schneeballen was really … dry, and not very flavorful. I wouldn’t put this treat on anyone’s “must eat” list when visiting Rothenburg.

Afterwards, we walked along Herrngasse (Lords Lane) to the castle gate and gardens. This area of Rothenburg is so pretty, especially in springtime with sunny skies, tulips blooming, and spacious views of Tauber Valley.

The night watchman told us an interesting story during his walking tour: Although the castle gate has been rebuilt following a 13th century earthquake, the original wooden door still remains. In the olden days, guards locked the gate at 10:00pm to protect Rothenburg’s citizens who lived inside the town walls. When tardy townspeople stayed out too late, they would be locked out of the town. Tardy townspeople would either enter through the tiny door-within-a-door to get back inside or wait on the outside of town until morning.

Rothenburg ob der Tauber is such a darling German town; I’m glad we were able to experience it.

Our next stop in Germany was a town called Schwäbisch Hall, about an hour’s drive from Rothenburg and half-way between the cities of Stuttgart and Frankfurt. Staying here puts us closer to Stuttgart or Frankfurt so that tomorrow we can take a high-speed train to Paris, France.

Our drive to Schwäbisch Hall was an easy one along the German Autobahn. With no legal speed limit, Andi tested the boundaries of our Pullstar electric car by reaching speeds of 140 kph (90 mph).

We knew nothing about the town of Schwäbisch Hall, and were pleased to discover that it is very much a “regular” German town with average people living and working there (not a lot of tourism).

Our first stop in Schwäbisch Hall was to Müller, a convenience store chain that reminded us a lot of a Walgreens. We stopped here because Andi wanted to buy a few snacks to take along with us on our train trip tomorrow. We found more than we needed — a massive candy aisle, makeup, and gourmet snacks.

After shopping, we walked around Schwäbisch Hall’s old town streets leading to River Kocher. Similar to Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Schwäbisch Hall has the same half-timber style buildings and cobblestone streets, but what struck Andi and I differently about this town is its authenticity. This very much felt like a place where regular people work and live vs. being catered to tourism.

The four of us stood along the banks of the Kocher River for over an hour, watching a family of ducks swim along and two mean trumpeter swans causing a lot of ruckus. There were families with small children lounging on the lawn and elderly people strolling along the covered bridge. It was a very idyllic scene.

Around 4:00pm, the four of us drove to Rebers Pflug. This historic hotel with an attached restaurant is located on the outskirts of Schwäbisch Hall. Even though we have a rental car, Andi and I have found these hotel/restaurant combinations to be a convenient place to stay. Usually, the last thing we feel like doing after a full day of exploring is going out again for dinner. It’s much easier to walk downstairs inside our hotel, or walk elsewhere in close proximity to where we’re staying, for dinner in the evenings.

The manager of Rebers Pflug Hotel was helpful in checking us into our hotel room, even offering to plug in our electric vehicle overnight. It turned out that we didn’t have a compatible charging cord so he even offered to move our car to another location on the property so that he could charge it up for us.

Our hotel room was on the top floor of the small hotel, so we had to carry our backpacks and roller bags up four flights of stairs to reach our room. Andi commented that we’re never traveling with roller bags again, especially in Europe where there aren’t many elevators.

The hotel room Andi reserved for us was supposed to be a family suite with three beds, but it turned out to be two twin-size beds (for adults) and a fold-out loveseat sofa for the kids. I wasn’t sure this was going to work for Tory and Aden — even for one night — as the kids had both been sick this week and generally weren’t in the best spirits. Andi called the hotel manager to ask if they had any other room options available, but they didn’t; we were stuck with this set-up for the night.

I’m continually amazed at how little emphasis Europeans put on sleeping arrangements for kids. Time and time again, the hotel staff and airbnb hosts we’ve encountered simply can’t understand why Tory and Aden don’t want to share a bed together, or why sleeping on a beat-up, old sofa mattress isn’t acceptable for them.

I could tell Tory was tired when she muttered in defeat, “Whatever, I’ll just sleep with Aden” under her breath. I’m glad she agreed, because we didn’t really have another option. Well, aside from me sleeping on the sofa mattress with him and Tory taking an actual twin with Andi.

At least the bathroom was nice. It had clearly been remodeled recently, and featured a tub, shower, and large windows letting in lots of light.

None of us had eaten anything since breakfast in Rothenburg, and there weren’t many options available around the hotel. A food truck across the street from Rebers Pflug Hotel sells sausages and other German foods to-go, but unfortunately it had just closed for the evening.

Instead, the four of us tied ourselves over with the granola bars and candy we’d purchased at Müller earlier in the day. We spent the next two hours lounged in our hotel room until the hotel restaurant opened for dinner at 7:30pm.

While we waited, Andi searched for high-speed train tickets from Stuttgart to Paris, France. Unfortunately, every seat on the outbound trains tomorrow were full! Now what? Ideally, we wanted to leave from Stuttgart because its a smaller city than Frankfurt and would have been an easier place for us to return our rental car. Andi spent some time on the phone with the train company trying to find a solution. In the end, he booked tickets on TGV high-speed rail line from Frankfurt to Paris at 4:30pm tomorrow afternoon.

At 7:15pm, it was finally time for dinner. The four of us walked downstairs to Restaurant Rebers Pflug. We were all tired and hungry by this point, and none of us felt like sitting through a two-hour meal. Unfortunately, this was our most convenient option for dinner.

We’d passed by a small dining room in the lobby earlier this afternoon, but now as we walked down the stairs to the restaurant, that room was closed. Instead, the hotel manager led us through a set of glass doors and into a much fancier Restaurant Rebers Pflug.

The restaurant was already filled with customers at its opening time who were dressed in much nicer clothing than we were. It looked like a lot of business meetings were being held, or people celebrating a special occasion over a meal. Our waitress didn’t speak much English, and seemed annoyed when we couldn’t understand her explanation of the menu. She was visibly appalled when Andi ordered an apple juice for himself to drink. “For them?” she kept saying, as she pointed to Tory and Aden. She obviously expected us to order something from the extensive wine list.

The food menu was fancy and expensive — yikes! Somehow Andi and I’d missed the memo that this was a one-star Michelin restaurant. I struggled finding food offerings that Tory and Aden would eat. For some reason, duck liver and veal schnitzel weren’t at the top of their list.

Andi took the liberty of ordering, and asked our server if the kitchen could make a simple dish of pasta and red sauce for the kids. Our server didn’t understand our request, but with assistance from the hotel manager we were able to have our request met.

Since the pricing was much money than we were interested in spending, Andi and I agreed to split a few dishes for the table. He ordered one appetizer, a soup and salad, as well as a beef roast with spaetzle. The look the server gave us when Andi said we were planning to share plates was comical. She seemed appalled.

The quality of the food, of course, was fantastic. It wasn’t a lot of food in terms of quantity, but what we did eat tasted amazing.

Essence of boiled beef with semolina dumplings, root vegetables, and roasted onions

After dinner, Andi asked to see the drink menu. When he asked the waitress a question about one of the liquors, she had the hotel manager come over for more clarification. He also seemed confused, and returned with a giant bottle of port wine. He poured a glass for Andi, and smiled widely. We didn’t order that, but whatever — we drank it.

After we paid the bill and left the restaurant, Andi and I couldn’t help but laugh. What was that?! How do we find ourselves in these situations?

The four of us happily fell into bed and slept (mostly) soundly in our less-than-ideal sleeping situation. Tory and Aden barely complained which might’ve been a testament to how exhausted they both were from traveling and being sick.

Tomorrow, we say good-bye to Germany and make our way to Paris.