We traveled down the Romantic Road today visiting numerous lovely city’s as we passed through. If you’re into castles and church’s with old villages the Romantic Road is heaven! We loved it, you have to pinch yourself to make sure it’s real!

Not too many Tour groups encountered. It’s great to visit places slightly off the beaten path! Travel time 8 hours, including a picnic in the meadow you see overlooking a medieval village.

We are staying in Erding, a suburb of Munich. It’s by the airport and the S Baun ( train ) runs you right into downtown Munich in 20 minutes. The Airbnb we are staying in is cute and roomy.

We didn’t realize today is May 1st or May Day when we were planning our trip. May Day is a big holiday here in Bavaria! It’s also their Labor Day and can lead to strikes, but the host says none are planned today. The raising of the May pole is a beloved tradition in Bavaria and we can see Erdings from our balcony. It will be fun to watch them raise it.( Beer \ dancing)

We are planning on visiting Munich too today as the weather has turned back to sunny!

Beer gardens here we come!

We spent Sunday the 28th with the idea of a rest day in our Airbnb in Ladenburg. After a German breakfast of yogurt and Musli we went for a 5 mile hike. Then to the grocery store we went to get food and liquid (beer) for a picnic. Little did we know all grocery stores and beer stores are closed on Sunday 😳 And mostly everything else too!

OK, Cindy says it was actually a 12 mile hike. We have one bottle of rose (😒) at home, so we had a short picnic in our Airbnb as it started raining, hard.

Monday, we drove two hours to Strasbourg in the trusty Peugeot and toured the city for 4 hours. It’s an old city, first mentioned in 10 BC and has always played an important role in the area as it is a river port and the main port in the area!

It’s been French , German, French, German more times than I know, but it became French after WWll and I assume it will stay that way for awhile. You can see the German and the French influences in the architecture. It’s quite a lovely city.

Lots of tour groups, but a big enough city to ignore them, great place to people watch.

Tomorrow, a slow trip to Munich, one of our favorite city’s in the world, along the Romantic Road. Beer halls/beer gardens here we come! 😎

Saturday the 27Th we drove The Romantic Road, from Würzburg to Rothenburg ob der Tauber. The Romantic Road was an idea by German travel agents to generate travel in the area after WW11.

Using the trusty GPS, we drove in the trusty Peugeot from Ladenburg to Würzburg to start our tour of the Romantic Road area. The drive to Würzburg through the back roads was wonderful, quiet German towns, cleaning their yards for spring, with everything bright green and flowers in bloom! Lovely!

The city of Würzburg is quite a treasure. The city was founded in the 400AD era. With each war, as the area grew, and with change of kings , the fortunes of the city grew because of the agricultural area and forest products being shipped on the river.

In the early 1600s, the largest witch trials were held here with over 900 women burned at the stack by some accounts!

The city was completely destroyed in WW11, by bombers, the city was completely rebuilt in the next 20 years, mainly by women as the men were mostly dead.

It’s now a lovely city, with lots of great sights to see and easy access. Not to many tourists, so it was nice to hear mainly German spoken.We enjoyed a picnic in the Residences Park watching several weddings couples have pictures taken.

Highly recommend!

Rothenburg ob der Tauber is an intact walled city built in 900 timeframe. The castle was built in 1000 , high above the city, it was destroyed by an earthquake 200 years later. Over 5500 people lived inside the walls at one time.

In 1634 the bubonic plague basically wiped out the city, leaving it mainly empty for years, and preserving the walled city for years.

In the 1800s it was rediscovered as a tourist area and remained so until it became the Nazi model city in the 1930-40’s. It was mainly spared in WW11 and now is a reminder of German life in the past.

It’s a very lovely town that looks like it’s from Disney it’s so perfect. It’s a fun place to visit as people still live in all the buildings.

Cindy’s doing a wonderful job planning our trip, I highly recommend her services 😎

Today, a day off than Strasbourg tomorrow!

Today we took the short walk to the train station and took the train to Heidelberg. It’s a short train ride, 20 minutes. Unfortunately, our weather has changed and it was cold and raining! But we bundled up and proceeded on!

Arriving in Heidelberg, we visited the Information center, armed with a map and some local knowledge we walked to the Old Town area. Heidelberg is a University town and has long been a center of environmental studies. Friday is protect the future protest day so we saw a couple hundred people parading to speak for the future, interesting!

The old town is centered on the Heidelberg Castle, which of course sits on the hill, dominating the city. The university and the bridge with of course the church’s are lovely!

We treated ourselves and enjoyed a huge lunch of Schnitzel with trimmings which also became dinner.

Lovely city, however it is on the mainline for tour groups and river cruisers, so it was touristy and crowded!

We returned to lovely and quiet Ladenburg, walked through the city where the local farmers market was in process, than home for leftovers and a glass of vino.

Today, we are driving the romantic highway and Sunday taking a day off before driving into France on Monday, visiting Strasbourg. Tuesday, on to Munich, and hopefully nicer weather for the beer gardens,

Cheers, Mike and Cindy

Our flights were uneventful and we enjoyed our Business Class seats. It seems like all we did was eat and drink! Frankfurts airport is huge. A plane arrives or departs every 30 seconds!

Minor adventure in locating our leased car center as it was far away from the airport. After some challenges with the language barrier we were picked up and taken to our car. After some quick Puegoet instructions we hit the autobahn. (No speed limits! Germans drive really fast!) First stop was filling up with gas…$7.20 per gallon!

With the help of our trusty GPS (don’t leave home without it) 70 kilometers later we arrived in beautiful Ladenburg (close to Heidelberg). It is one of the first German cities originally built by the Romans as a fort in 100 ad. That’s old!

We checked in to our beautiful Airbnb which is right in the center of the old town. We walked around and found a market, bought some bier, bread, sausages and a few other groceries at the Aldi and made our way home. Enjoyed our light dinner in the little courtyard of our Airbnb.

We slept 12 hours last night and feel pretty refreshed. We walked around this beautiful old town enjoying all the sights.

Enclosed are pictures of us leaving our home in Eagle, Cindy and the leased car and picturesque Ladenburg. We are here 5 more nights. We will visit Heidelberg tomorrow, take several driving trips through the area and go to Strasbourg on Monday.

We’ll update the blog in a few days before we head to our next destination, Munich.

Auf Wiedersehen

We visited Mexico February 8 through March 23, ate way to many tacos , and enjoyed a great time in the lovely weather !

Welcome to the Trafton’s Europe & Mexico Adventures throughout 2019-2020!

Join us as we travel all over the world. Our first trip will be starting on February 8, 2019 in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico!

The picture below is from our recent trip to New York City where we sampled 20 different kinds of pizza!

Talk soon.

Mike & Cindy