Walking the walls of Rothenburg ob der Tauber

We woke up pretty early on our second day in Rothenburg, not surprising since we had an early night the night before since there is very little to do in the town after about 8.30 p.m.

After a delicious breakfast in our hotel, we headed out to explore Rothenburg in the daytime. Once again we seemed to have the entire town to ourselves, with the day trippers having not yet arrived.

Our first stop of the day was the Rothenburg town walls. We planned to walk the entire way around Rothenburg to get a good overview of the little town. The town is surrounded by a fortress with a covered walkway, which means you can still walk the walls even when it is pouring with rain.

Lucky for us it was turning out to be a lovely sunny day, so we were hoping to get some good views of the town and the countryside.

Rothenburg's medieval town walls were damaged during World War II, and the mayor of the town asked for donations from the visiting tourists and citizens of the town for donations in order to rebuild the wall to its former glory.

The entire length of the town walls is covered in plaques, of people and companies who made the much needed donations in order to fix the walls.

The entire walk is about 3km, and takes about an hour depending on how slowly you walk, and how often you stop to take photos. We were the only ones walking the walls that early in the morning, so we took our time and stopped often to admire the views over the town, and to get glimpses of the tiny alleyways hidden from street level.

Looking towards St Jakob's church

Some parts of the walls were very tight to fit through, I can't imagine how someone of a much larger size than Bradley and I would get through some of the gaps. The roof also was very low in some places, so it doesn't pay to be too big or too tall if you want to walk the Rothenburg city walls!

Taking a break in the sunshine

All up the walk took us about an hour and a half, with lots of stops for photos. During that time we only passed one other group. Not sure how busy the walls get, but it would be pretty hard to get around anyone if you were stuck behind a tour group!

We came down from the walls on the opposite side of the town in a cute little courtyard with an old bridge and little garden. We wandered round the outside until we found a way back inside the walls.

We spent the rest of the afternoon just wandering around the streets and alleyways, exploring the parts of Rothenburg that you wouldn't get to see on a day trip. There were hardly any tourists at all, they seemed to concentrate mainly on the Town Square and the Christmas shops, without exploring too much further.

Rothenburg has a total of 42 gates and towers throughout the town and it really did feel like stepping back in time when wandering through the back streets and old buildings built into the city walls.

The Siebers Tower, one of the original entrances to Rothenburg

One of the most popular attractions in Rothenburg is their Medieval Crime Museum, filled with instruments of crime and punishment from the middle ages. Unfortunately it was closed when we were there so we didn't get to go inside, however they did have a big water dunking cage outside, so I imagine the inside would have been pretty interesting!

Bradley making friends with a cat

Having fully explored Rothenburg we decided to go for a walk in the surrounding countryside and the even smaller town of Detwang just down the road.

It was an easy walk down the river to Detwang, however there wasn't much to see when we arrived. The walk was worth it to see Rothenburg from outside, where we could fully appreciate the amazing town walls and how hard it must have been to penetrate by invaders.

By the time we got back it was dinner time, so we stopped and had an amazing Japanese dinner. Each time we have visited Germany we have had great Japanese food, I think German's just do everything well!