Slowly down the Romantic Road, Germany

Feeding the geese (?) in Wertheim

Day 27 finished the first tub of Quality Street.

Day 28, finished the 10 litre wine box, bought on our first full day as we left France. What we have discovered though is they sell wine in Germany and it’s not taxed, or requiring of a license to sell it in the same way as in the U.K. at all. We can buy an Australian, Spanish or Californian red that we recognise in Aldi for €2.50 a bottle, or a German that we don’t, but is quite palatable for €1.99. You can also buy a glass of wine, to go with your fish and chips, sold from the opposite end to the wet fish of the fish van in the market! 

The band playing in Wertheim

What more could you ask for? Coffee and cake is an afternoon staple and eis bars, or ice cream parlours will sell a cone of ‘proper’ ice cream for €1 as well as selling you a beer. It appears to be illegal not to have at least one sausage in a bun a week, and every village, however small has a kebab shop!

To counter this processed meat fest I did make a great veggie curry today. Swede from the U.K., butternut squash and chick pea, as all my veggie curries have chick peas in. Some manky cherry tomatoes, a stick of celery and obviously onion, garlic, ginger and chilli. 

In one of the three motorhome parking spots in Tauberbischofsheim

I love the fact that in Ted I have a more complete collection of herbs and spices than I’ve ever had, and I’m not afraid to use them. So mustard, cumin, fennel and coriander seeds were all heated to popping along with cardamom pods before adding the veggies, a stock cube, a squeeze of tomato purée, a splash of coconut milk and some garam masala and turmeric (well it is supposed to cure everything!) Oh, and a carrot. All this just to try not to waste any of the swede that has so far been in a beef stew and with boiled gammon....

Tauberbischofsheim is a nice town, but nothing special

Day 33 first tube of toothpaste bites the dust.

After our unexpectedly two free days parking at Wertheim we dumped our grey water but didn’t do the toilet or fill the fresh water, well it was free at the next place.....

We arrived at Tauberbischofsheim, having filled up with gas, found the carpark with the three mobilehome spots, all available, but no services. (Stellplatz location: 49°37'15.7"N 9°39'59.5"E) The tourist information lady translated the sign and explained we had to just go up the road. Tauberbischofsheim was cute enough, but it only took us a cold, damp morning to look round. Stay or go? Having logged into Lidl’s WiFi we stayed.

Our quiet parking outside the gates of Weikersheim castle/palace

Up the next morning and off to what I thought was going to be the tip, but was actually the sewage farm.... Arrived at a gate with a buzzer, pressed the buzzer and for the first time, of asking "do you speak English?" I got the answer "nein!" Large gulp, big intake of breath and said (I think) 'I have a mobile home and need water and toilet' the gate opened, the toilet was to be dumped straight into the round sewage thing, grey water (washing up, teeth cleaning etc) down the drain.. wasser? I enquired "nein!" But then his mate, with a little English appeared, took us into some locked room and took a hosepipe off a tap so we could connect our own after asking what we would use it for. 

The market place in Weikersheim. The arched gate leads through to the castle

He was obviously very aware of the water quality coming out of all his taps.... We then had a random conversation about Johnson and Trump being brothers, and the secret two night trip he's booked to London last April for his wife's 40th in February..... It's stupid things like that, meeting lovely people that make our trips....

Weikersheim, with a free park up by the castle, was our destination. (Parking location: 49°28'41.0"N 9°53'40.4"E)It was actually a “renaissance style palace, with gardens a la Versailles”. The only way to see the house, with some amazingly preserved rooms, was on a tour, in German! We were given a booklet in English each and were the only people on our tour so we got enough out of it.

Weikersheim castle/palace is well worth the €6.50 entrance, but no photos inside as they weren't allowed. I couldn't sneak any crafty ones either as we were the only ones on the guided tour. There are a few photos on their website however: https://www.schloss-weikersheim.de/en/home/

Brian took a walk while Jackie had a doze. Here's Weikersheim from the hills

With only one night stops this tour isn’t going to take nearly as long as the last one. Rothenburg ob der Tauber has taken two nights however, it’s a lovely, medieval, walled town, with walls you can walk on nearly all the way around. (Stellplatz location: 49°22'12.4"N 10°11'00.1"E)We had a good look round yesterday, trying to avoid all the Japanese and American tourists. We saw the cart from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang that the child catcher used, in the centre of town to capture the children, though we didn’t recognise the square. We also had a schnieballen, or snowball, a Rothenburg specialty. Basically deep fried pastry then dipped in sugar, chocolate or all sorts. They were fine, but not as exciting as we’d been led to believe, but possibly just as well. What’s the point in being really taken with something you can only get in one small town....?

Rothenburg is an incredibly photogenic old walled town and I took loads of photos. It's possible to walk almost right round the town on the battlements and, although we had two days there we were still getting lost in its little cobbled streets and finding new things to see. It is a fabulous place and so worth spending time here. No wonder it was used to film some of the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang film  

Today dawned, as forecast cold, but with blue skies, so we set off for a walk. Only a couple of hours but we only had until lunchtime cloud free. Managed to get round, into town, have a gluwein, lunch and a beer sitting outside before the predicted rain started and we hurried back to Ted.

I have to restrict myself on how many photos to put on here, there are so many fantastic views in this town

One of the gates into the town

Climbing up onto the battlements that encircle the town in a 2.5km long wall

Still walking round the battlements

This is in the market square and the clock in the white building is chiming the hour. The two lit windows either side of the clock open and two figures inside move about pouring and drinking. Its a local attraction and tour groups are brought here on the hour to take photos. It was more interesting watching people taking photos and then departing as quickly as they came following their guide with flag held aloft 

We ate in the restaurant on the right in the above photo and they have a replica of the clock inside, theirs goes off seven minutes after the one outside to give people a chance of seeing the real thing and then coming inside to see theirs. Here's the one o clock chime at seven minutes past showing the two windows open

Another photo of outside the town walls taken from the battlements. I could go on, I have so many photos, but I'm not going to. This is a great place to visit

Rothenheim from a distance as seen on our walk today

This is a short video of our walk today with photos. I've put it at the end as, on Jackies Ipad it separates all the photos and lays them out underneath, but on my Android phone and Windows laptop it displays as it should, as a video of the route stopping to show a photo at various places. Don't know which version you'll get: