We started our day in Stuttgart. Yesterday was our first stay in a Motel One. This is a hotel chain in Germany and we have been very pleased so far. The rooms are nice and clean. The hotels are modern and well maintained. And we enjoyed our breakfast this morning, plenty of selection to fill us up and get us ready for the day. After checking out of the hotel we walked across the street to the parking garage to get in our car and go, or so we’d thought.

Unfortunately, we had to pay for the parking and the machine didn’t tell bills over $20 or credit cards. This meant I was running back across the street to ask the hotel to break our $50. Jacob stayed behind at the car – but I could have really used him… the automatic doors here have a hard time sensing me. It took me three times walking up to the hotel doors before they opened! Once we had our change, we were out of the garage and back on the road.

Our first stop on our tour-de-Germany today was Rothenburg ob der Tauber. This place is well known for its well-preserved medieval old town and the old town wall you can walk on. When we arrived, a man wearing a Canada hat approached me and started speaking to me in German. He seemed very friendly so I said, “English?” Then he said, “Parking ticket?” He then offered us his paid parking ticket that still had two hours left on it. I was surprised and thanked him for the ticket. This meant free parking for us, thank you kindly!

Rothenburg ob der Tauber was amazing! I could have stayed there all day. It feels like an authentic medieval town and the wall was fun to walk on even if it was challenging with the the uneven floor. Photos below…

From Rothenburg we were on our way to Wurzburg. It was about a 45 minute drive. When we got to Wurzburg we were looking for easy parking. Thankfully, here when you drive into cities they often have signs that list the various parking garages and how many spaces they have free and where they are. We followed a line of cars to a garage that said it had 200 open spots. Well, we found out why that garage had so many spots open – you couldn’t get to it! The roads were closed off. So, we followed the line of cars and we all took turns doing u-turns on the tiny cobblestone roads. From there Jacob was able to find parking right in front of the Residence.

We walked from the Residence across the Alte Mainbrucke (a bridge built 1473-1543). This bridge was damaged during World War II but restored. Along the bridge are 12 statues of saints and historically significant people. When we were on the bridge Jacob asked if I wanted to walk up to the Marienberg Fortress. I said of course! And he said, he just wasn’t sure my little legs were up to it. Below is the fortress from the bridge.

Since we are champs, we took the shortest and steepest way possible and it wasn’t that bad. When we got to the top we found out the fortress is closed on Mondays, but that was ok by us – that meant it wasn’t crowded and we could walk around the grounds. Here are some photos from around the fortress and the view from it.

View from the fortress below. You can see the Alte Mainbrucke we walked over.

On our way down, a woman asked us if she was going the right way to the fortress. We said yes, but that it was closed. She was shocked to learn this then asked us if she can still take pictures of the views, and we said yes – she can take lots of great photos. After that, she turned to two other people with her and said, well I have some bad news…

We walked through the town on our way back to our car and the Residence and picked up some snacks. Jacob got three pretzels and I got some bread with melted mozzarella cheese and tomatoes, so good! We ate our snacks and sat on a bench at the Residence (ok Jacob ate his snacks, I couldn’t wait and ate mine on the way). Photos of the Residence below.

From Wurzburg we had a three hour drive to Leipzig. Jacob got to practice driving 100 mph some more, we passed through several impressive tunnels, including the longest tunnel in Germany (8 kilometers) and we drove over the tallest bridge in Germany (185 meters high).

Not a bad day for our second wedding anniversary. For dinner, Jacob wanted to try “Italian style,” pizza, so we ordered that, a salad and panna cotta with chocolate as a special treat.

We are now checked into our second Motel One in Leipzig and ready for bed. Tomorrow we will see the sights of Leipzig then be on our way to Dresden. We will be in Dresden for five nights. Until then…