We spent enough time at the Mad King’s palace, so we are off to our next Google find: Rothenburg ob der Tauber. Not sure what it will be like, but there is an old walled city in the center of town that sounds like it would be fun to see. According to Google Maps it is about a 3-1/2 hour drive, but that is about a 5 hour drive in Rosie. Rosie has a top speed of 90 kph which is strictly enforced by a built-in speed limiter which was installed at the Mercedes factory. All trucks in Europe are required to have speed limiters. Most are set at 100 or 110 kph. Rosie’s limit is 90 kph due to her off-road tires (Michelin XZL+ 14.00 R20) which are big and knobby, great for mud and dirt, not so great for highway driving. Major highways in Germany have speed limits of 130 kph and Rosie can only do about 70% of that, so the Google travel times need to be increased by about 40% to get our Rosie travel time!
We prefer to drive about 1-3 hours per day whenever possible. We will go longer if we have to, but a 3 hour drive in Rosie is not too strenuous and makes for a less rushed feeling day. Given that we have 5 hours to our next destination, we decide to stop for the night at the Allianz Arena, which turns out to be the home stadium of the Bayern Munich Football Club, the most popular football (soccer for our USA readers – all 1 of you). We tried to get a tour of the stadium, but they were all booked up even though it is a Sunday evening!
The next day we arrive at Rothenburg ob der Tauber where we have located another motorhome parking lot.
This is a great location as it is only a 5 minute walk to the old walled city and 10 minutes to a grocery store.
Rothenburg od der Tauber has a well preserved medieval old town and is one of only 3 remaining completely intact walled towns left in Germany. After WWII just over 30% of the walls had to be rebuilt due to destruction from bombing.
The city has 46 towers and 5 main gates. Residents who live in the old town are allowed to drive and park their vehicles inside. Each resident vehicle has a special sticker in the window identifying which zone in the town they can park in.
Most of the walls surrounding the old town have elevated walkways that are accessible to the public and provide great views of the old town and also the surrounding areas.
We found many new looking stones embedded in the walls along the walkways. Each stone had the name of a person, family or in some cases a company. Also marked on these stones was a date and location, many of which were from around the world (Japan, China, South America, etc.). Later research informed us that for a minimum donation of 1,300 euros you could get your own stone on the walkway walls.
Rothenburg ob der Tauber was great find! We could have spent more time here. We may have to come back as we didn’t find time to sample the local delicacy the Schneeball (Snowball). Strips of dough wound together into a ball shape and then covered with a wide variety of tasty toppings!