A Whole City of Christmas!

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Rothenburg ob der Tauber is totally over the top about Christmas - but that makes it a great place to visit at Christmas time. I kind of imagine the locals must be something like the Who's in Whoville (from How The Grinch That Stole Christmas) who must plan for Christmas all year. When we visited Neuschwanstein and the Romantic Road in September, on a whim we drove home via Rothenburg ob der Tauber. It was so beautiful (a medieval walled city, almost 1000 years old) but being 5pm on a Sunday afternoon, nothing was open. We decided we would come back in December, assuming that like all good Bavarian towns there would be a cool christkindlmarkt (Christmas market). Turns out that was a bit of an understatement!

We had booked into a hotel that was actually built into the wall of the city, but with some confusion it turned out we were actually staying in the top story of the home of the hotelier’s parents. It was one of those really lucky mistakes because they were such a lovely elderly couple, and the home was beautiful. The man, Otto, even insisted on driving me into town to get pizza for dinner when I asked him if he knew of a good pizza place!

It was a short walk from the old town centre, but unlike other Christmas markets we've been to in Nuremberg, Dresden and Prague, the red roofed Christmas stalls were sprawling through every cobble stoned street. And I think every shop had put away their regular stock and wheeled out the Christmas decorations. There were ribbons and wreaths everywhere and every shop had at least one Christmas tree out the front! There was even a Christmas museum - did you know Christmas originated when a virgin called Mary gave birth to God's son? Just joking... it was more about traditions of Christmas trees and decorations... Shopping did get a little tedious by the end, but I don't want to be a scrooge. The other highlight was climbing to the top of the Rathaus (Town Hall) Tower and seeing the view of the roofs, wall and frost covered hills.

On the way home we decided to stop at Nuremberg to get a particular German toy we wanted to give Dahlia for Chrissy. After some random trips to shopping centres we found on our GPS we finally found it right in the extremely packed city centre. Dahlia was over the trip and about to spack-attack on us when we ran into Santa in the middle of the shopping centre. Oh what luck! And Dahlia absolutely loved him! Another Christmas miracle! 😊 Really surprising since all our first Santa photos feature traumatised and hysterical babies. We managed to whip out the digital camera just in time before he lost his beard to a curious little girl. Watch out Grandad - your beard might not survive Dahlia and Steph's visit home in January!

Back in Prague we wound up the Christmas kick-off weekend on Sunday with a trip to the garden centre to get our Christmas tree. It’s been made very clear to me that we will NOT be getting a real tree for Christmas once we move back to Australia so I'm making the most it. We picked the most perfect looking of dozens of perfect looking trees and spent the evening decorating. We've tried to buy a cool ornament from different places we've travelled but this year have had to add a few of unbreakable and chewable decorations for the bottom branches!

Happy Christmas everyone!

Anth

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Photos

An Ornament Shop in Rothenburg ob der Tauber
The Christmas capital of the world!

Is this the one?
Christmas tree shopping :)

Rothenburg Street
Every door and window decorated

Cuckoo!
As well as Christmas this town is big on cuckoo clocks. There was a wall like this in most shops.

Rothenburg ob der Tauber
View from the top of the Rathaus tower

Our 'Villa'
Just outside the city walls

Beautiful Frost Covered Valley
From the breakfast room

First Trolley Ride!
We weren't sure how we would manage to prop her up, and then we stumbled upon one of those big bins of balls!

She Loved Santa!
Who knew she would find Santa so interesting?

Happy to be home..
...and ready to decorate!

Pretty :)
Steph trying on the Christmas tree mat

Chewing on a decoration
Surrounded by ornaments and wrapping. Christmas choas!

Attempt #84 (and the final one!)
Next year we'll get a perfect one with us all looking at the camera!

A Decoration Given by Anth's Mum...
That looks EXACTLY like her. Has anyone seen the Seinfeld ep where George's fiance has a doll that looks like his mum?

Prague Old Town Square
Amazing at Christmas

Comments

[Leanne]

Looks so beautiful!
hi guys, thanks for the photo's and story. Looks like Christmas wonderland. I love your Christmas tree and Steph looks stunning in the red velvet mat. Good that Dahlia likes Santa, she looks very happy and very gorgeous. Can't wait to see her again one day. Thanks too for the beautiful little wooden dove, it came on Friday. I will find sonewhere special to hang it. My big news is I might be buying a house. Need to pay 10% on Wednesday but the building report has comw back with some problems so not sure what to do. Potentially exciting but a wee bit stressful at the moment. The nominators have also but a name forward to be our new Rector. Don't know who it is but the nominators seem excited. Hope you have FANTASTIC Christmas celebrating Jesus coming into the world. Love you lots Leanne