Rothenburg - Germany's Romantic Road

Germany’s Romantic Road is a small collection of towns unconnected by trains or large highways and was for years forgotten. Even WWII bypassed these towns. One of the small towns is called Rothenburg. This weekend they were celebrating the day when the mayor drank a huge tankard of beer in one slug which saved the town from being plundered. This is the 800th year that this festival has been going on, so Washington Irrigation Festival, eat your heart out.

The whole community gathers each year to re-enact the lifestyle and of medieval times. Men were being dragged down the streets for having extra marital sex. We saw children and adults in stocks, loose camp woman resting lewdly outside of tents. Braces of young men guarding the streets with swords and pikes. Drummers, trumpets, and fifes, roused our spirits. There must have been a terrible fight with another town over access to tourist plunder, as some of the men had bandages and bloody head wounds.

Announcements were made by the constable and other petty officials, roasting chunks of meat were being cooked by primitive spits or hung from tripods of steel, muskets were leaning against walls with real dead pigeons hanging from the barrel, and all manner of tradesmen turned a tidy profit making tools, coins, and leather crafts. Soldiers on horses kept order in the street although the disorderly had either passed out or were tied to trees. Most of the men had tankards fitted to their belts and were constantly refreshed by some unknown brew. At one point Gayle was taking a picture of several men resting in an alcove separated from the main passageway by a metal grating. One of the men spied my buxomly bride and raced towards her, howling with frustration because of the bars separating them. Gayle screamed and left the passage howling with fright and laughter.

And yet, as bawdy as the town, as rough and ready, nothing so strikes fear in ones heart as returning to Nuremberg via the autoban. Werner blasted down the slow lane at 130-140 kilometer per hour while cars literally screamed past us topping 200 km. At one point we need to pass a truck going a mere 110 km and Werner slid into the fast lane, pegged the accelerator. I felt we should cut the AC and lean forward like a ski jumper, urging our car ahead before we were flattened from behind by a mere Peugeot. Tomorrow Werner and Sieglinda are going to look for a new car, this one is just too slow!