German Gems

Cologne is not one of them. In my opinion, this was a very interesting experience. Granted, we only stayed in the city one night. When we first arrived, we checked into our standard hotel, NH Collection Koln which we actually enjoyed just fine. As with most European hotels, they require 2 rooms for 4 people, so the boys were one again ecstatic to have their own room with their own TV.

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We knew we were only here one day, so we decided to get straight to the Cologne Cathedral. The surrounding area is a bit rough. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why all of the buildings around this incredibly monstrous cathedral lacked all aesthetic appeal. Turns out, Cologne is the first major German city hit in WWII coming from the west.

This area was absolutely demolished. It’s evident buildings were built in mass to rebuild after the destruction.

I will say, this cathedral is worth taking a look at. It is by far the biggest and most impressive exterior I have seen. It looks like it could use a good power washer but impressive nonetheless.

Next we headed to Rothenburg. Holy cow, this was an AMAZING little town, and we absolutely loved it. Highly recommend making this quaint town a stop on your way. It actually ended up being our favorite stop in Germany.

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The town is a walled city that was spared several times throughout history. Rothenburg was located on the major trading routes in Germany during the Middle Ages. It became quite prominent and was a free imperial city. This meant only the King had direct authority over the city, no Dukes or other nobility could control the city. Only the King directly. And he typically had other things to do.

All notes here are from the night watchman tour we took and have not been fact checked! The first major sparing was during the Thirty-Years war. Troops passing the area got stuck in the area due to mud and poor weather. Rothenburg was a town of about 6,000 and the 40,000 troops decided this would be a good city for them to rest for the winter.

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Rothenburg put up a good fight, but when their armory blew up and blew a big hole in the wall, there wasn’t much of a fighting chance. Lesson learned to not put all of your gunpowder in one place. The troops completely ravaged the city but didn’t burn it down after they left, as was apparently tradition.

The town was then hit by the bubonic plague in 1634 like the rest of Europe, and the town went into a deep depression. Nothing changed. It literally froze in time. People forgot about it. It was poor and absolutely no infrastructure or technological updates were made for centuries.

It wasn’t until the 1877 that artists and poets rediscovered the city. Since it was inexpensive and beautiful, they started writing and drawing the city. This sparked the beginning of its tourism commerce. Artists literally brought the town back to life. Investments started happening in the city, but they kept the medieval integrity of the city.

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The 2nd sparing was WWII. Rothenburg was considered the most German icon of German towns, and they were Nazi sympathizers. In March of 1945, a German high ranking officer went into hiding in the town. Americans had ordered the town to be obliterated. However, Assistant Secretary of War John McCloy knew of the city and its beauty due to his mother’s travels.

He ordered that first we try to negotiate the town to surrender. The Nazi commander in-charge of the city at the time, also not wanting the town destroyed, quickly agreed to surrender the city without proper authorization from his higher ranking commander. The city was spared, and the war ended soon after.

It was a great visit, and we loved the night watchman tour!!