Christmas Markets Part I: Frankfurt and Heidelberg

Last Monday, I met Aaron in the Frankfurt airport. He had just a little shorter travel time than I did to get there... roughly 15 hours to be exact. But we ended up in the same place and thus our Christmas market extravaganza began!

When we landed on Monday morning, we took the train into the city. Aaron's coworker and his wife had kindly offered up their second bedroom for us to stay in, so we dropped off our bags at the Russell Frankfurt office and then set off to explore!

Frankfurt is a very business-driven city: there weren't many "sites" that we were interested in seeing so we wandered through the Christmas market and up and down the river, but after walking around for a few hours in the freezing cold, my jet lag began to set in... so where do you go when you are tired and want to warm up? There is one place you can always rely on to be cosy even in different cities throughout the world: Seattle-based Starbucks : ) We sipped on lattes and lounged in two comfy chairs while coming up with a plan for what to do next.

Recently, there's been a popularity boom of "real life escape games" in London. I'm not sure if these are in the US yet, but basically the concept is you are locked in an "area/room" with 2-6 people and have to try to escape using clues that are hidden around it (ex. finding hidden notes or clues with numbers that would then unlock a safe which leads to your next clue). Aaron and I found a place in Frankfurt that did this and luckily they had an opening that late afternoon.

It was just Aaron and I searching through the two rooms, racing against the clock as we only had an hour to get out. I don't want to give too much away, but believe me when I say it was awesome. The whole concept is right up our alley. And yes, we did make it out of the room with 6 minutes to spare : )

That night, we had dinner with Aaron's coworker and his wife at one of their favorite restaurants that serves Frankfurt specialties: schnitzel, Handkäs mit Musik (appetizer consisting of bread with a Germany cheese and onions), and Apfelwein (apple wine that is unique to Frankfurt).

The next morning we caught the train to Heidelberg (only one hour away). I had been to the city about 7 years ago when I studied abroad and loved it. It's a fairly small, college town with narrow walking streets and a beautiful castle that is up on the hillside overlooking the downtown area.

The first thing we did when we arrived was tour Heidelberg Schloss which is the castle. It was built in the late 1200s, but the first mention of a castle on the site was in the early 1200s. The castle has been struck by lightning... twice, subject to wars and damaged by fires, but for the most part it is still in pretty good shape.

Inside the castle is the largest wine vat (a huge barrel). It took 130 oak trees to build and has a capacity of 58,573 U.S. gallons. Basically, people in Heidelberg used to drink a lot of wine. It's not in use anymore but we were able to see it and then have a wine tasting in the cellar : )

There were two Christmas markets in the city: one near the castle and one in the downtown area. We went through both and then "sampled" the mulled wine like Heidelberg college kids : ) Then the next morning headed out to make our way to the next even smaller German town...