Bud and Pat...

PatBee and Bud

~ Ferienwohnung (Apartment) Accommodations from 2006 ~

Ferienwohnung im Grünen
Werner + Gabriele Kinder
Hettersbachstraße 51
66640
Namborn
Tel - 6854/1208 ~ Fax - 6854/7090227
Email -
wg.kinder@web.de

This lovely FeWo in the Saarland area cost us €34 a night. It came with Satellite TV, DVD player, CD player, AM/FM radio, and a kitchen filled with every cooking implement known to man. We had a private terrace and very friendly hosts, who lent us a stack of DVDs that came with either English or German dialogue. (We took a portable DVD player and some movies with us, but learned that American DVDs don’t work on German players.)


Gasthaus Zum Schwanen
Familie Huber
Schwarzwaldstraße 30
77740
Bad Peterstal-Griesbach
Tel & Fax - 7806/227

Our second destination was this resort town in the Schwarzwald. Our FeWo was in a Gasthaus/Fremdenzimmer/Ferienwohnung on the main street, and came with a little balcony that overlooked a rushing stream and green hillsides at the back of the building. We had two bedrooms, two bathrooms with toilet/sink/shower, and another room with a big bathtub and shower adjacent to the kitchen. It was €34 a night, with a €1.50 per person Kurtaxe added for each night. Guests in the Black Forest are given transportation passes to ride buses or trains free within the Schwarzwald area, so we took a scenic ride to Freudenstadt to spend one of our days there. Bud said he loved Bad Peterstal because we (at 82 and 76) seemed to be about the youngest people in town. It was a slight exaggeration, but you get the point.

Bud on the balcony, ready to smoke his pipe.

The hallway of FeWo zum Schwanen. Two bedrooms (with baths) are on the left-hand side of the hall, the balcony and kitchen (with adjacent bathtub and third shower) are to the right, and our breakfast table is in the hall. Not elegant, but comfortable and very convenient.

Inge und Karl Rost
Finsterlohr 47
97993
Creglingen/Finsterlohr
Tel & Fax - 7933/7780

Our next stop was this tiny village a few miles north of Rothenburg. We paid €23 a night for a charming two-bedroom apartment with a sunny utility room where we were able to hang some laundered items on their foldable clothesline. Our hosts were both retired bakers, and treated us to fresh-from-the-oven plum cake, as well as some home-made “Schneeböllen,” the fried-pastry balls so popular in Rothenburg. We had a lovely large terrace overlooking fields, hills, and forests, and hope to go back for another visit in two years, with a grandson in tow. Bakery and village store are a block away.

Our hosts, the retired bakers, who plied us with homemade goodies. We were their first-ever American guests, and they were eager to help us enjoy our stay (which we did!)

Dining area and living room were charming, comfortable, and convenient.

Haus Gitta
Gitta und Peter Klaje
Weberstraße 47
97762
Hammelburg
Tel - 9732/2164 ~ Fax - 9732/780824
Email -
PKlaje@t-online.de

Another great stop was not too far north from Finsterlohr, and just a short drive to Bad Kissingen. This very nice Ferienwohnung was also a low €23 a night, in a very nice house at the edge of town, with meadows and forests stretching behind. Our landlord was a retired Bundeswehr Lieutenant Colonel, who very kindly invited us to accompany him to a guided tour of the German Army’s Infantry Museum at the Hammelburg Kaserne. The tour had been arranged specifically for the benefit of a class of young German officers who had come from various parts of Germany to be trained as security officers for German air bases, and it was a fascinating, and quite informative, two hours.

The apartment was very nicely furnished, with Oriental rugs and carpets galore, and our private terrace was surrounded with an abundance of beautiful roses.

The view from our kitchen window--a wonderful addition to our breakfast every morning.

Ferienwohnung Albert
Familie Albert
An der Karlskuppe 61
99817
Eisenach
Tel - 3691/734475

Off to the formerly East zone city of Eisenach, where we had a marble-floored, radiant-heated, living-room-wall-of-windows FeWo for €30 a night. Our landlady informed us, sadly, that her husband had died four months earlier, and she was living in her big house alone. Our FeWo was on the ground floor, so we didn’t have to climb any steps. She also greeted us with a big plate of freshly baked plum cake, then took off on an overnight trip to visit her sister in another town. These people are so trusting! The house was in a suburb that has grown up since the end of the Cold War. It is right off the Autobahn exit, and is about a five-minute walk to a gas station, McDonald’s, an Aldi store, a German version of our dollar stores, a shoe store, and a furniture store! It was at the edge of the city, with fields (and prancing horses) behind the house. A great place to stay, like all the others. Oh, yes—it had a dishwasher!


"Bei Beichert's"
Familie Rüdiger Beichert
Oberstraße 13
35789
Weilmünster-Laubuseschbach
Tel - 6475/8207 ~ Fax - 6475/912577
Mobil - 0171/6815587
Email -
M.Nickel-Beichert@t-online.de or Beichert@t-online.de

Next, we headed west toward (but not to) the Rhine area. Our FeWo here was another winner, and priced at just €30 a night. It had cupboards full of platinum-banded crystal, an Espresso machine, electric egg cooker, and a ton of other kitchen gadgets. Not only had our hostess stocked the fridge with bottles of mineral water, Coke, and Limonade, but she also brought us a plate with four delectable slices of cake to enjoy on our first night there. Another winner in our book.

Sunny living room with cable TV, CD player, DVD player, AM/FM radio, and a basket full of brochures about local places of interest.

Schloss am Maiberg
Dagmar Ohly
Im Hafergarten 48
61239
Ober-Mörlen
Tel - 6002/1400 ~ Fax - 6002/1403
Email -
dagmar.ohly@t-online.de

Our last FeWo was the funniest. I really had to search to find this one, and they don’t really have a web-site, but I sent an email to Dagmar (the owner) and she emailed me a picture. It is called “Schloss am Maiberg,” the “Castle on May Hill,” and looked pretty grand in the photos. It sat up on the side of a steep hill, cost €32.50 a day, and was the least attractive of all the wonderful places we stayed in. However, it was comfortable enough and we enjoyed our nights there. Dagmar seems to bear the entire responsibility for operating this place, although her husband appeared at our car as we were unloading our luggage and asked if we could pay him then and there. I did give him the envelope with the "rent money" we had set aside, and he thanked me, but I must say this is the first time ever that we have been asked to pay before we even moved inside. Dagmar picked up two of our suitcases and hauled them down the steps to our FeWo, and the next day she was out there nailing together a kind of jerry-built railing to accommodate us two elderly folk. She was a hard worker, and her husband might be, too--but she was the one who was hustling luggage and building stair rails and doing just about everything else.

Our living room in the "Castle on May Hill." No heat in the radiators, but plenty of warm fleece blankets were available.

Dagmar's hand-built railing, constructed to keep us from falling down the steps.

~ Departure Hotel near Frankfurt Airport ~

Airport Hotel Kelsterbach
Waldstraße 126
65451
Kelsterbach

34 rooms with toilet/shower, minibar, cable-TV, desk, phone, some with balcony, wireless internet access. Shuttle service from/to the airport for a fee. Parking (fee required), Restaurant, Bar, 24-hour Front Desk, Newspapers, Breakfast Buffet, Room Service, Laundry, Dry Cleaning, Ironing Service, Internet Services, Currency Exchange, Car Rental

We drove to Kelsterbach the day before our return home, checked into the hotel, which was €65 a night, and turned our car in to AVIS. The AVIS people drove us back to our hotel, which was nearby. It was very nice, and definitely NOT expensive, considering the convenience of being near the airport.

We had our final German beers and the last Schnitzel dinner at this restaurant, just a few steps across the street from the hotel.

The hotel offered a buffet breakfast, which we didn't want (too early in the day) and it had a nice little bar. Our room had a mini-bar, TV, shower, and featherbeds in crisp white duvets. They took us to the airport the next morning for €10—a bargain for two people, and a heck of a lot cheaper than the taxi fare at the beginning of our trip. In fact, the young hotel manager, who drove the shuttle, jumped out at the departures area, ran and got a luggage cart, loaded all our bags on it, and gave us a nice farewell handshake. We would recommend this hotel for anyone who is on a budget.


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