So, last Saturday, taking advantage of a national holiday, me and my maternal family went on a trip to Frankfurt, Germany. The motive was to finally meet the family of my cousin’s wife (from this point on, let me use her name to make things easier, she’s called Claudia), while we did meet them on their wedding two years ago it was about time we paid them a visit as well. Plus, being early December, it was a nice occasion to visit the different Christmas Markets (Weihnachtsmarkt in German) happening in all the country.

What to expect in the Christmas Markets? Well, some shops where you can buy different kinds of decorations, most of the times handmade, but above all, food and drink places. It’s traditional to drink hot wine in here, and so many places offer it, with a ton of different flavors and even alcohol-free variants. About the food, most of you will know what I mean.

Starting with the report, the flight was scheduled on early morning, so we could enjoy the full day at our destination, and since we rented a car, we didn’t need to go straight to the hotel. We spent the first day on Frankfurt, which happens to be the location of the European Central Bank, responsible of the monetary policy of the Eurozone.

Frankfurt also hosts a very big Christmas Market, the biggest we visited. Maybe Nuremberg could have surpassed it, but it was beyond our reach (4 hours of travel by car).

Some interesting things I found there was this particular shop, which had an impressive design, and also this enormous carousel, being composed of two floors!

In the afternoon, we finally went to the hotel, located in Bad Hersfeld, roughly 90 minutes from Frankfurt. It was already dark night, and due to the daily schedule Germany has, there was barely anything to do. We waited for dinner, as Claudia’s family came to visit us, and we had dinner together. Four members of her family came over: her parents, her twin sister and her boyfriend.

The following day was spent entirely with her family. We met at early morning at their house, located in a village named Wehrshausen, some 20 minutes from Bad Hersfeld, and nearly immediately after headed to the restaurant to have lunch (at 11:30 AM, and we were the last to arrive!). Even though it was enclosed, it resembled a medieval village, with trees in between, houses and even a water mill.

After that, we picked up Claudia’s grandmother and took her with us, back to my Claudia’s parents’ house. We had an afternoon snack with them, and saw in shock that we had a very special visit. None other than Saint Nicholas himself!

It was a really unexpected surprise, considering how little Christmas spirit we have in Spain, but in Germany they adore Christmas and Saint Nicholas. He brought presents for all the family, including a Christmas hat.

We took advantage of being still relatively early (7 PM, even though it was dark night since the sunset at 3:45 PM) and visited the exiguous Christmas Market in Bad Hersfeld. Only 5 shops in direct contrast with the 15 food and drink places.

We enter day 3, which we spent in Kassel, nearly an hour away from Bad Hersfeld. We visited the Bergpark Wilhelmshöhe, a landscape park covered with many statues, the biggest one dedicated to Hercules.

Being located in a mountain, it has a great height difference between the lowest and highest point, as you can see here.

You can also see how big Kassel is, even though it is relatively unknown internationally. It also serves as an important road junction, hence why there were literally millions of trucks going to and from Kassel at all times.

Kassel also had a Christmas Market, which was inspired in creatures created by the Grimm brothers, who were born in Kassel. You could see many references to their creations throughout the market, like this adorable creature.

As mentioned before, in Germany exists an intense Christmas spirit, which Kassel openly demonstrated.

What impressed me the most about Kassel was the appearance of the shops and places, which were all shaped like houses, and even some had spectacular designs like this rotating pyramid (don’t ask why, but this kind of pyramid is very popular in Germany).

Day 4 was the last one. We spent it in Fulda, very close to Bad Hersfeld, and the village where Claudia was originally born before her family moved to Werhshausen. It isn’t very big, but still its market was fairly decent. One of the places had an even bigger rotating pyramid, and there were also some beautiful shops.

After the visit, we traveled back to Frankfurt, so we could take our flight home. It was originally scheduled for 8:20 PM, but due to the mist the plane arrived late. To make things worse, it got damaged, and thus maintenance works had to be made on it. We managed to take flight two hours later than scheduled, and safely landed at 12 AM.

It was an amazing trip. I didn’t knew Germany had such a potent Christmas spirit, and the markets were very beautiful. Germany will never cease to amuse me, whether I go to Frankfurt, Köln or Berlin. I still have many things to see there, I wonder when will we have our next trip. I can’t wait for it!

Vanelan : You wanted a thread about it, so here you go!

TornadoMudkip : As you can see, I did enjoy the food. My tongue probably didn't, as everything was burning hot, but my stomach surely did

Eniitan : I promised some pictures, so here you are. Too bad I couldn't upload the ones from my GoPro for being too big, even after shrinking them. I'll find a way out of this as well next time.