Hello, Erfurt

I long ago gave up looking for the elusive “untouristy Rothenburg.” I was once obsessed with the idea, but it hasn’t even occurred to me for a decade. Now, suddenly, it’s back…because today I found it: Erfurt.

Erfurt, a rare city in the center of Germany that escaped the bombs of World War II, was stuck in the strange cocoon of East German communism for half a century, and today still feels sleepy. But it’s gearing up for the spotlight in 2017, when German cities associated with Martin Luther — who studied and became a monk in Erfurt — will be in for a tourist boom, celebrating  the 500th anniversary of Luther kicking off the Protestant Reformation.

Today I spent the morning in my Munich hotel room. At 11:45, I pulled the lid down on my laptop and checked out. Just walking three blocks to the station was an exercise in the fun of travel: I walked past women in burkas enjoying a little shopping during their families’ medical vacation from some wealthy Middle Eastern nation. I marveled at how efficiently German sidewalks can be deconstructed to move overhead wiring underground. My Austrian SIM card finally ran out of credit (it goes fast when you cross a border), so I had to buy a German one for my cell phone. The rates are very competitive: €10 for my own German number, including €7.50 of credit for €0.09-a-minute phone calls. The girls in the table-dance bars were pretty forlorn, and the Internet points were filled with immigrants wearing headphones and hammering away on keyboards.

Walking through the Munich train station, I remembered including it in my city walks back when I was leading my minibus tours around Germany in the 1980s. The soundtrack, commotion, gear, and even the smells of a great train station all add up to the essence of travel.

At 12:14, I settled into my first-class seat on the luxurious German bullet train and filled in my Eurail log. (The new standards are strict — Eurailpasses must be kept in their jacket, and each journey must be diligently entered into the jacket’s travel log. I used to ignore this, but now conductors are checking and enforcing this rule.) At 12:16, I glided out of Munich, and in no time was rocketing through the German countryside.

By 16:30, after one change, I was in Erfurt. After Vienna, Salzburg, and Munich (all of which I know well), it was fun to be in a city that was new to me. I was in town for 24 hours to review and update the chapter my ace researcher and co-author Cameron Hewitt had written new for our Germany guidebook last year. We’re finally covering a few northern German destinations. I guess I’m soft: I could have followed the guidebook and caught a tram, but my guest house was on the far side of town, and I was excited to check in, stow the bag, and get sightseeing. So I walked directly to the taxi rank, hopped in, and was at my hotel in five minutes — €6.50 very well invested.

Now it was sinking in: I’m not in Bavaria anymore. There was that old Tupperware aura of East Germany. People seemed more hardscrabble, less exposed to the world. English was suddenly very foreign. And I didn’t hear an American voice all day.

I’m in a guesthouse run by the monastery Martin Luther called home. His home church spire towers above my head. And a tiny wooden cross decorates the blank wall above my headboard as I type. The inlaid tiles and creaky floor feel like pre-WWII Germany. There’s no Wi-Fi, and the woman at the reception doesn’t speak English. Pushing out my shutters, I lean out my window and survey the scene: a thick deciduous forest, chirping and hooting birds, a babbling brook, and a well-groomed lane with people strolling by who seem delighted with their simple lot in life. After Hard Rock Café Munich, Climb Every Mountain Salzburg, and Boys Choir Vienna, this is delightful.

I scrambled to get oriented, taking the new self-guided walking tour in the book. When I reached the starting point of the walk, I was famished, so I dropped by a characteristic bratwurst stand to buy a basic Thuringian brat. The man paused until I realized I was supposed to pick up and spread open my roll so he could place the sausage there to go. I beaded it with hearty mustard and then snuck in a little ketchup, and sat down to read what Cameron wrote. He kicked off the walk by recommending that same bratwurst stand, reminded me that the tradition is for the customer to hold open the bun, and even scolded me for sneaking the ketchup. It was perfect.

I completed the walk and loved it. Erfurt has history swinging from its eves. An opera troupe was rehearsing on the cathedral square, dark churches rang with the sound of pipe organists practicing, and the cobbles still lead into the river where the muddy river (Er-) was forded (-furt).

Walking home later than I expected, I turned the corner. Before me, just past the babbling brook and under the simple spire that for 500 years has towered above the monastery of Martin Luther, stood my creaky and well-worn guest house. It felt, on so many levels, like a pleasant homecoming.