Famous storytellers Wilhelm and Jacob Grimm were born in Hanau, Germany. The Grimm Brothers often used the landscape of Germany as an inspiration for their stories’ setting. Tales like Rapunzel, Snow White, The Pied Piper and Little Red Riding Hood are only some of the stories that came out of Germany. Now, visitors can actually experience these folklores in real life by visiting The Fairy Tale Road.
The road connects the villages and landscapes that were used as backdrops of the stories. It is about 370 miles long and starts in Hanau, and ends in Bremen, from the tale “The Town Musicians of Bremen”.
Brothers Grimm of Hanau
Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough time to travel the whole Fairy Tale Road but I was still able to visit Hanau and HameIn, two towns that were the closest to Frankfurt where I stayed. HameIn (or Hamelin) is the town of The Pied Piper. I honestly felt like I really was in the fairy tale! Hameln did not disappoint. It lived and breath everything about the story. There were statues of the Pied Piper everywhere as well as carvings of rats all over the place. My favorite was the center square where you can see the clockwork figures retelling of the fairy tale at the Hochzeitshaus and the Glockenspiel where the Pied Piper song is played a few times a day.
The Pied Piper of Hameln
How to get there
You can take the train, but renting a car will make it a lot easier to follow the road, and stop whenever you want to. Parking may be a struggle but some of the town centers are far from the train stations.
If you would like to go on the whole fairy tale road, I recommend planning ahead. Dedicate a few days so you will have enough time to explore it. There are at least fifty towns to see. Choose your fairy tales, and decide on which towns you would like to visit first. You can easily spend a week just walking down the fairy tale in Germany.
Have you been on The Fairy Tale Road? Is this on your bucketlist?
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Jen is a Chicago-based traveler and creative. She is a full-time development & communications executive specializing in non-profit organizations. Originally from the East Coast, she created The Jetsetter as a place to share her travel stories and photos with friends and family. Now, it is a place for adventurers and dreamers. Its purpose is to inspire and encourage busy professionals to see the world and achieve a better work-life balance.