Weekend in Frankfurt in January

Old Nov 6th, 2017, 05:45 PM
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Weekend in Frankfurt in January

We arrive in Frankfurt at 9:00 am on a Saturday. need to be there Tuesday morning for business.
The weekend is January 6 and 7, so I think the Christmas markets will all be closed. LAst year we went to Heidelberg. I would love some suggestions about going to another city for the weekend or even stay in Frankfurt and take a day trip of 2 for Saturday and Sunday. We would take a train from the airport.
I don't want to go very far. Maybe 2 hours by train. Thanks
alane is offline  
Old Nov 6th, 2017, 05:59 PM
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Have you explored Frankfurt itself? Take a great walking tour--Frankfurt on Foot http://www.frankfurtonfoot.com/

Hoechst is charming and close.

I love Mainz.

Weisbaden and Worms are great choices.

If you want to go a little further, and if you like Roman history, try Trier.

Marksburg Castle on the Rhine is great. All along the Rhine is lovely spring to fall, but maybe not so much in January.
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Old Nov 6th, 2017, 11:17 PM
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Here are some suggestions easily done on regional trains:
Marburg 57 minutes by train, the largest undestroyed city in Hesse, lots of half-timbered buildings, Germany's first Gothic church and a castle. Here's an English brochure
https://www.marburg.de/downloads/dat...016_en_web.pdf
Fulda 1 h 23 min, a baroque city with a palace (and another even nicer one in nearby Eichzell), a cathedral, a Romanesque church and an old town which survived WWII reasonably good.
http://www.tourismus-fulda.de/filead...Willkommen.pdf
Wiesbaden 40 min, a grand 19th century spa town with lots of big prestige architecture, only minor bombing damage (though some in the historic centre)
https://www.wiesbaden.de/en/tourism/
Limburg 1h 10 min a completely preserved old town with some of Germany's oldest houses and one of the most important and beautiful cathedrals
http://www.limburg.de/Tourismus only automatic translation by dropdown menu
Wetzlar 55 min, old town and a cathedral, famous as the real-life place where the events of Goethe's novel "The Sorrows of Young Werther" took place
https://www.wetzlar.de/microsite/en/index.php
Eltville 55 min, nice old town and church plus an opportunity to visit the well preserved monastery Eberbach (18 min by bus)
http://kloster-eberbach.de/en/monastery
Darmstadt 18 min, while the old town was completely destroyed in WWII, the town still has a palace, the fine Hessisches Landesmuseum and its crown jewel the Art Nouveau Mathildenhöhe
http://www.darmstadt-tourismus.de/en.html
Gelnhausen 36 min, old town plus an important church and the best preserved remnants of a former medieval emperor's palace
http://www.gelnhausen.de/fileadmin/m...n_englisch.pdf
Seligenstadt 49 min, old town and basilica
Michelstadt 1 h 17 min, old town with an iconic half-timbered town hall plus a very old church in the quarter Steinbach. Just five minutes further down the line is Erbach with a fine palace including some collections and a nice ivory museum
Weilburg 1 h 35 min, old town above the river Lahn with a large castle/palace which takes up half of the town
Rüdesheim 1 h 11 min everybody's favorite tourists trap (the notoriously fake Drosselgasse) has some real attractions like the Brömserburg or the Brömserhof, the Ehrenfels ruin and the Niederwald monument
Büdingen 1 h 2 min, well preserved old town with castle and town wall, can be combined with Gelnhausen
http://www.buedingen.info/en/
Friedberg 22 min, old town, castle with a tall tower, church and a large medieval Mikve, the best preserved one in Germany
Lorsch 1 h 13 min, a nice old town but the star is the UNESCO world heritage gate hall from the 9th century. Can be combined with the old town Bensheim where you have to change trains or with Heppenheim an even nicer half-timbered town with an iconic town hall, just a train station further
http://www.kloster-lorsch.de/en/

Almost all of these places can be reached with the new RheinMainCard http://www.frankfurt-rhein-main.de/e.../RheinMainCard , here's a map of the regional train lines which tells you which places can be easily combined a la Gelnhausen and Büdingen
https://www.rmv.de/linkableblob/de/1...ennetzplan.pdf

In Bavaria you can reach Aschaffenburg (47 min) with its huge Renaissance castle though Würzburg is quite a bit by regional train (1h 47 min).
Heidelberg is doable at 1 h 33 min as are Speyer 1h 43 min and Worms though the latter is easier done from Mainz.
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Old Nov 6th, 2017, 11:21 PM
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The travel times are from Frankfurt main station BTW.

Here are also some videos by rewboss who has some nice city portraits in English (no museums, few interiors are only in the newest videos), relevant for Frankfurt visitors are in roughly descending order:
Frankfurt https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zqe5vFQPT20
Mainz https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPZDqYaft6I
Würzburg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqNE7FMynMo (though a longer trip on regional trains)
Wiesbaden https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5RpzE8Z058
Darmstadt https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1nfFwHuonE
Limburg and Diez https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvHGdmM853s
Fulda https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J63wzAFqPe4
Hanau https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s568GNwPFXw
Gelnhausen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnwsKn1qCJY
Aschaffenburg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gikk944wR6E
Eberbach monastery and Niederwald Monument https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyzWz9qgwws
Seligenstadt https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZjz1pbK6KE
Breuberg and Otzberg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1i0FSaY-cv4
Ortenberg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03VLZJLNAcg
in worse quality:
Marburg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcnwxYOZGgw
Heidelberg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YpDptaM1xw
Koblenz https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47MVr1lRC70 (again quite a long trip on regional trains)
Münzenberg, Lich, Laubach https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IgInMkF9-wU
Büdingen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EX0yo8dtbEI

And here are lots of nice contemplative video portraits about towns near Frankfurt (though again no interior shots, no museums) https://www.youtube.com/user/Stadtrundgang/videos , noticeable of the Hessian towns are in roughly descending order of importance
Darmstadt https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htPcf69idz8
Marburg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ST0xvJoMsBI
Eltville https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prc7svEhMJw
Gelnhausen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyUbk4QJ9is
Wetzlar https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoPN7jVNheg
Oestrich-Winkel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sU_fqsThTho
Rüdesheim https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtNW1zaLIQk
Seligenstadt https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1LCMZV68nU
Geisenheim https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSoe0CDCA38
Friedberg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-5b8NvtCnM
Büdingen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNnWKnFHZ2I
Lich https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpi9fWvR2gg
Butzbach https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVwlGhFhFVs
Michelstadt https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ruPkAtUGqHA
Hirschhorn https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sb9AojHkSqI
Idstein https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYBcAkAVxak
Bad Nauheim https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbJffYXdlxU
Herborn https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qImpAJdZiG0
Kronberg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WLLu_ZyzX8
Groß-Umstadt https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlXq1R1oHxU
Dillenburg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jQQNluJ130
Münzenberg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhazuHeLOIk
Heppenheim https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2k3vSIsBzV8
Babenhausen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOXon0B-NDc
Lorsch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOmrKKZ0A2g
Königstein https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8i_6TxYEsw
Neckarsteinach https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQW4pCUvQc8
Dieburg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYKMtq9LZOk
Hofheim https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1S7WR7hr_Y0
Oberursel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZamxQ6EhQQ
Erbach https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVyN2aGJACg
Outside of Hesse but doable in this video list are Mainz, Diez, Bingen, Ingelheim, Speyer, Schwetzingen, Heidelberg, Aschaffenburg, Miltenberg, Mannheim, Ludwigshafen, Worms, Weinheim and Ladenburg.

With the exception of Bensheim, Bad Homburg, Weilburg, Kiedrich and Lorch plus arguably despite their wartime destruction Offenbach and Gießen these two channels give you an impression of pretty much everything within an 2 hour range on regional train.
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