Bad Arolsen is a charming little town in northern Hesse. I was there to visit the IRC Tracing Center which has records from WW II persecutions. A somber mission, which is why I am very glad I stayed at this lovely little hotel only a few blocks walking distance from the Center. I had a top floor room under the eaves and it had the feel of Paris, very irma La Douce.

Good updated bathroom, quiet dead end street, lovely built-ins in the good-sized room with its "französches Bett" which is what a real queen or double bed is called in German. The restaurant downstairs was excellent and the staff extremely friendly. Good German food and beer, and they had a delicious Baden rosé (also called "Schillerwein"). Breakfast in the breakfast room was about average, but two weeks of German breakfasts, and I'm ready for something much simpler, anyway.

Down the street was a building from the late 1600s and the hotel, which is next to a brewery, is older than... more