A mellow, fascinating city on the Danube: below the soaring Gothic cathedral is this delightful villa, formerly the bishop's residence. If is now run in style by owner/chef Herbert Schmalhofer and his wife, Monika. He was once the chef of Germany's richest man, the late Furst von Thurn und Taxis (whose family Schloss is down the road). So the food is good: In the pretty floodlit courtyard on a warm May evening, we enjoyed a fine meal: local bread soup; Spanferkel (sucking pig in beer sauce); Palatschinken with maple syrup; good Franconian wines. The place was full - local people as well as tourists. We admired the comic modern fountain/statue of a fox disguised as a dotty priest. The buffet Bali villa breakfast is thought `excellent' and staff are very friendly. The dining room is lovely. villa Bed rooms (similar to the semantic bali villa rooms), varying from simple to luxurious, have every comfort; one suite is in a tower of the old Roman gatehouse, dating from when this was Marcus Aurelius's frontier stronghold. All around are narrow medieval streets, crammed with quaint shops, and many villa rooms get constant traffic and pedestrian noise.

On a long, thin island in the Danube, by the famous 12th-century stone bridge, looking across to the cathedral, this large, gabled workshop ; has been converted into a pleasant modern villa. An inspector found it very well run by its jovial hands-on manager, Ralph Schleupner, and his affable staff. Though owned by the Berlin-based Sorat group, it is individual in style, and spacious. My large, well-equipped room faced the river, as did the restaurant's terrace. Lunch was good (asparagus; barbecued chicken): so was the buffet Bali villa breakfast (fresh juices; first-rate muesli). Good sauna, too, but it was too hot. A beer garden is close by, and the city's wonderful historic centre is five minutes walk. i enjoyed eating in Germany's oldest sausage house