My family and I arrived at Frankfurt Airport around 6.45am on October 7th, 2013. After claiming our luggages, we went straight to Avis counter as my husband had booked a car online (paid for a week rental using debit card) but the process didn’t went well as Avis needed a credit card to verify the booking at the counter. As my husband and I only have debit card, we had to cancel the rental. My husband had wrote a refund claim e-mail as I wrote this and that will take about two weeks to clear. But nonetheless, at least we know what to expect if we were to rent a car in Europe again.

We took a taxi to Offenbach as taking the train was out of the option as we had big luggages and a box full of books to carry. We reached the place we rented around 9am. Had to wait an hour for the owner to come as check in time was at 10am.

Boy, it was cold!

The owner, Dr. Mai, is a Muslim Egyptian doctor staying in Frankfurt with her family for 15 years already. She showed around the fully-furnished apartment and told us that we were free to use everything and thank God for the washing machine and electric cooking stove. These are top on the list when you have a family travelling with you.

Dr. Mai’s house is awesome!

I am very thankful to have found Dr. Mai on Airbnb. I got a very cheap deal renting the place from her as the rental was not based on pax as what the hotels in Frankfurt (perhaps in Europe) are charging. There were other places listed on Airbnb around Frankfurt but all were not within my budget so I opt to stay outside the city. Anyway, staying at any hotel in Frankfurt during book fair can go up to €300(and more) per day!

My family were all tired and they took a little nap before exploring Frankfurt.

After sitting on 12 hours flight.

We went out later in the afternoon around 5pm and took the train to Frankfurt city. We walked to Offenbach OST (10 minutes walk) and paid around €15 (one way) to reach the main station, the Frankfurt Am Main Hauptbahnhof.

Frankfurt Am Main Hauptbahnhof.

The boys were already hungry (we had nasi impit and sambal ikan bilis for lunch at the apartment) and having visited Frankfurt last year, I know a nearby Halal place to have dinner. We went to Thai Fun at Elbestraße, about 5 minutes walk from hauptbahnhof.

Yassin shared fried rice with his dad while I had rice with chicken and mushroom. Azmi had rice with tomyam.

Busy with phones! It was either they were tweeting or sharing photos on Instagram. Haha! We bought a prepaid data plan earlier and shared connection. I will blog about this on a separate post on ‘how to plan a trip to Frankfurt with your family’. Sounds good? Stay tuned!

And that was all for Day 1. We took the train back to Offenbach and paid another  €15. Yikes,  €30 altogether.

Stay tuned for Day 2 tomorrow!