While there are some rather decent books (including first and foremost Fuehrich's "Reiserecht-Handbuch", 6th ed. (2010), and of course ;-) my dissertation thesis "Die mangelhafte Reise", 2009; see recommended books), some useful and a myriad of mediocre to downright awful websites covering German travel law in German, you will be hard pressed to find anything -much less anything useful or substantial- on that topic in English.
This is the more puzzling considering the ongoing, ever increasing internationalisation and globalisation, which one would also expect to be emphasized even the more so in the field of tourism/travel and hence in related German legal treatment of these matters.

This web project is intended to rectify that. A wee little bit.

The purpose of this site is two-fold:
On one hand, it shall provide YOU as an interested or concerned (or both) reader with a free, easily accessible and up-to-date introduction into and overview of the German travel law. On the other hand, it shall provide ME with the option to refer to this site when communicating with international friends so I won't have to explain the same issues again and again on a per-case individual basis.
There is yet another side benefit: I will readily admit that the site has a self-serving purpose in so far as it presents an opportunity for me to maintain my English. Think autotelos and zen's "the path itself is the purpose".

German Travel Law:
The site title "German Travel Law" as such at the moment pertains to German travel contract law, i.e.,  the law regulating the legal relationship between a traveller (or, more precisely as we shall see later, a tourist, as any tourist is a traveller, but not every traveller is a tourist) and his tour operator within a package tour. As an ongoing web project it is intended to be broadened and eventually encompass associated or related legal areas such as the law regarding independent travel or travel agencies. For now I will concentrate on providing an up-to-date coherent text that will cover the subject of German Travel Law as outlined by the definition above. In a second phase I will work out, deepen and broaden select issues of interest and add footnotes and bibliography.

What this site is NOT:
Unlike almost all the other pages on German travel law (which anyhow are, of course, in German, see my initial statement) this site is not written from the perspective of a traveller seeking compensation for faults of his trip. It is especially NOT a how-to guide giving you step-by-step instructions on how to claim for reimbursement of any kind when your trip has gone wrong. That said, naturally liability for trip faults will provide the main body of this site as well as it is the main focus of the respective legal regulations. However, my aim is to give an overall presentation of the matter from a neutral point of view and based on an in-depth explanation from bottom up, showing the complete legal situation as determined by the respective laws and court decisions.

My text & my design:
The content text of this site is original and does not use copypasted or merely translated text, I wrote it myself. As you can see in my short "about me" biography statement, my background is American English, so this might sometimes reflect in my choice of words, syntax and spelling. Moreover, this website is done by one man alone (me), in nightshifts whenever I get around to working on it, and I dont get any money for it, so do not expect a highly polished gloss web product with all kinds of java flash flimflam. Even though I enjoy working at this website, time is a limited resource and in my opinion it should rather be spent on content rather than a colorful wrapping. Keeping the design and layout of this website fairly simple and clean also facilitates a high compatibilty with a wide range of internet browsers.