My Passport’s Travels

Part 1, lots of pictures today!

This morning, Mom woke up not feeling well, so she stayed tucked up in her nice warm bed. I got up and out, though! After breakfast, I went out to take some pictures as we sailed away from Rüdesheim (we had stayed in overnight) and realized it was cold and wet.

The first of many wonderful signs telling you where you are on the Rhein!

After grabbing my coat, I started on the sun deck – even in the wet, the Rhein is beautiful! Low, misty clouds hanging over the castles, vineyards and villages.

We spent the next couple of hours sailing, with Emilie providing commentary.

The vineyards are all built on steep hills and are harvested by hand using migrant labor. The workers arrive in Germany at the beginning of the asparagus harvest in the spring and stay through the end of the grape harvest, going from crop to crop.

We’re sailing along at 20 Kilometers/hour. On the river, they measure in KM, not knots. This is a particularly busy stretch of the river.

I thought the fairy tale cutouts along the path to the castle at Trechtingshausen were charming!

If you look closely, you can see the cage hanging from on of the towers at the castle.

The quarry mines red sandstone to be used in building. The conveyor belt will load the stone onto barges.

On to Lorch and Niederheimbach! And a house with Christmas decorations on the balcony!

I like the juxtaposition of medieval castle and modern wind farm here!

In the first picture, you can see the kilometer marker that’s all along the River. The ships use them for navigation and tourists use them to see which castle they’re at on the castle reference guide!

Complimentary hot chocolate delivery! Complete with a slosh of spiced rum!

Next up, Kaub, a village with 18 towers and a church that looks like a rocket ship from the right angle!

A couple of WWII related facts: 1. Hitler would have train tunnels disguised as churches and old castle ruins so they were less likely to be bombed. 2. All the bridges across the Rhein were destroyed and not rebuilt. Today they rely on ferries to cross the Rhein in the valley.

The Lorelei was a siren who lured sailors to their doom by song. The legend is that she lived at the top of this rock.

The castles in this region were built to collect tolls from the river traffic. The owners would raise chains across the river, preventing passage until the toll was paid. Originally the funds were intended for river upkeep, but eventually turned into a profit maker for the local gentry and clergy.

Sankt Goarshausen only has 13 houses! The white building is the bar that leads into the yellow church – and the bar is the only entry to the church! And the mayor is also the barkeep and preacher!

One final picture to end the morning of scenic cruising – Boopard!

I joined the mother and three daughters from California and Hawaii for lunch. A lovely cream of broccoli soup (we’ve noticed their cream soups are much brothier than our cream soups tend to be) and Wiener Schnitzel! While we were dining, we docked in Koblenz. We’re the outside ship on the docking – so we’ll walk through another ship’s lobby when it’s time to go ashore!

(This has been so picture intensive, the afternoon/evening in Koblenz will be a different post.)