Germany, Germany, Germany

We left Amsterdam quite early Monday morning, headed for the Rhine River and the quaint town of Bacharach. After some quick-on-our-feet itinerary planning, we decided to get off the train at St. Goar, climb all over Rheinfels Castle (a ruin, actually), hop on the last Rhine cruise of the day, and check out the scenery from the river for an hour to our stopping point.

Rheinfels was very cool. It was one of, if not the, largest castle along the Rhine. If memory serves me, it withstood a siege of 40,000 enemy soldiers. Now it is a fraction of the original size and in ruin --- but nonetheless amazing. We hiked all over the place and were generally impressed with the fortifications and flat out history of it all. When we had completed our walk, we took the slightly corny Tschu Tschu train back down to town (had to save our aching feet!!).

The cruise we took was very relaxing and allowed us to not only witness several Rhineland castles, but also the vineyards that produce the grapes that make the Rhine's famous white wines. The best grapes are grown on these steep, terraced fields. The slate below the soil keeps them warm all night, while the grapes grown above the river on flat land cool down and are less sweet.

Bacharach was home for two nights. We stayed at the Pension of wonderful Lettie. We met a very nice family from South Carolina and ended up being travel partners for a bit of our trip. On our first night (Monday) we ate at the oldest building in town, and had the BEST salad of our lives. It was incredibly simple but whatever was in the dressing was sehr gut!

On Tuesday we had quite the adventure. We had heard that Burg Eltz was one of the best-preserved medieval castles in all of Europe and that it was within traveling distance of Bacharach. So we took the train back up the Rhine, switched at Cochem, followed a new route along the Mosel River and hopped off at a little town so small that the train station is no longer manned. From the station we hiked for nearly 20 minutes through the sweet town of Moselkern (after wondering with an older couple from Chicago if we were in fact going the right way), and then hiked another 45 minutes through a forest where we expected knights and their ladies fair to appear at any minute. It was truly like being in a fairytale...except, of course, in fairytales the protagonists don't have achy legs from hiking. :)

Finally, Burg Eltz appeared. After a grueling last climb up what seemed like never-ending stairs in the midday sun, we arrived in the castle courtyard. We took the tour and followed along the German explanations with our English reading guide. Our high school German didn't help us much as our guide was explaining away. The rooms of the castle are decorated just as they were in the 14th and 15th centuries. It was so fascinating to see how people really lived back then. One of Jason's favorite rooms was the toilet. :) The castle is still owned and partly inhabited by the Eltz family, and the current countess makes sure all the rooms have fresh flowers weekly.

On our way out, the couple from Chicago offered to share the cab they had called but we declined and enjoyed a more relaxing climb back down.

Wednesday morning we took the early train with the family mentioned above to Rothenburg, an absolute haven of medieval coolness. When we arrived we took our bags to our room, rested a bit and then followed Rick's town walk. After that we toured St. Jakob's church, ate at a delicious little place (where Jason had a beer and decided he still didn't like beer) and where I had traditional bratwurst and sauerkraut. Then we took the entertaining Night Watchman's tour and headed home for bed.

Today we slept in a bit, ate our breakfast at the ancient but delicious Altfrankische Weinstube and toured the Crime and Punishment museum where we learned about medieval torture methods. Cool, huh. After that we did a tiny bit of shopping, the first of our trip. Then we left town right as the rain came in.

We took the train to Munich, arrived around 3:30, spent an hour at the Euraide office where we received some amazing help straightening out some goofed up schedule we received in Koln, and then headed for our hotel. More later as my time is up.