germany

Germany, Day 10: Oom Pah Pah

With heavy hearts we packed our bags, ate a fantastic breakfast and caught a cab out of Rothenburg, cursing our thorough but not thorough enough trip planning for the singular night in that magical little hamlet.

We got on the train and headed south-east to the suburban Bavarian town of Augsburg.  Augsburg is about a 45 minute train ride outside of Munich, and we decided to stay there rather than in Munich proper because the largest outdoor festival in the world is happening – Oktoberfest.  Going to Oktoberfest was a dilemma for me – I love beer and fun, but I hate crowds and getting jostled around.  One of my managers at work had told me that Oktoberfest isn’t fun and it’s mostly drunk people peeing in the streets.  Ma and Pa weren’t convinced either, but Argie piped up and said she just wanted to see what it was like, maybe have a beer and then we could leave.  We decided that this wasn’t an opportunity that presented itself every day, so we checked into our hotel in Augsburg, dropped our things off and headed into Munich.  We had a little chuckle when we boarded the train as we saw a group of young men in lederhosen, gingham shirts and tyrollean hats – cute!

First things first – the Munich train station is an incredible piece of engineering and algorithms.  36 tracks and trains, shops, restaurants, tour companies, all busy and bustling.  Also, like a lot of the train stations we’ve been to, they are all very clean and don’t smell like pee and armpit, unlike some of the skytrain stations in Vancouver…

Anyhow, we got off the train at the Munich train station and discovered that group of men in lederhosen were in the majority and us in our civvies were in the minority.  Most men were in some sort of suede shorts/gingham shirt combo and most women were in dirndls, every single one of them looking beautiful and rosy-cheeked.  We followed the crowds of traditional dress and marked sidewalks to the fairgrounds, had our bags checked by the tiers of security and polizei and entered into a joyous, beer-soaked world where people from all over the globe convene to eat, drink and be merry:

_mg_7134_mg_7142_mg_7144_mg_7150

14 beer tents, all holding about 7000 and bursting at the seams with merriment!  Argie and I decided we wanted to try the Hofbrauhaus tent for a mass (1 litre) of beer, listen to the band and maybe have a pretzel as it is arguably the most famous brauhaus in Bayern.  Ma and Pa followed suit and as we entered the tent, a huge smile spread across our faces – the oom pah pah of the band hit our ears and the yeasty smell of beer and roasted chicken and pork knuckle hit our senses.  One of the waitress frauleins showed us a space at one of the long tables where we quickly made friends with some of our neighbours.  Argie and I quickly became very popular with some of the more inebriated men.

_mg_7159_mg_7163_mg_7166

We got our mass of beer (well, beer for me and Pa, radlers for Argie and Ma), ordered some food and just enjoyed all of the commotion around us – people trying to chug their beer, people swaying and ‘prost’-ing every time the band played “Ein Prosit” (apparently they are to play it every 15 minutes to keep people drinking).

_mg_7173_mg_7186_mg_7193

Argie and I made friends with two of our table mates, Vroni from Hamburg and Maximillian from Dresden.  They are both flight attendants with Lufthansa and Argie and I hope we get to fly with them some day.

_mg_7202

It seemed to us that at Oktoberfest everyone is your friend and much more affectionate than when you are sober.  These Dutch gents insisted I come visit the Netherlands soon.

_mg_7232_mg_7236_mg_7247_mg_7252_mg_7257

I don’t know how the staff kept it together.  These women must have the strongest forearms in the world and the sharpest memories (and I would imagine, the most bruised butt cheeks after these two weeks).

_mg_7260_mg_7263_mg_7269

We finished our meals and beer and decided it was time to move on to explore the other parts of the fairgrounds, and Ma heard whispers of a dessert tent and wanted to ferret that out.

_mg_7272_mg_7276_mg_7278_mg_7287_mg_7300

We found the fabled dessert tent and ordered coffee and cake and enjoyed the band, this time instead of playing traditional German music, played the hits including Queen and Suzie Quattro.

_mg_7304

We finished our strudels and coffee and decided it was probably time to head towards the train station as we had surprisingly been at the fest for 5 1/2 hours and had an early morning the next day.  As we were leaving we noticed the festival had gotten quite a bit busier and drunker, walking behind a poor over-served soul flanked by lederhosen-clad friends, giving him a good drag to the train station.

Germany, Day 9: My Little Town

Today we got up, ate our final breakfast at the Goldener Falke and said goodbye to Heidelberg, hopping the train (well, series of 4 trains) to the tiny and allegedly adorable town of Rothenburg ob der Tauber.  Rothenburg is on every single one of those “Most Adorable Villages you MUST VISIT!!” lists and is apparently the inspiration behind Geppetto and Pinocchio’s home town in the Walt Disney animated feature Pinocchio.  We pulled into town on a small milk train, stepped into a cab and also into the past.

_mg_7015_mg_7019_mg_7021_mg_7029

Rothenburg is even more adorable than we expected it to be.  Cute laneways, half-timbered houses, bakeries, Christmas shops, cobblestones, town squares, medieval walls and much more were preserved in this decadent slice of German heaven.

_mg_7034_mg_7038_mg_7039_mg_7041_mg_7047_mg_7052

We checked into our little Bed and Breakfast (I think it was at one point a monastery) and headed into town to soak in all of the glory.

_mg_7054_mg_7056_mg_7060

One regional delicacy that I insisted that we try are a sweet snack called “schneeballs” (snowballs).  They were originally made from leftover pastry dough in an effort to not let any of it go to waste, and there are dozens of different flavours.  The town is littered with bakeries that sell this little apple-sized delights, so we found one with a nice patio and picked our flavours – I chose caramel, Pa and Argie had rum-marzipan and Ma had dark chocolate.  They were definitely not what we had expected – we were all under the assumption that they would be soft and sweet, like a giant Timbit, but they were crunchy and crumbly, a lot like a fortune cookie.  They were also extremely filling!

_mg_7064_mg_7073

After our schneeball experience we decided to amble around, explore some Christmas shops (nutcrackers, steins, decorations, woodart!) and just enjoy how sweet this little town is.

_mg_7077_mg_7081_mg_7084_mg_7085_mg_7089_mg_7091_mg_7105_mg_7109

After dodging other tourists to take photos of the most famous and probably most photographed intersection in the city, we headed for the town wall.

_mg_7114_mg_7120_mg_7122

Ma and Pa decided that they wanted to walk the town wall, but Argie and I opted for something a lot more sinister in this adorable town – The Medieval Crime and Punishment Museum.

_mg_7124

We walked past the stocks and into a building with an arrow pointing into the basement which immediately immerses you into the punishment part of the museum, more specifically torture.  The museum housed hundreds of medieval torture instruments as well as shame fixtures including the aforementioned stocks and shame masks, different masks decorated differently depending on the crime.  The museum also had documents and descriptions of trials and law in the different areas of Germany.

After our fill of torture (and the museum was closing), we met up with Ma and Pa and headed to a recommended inn for dinner where we dined on soup and schnitzel.

_mg_7126_mg_7128

The dinner was delicious and after we settled up, we headed back to our inn to rest up for the night, wondering why we decided only one night in Rothenburg would be sufficient.

_mg_7130

Germany, Day 8: Like A Bridge…

_mg_6971_mg_6975

Today was our last full day in Heidelberg, so the the four of us (me, Ma, Pa and Argie) decided to check out the previously undiscovered parts of the old town, starting with the old bridge.  The bridge is old and mostly pedestrian so we had a good chance to amble around and take photos of the city, castle and bridge itself.

_mg_6982_mg_6989_mg_6994_mg_6997_mg_6999_mg_7002

The one end of the bridge houses a love lock fixture at a peaceful riverside point with a beautiful view of the castle.

_mg_7005

Following our time on the bridge, we headed over to check out parts of the old university.  Heidelberg houses one of the oldest universities in Europe and is still a popular institution today.

_mg_7008_mg_7010

The rest of the day was pretty much a day for relaxing.  We learned that gummy bears and gummy candy come from the west part of Germany, so we filled up with gummy bears and gummy Heidelbergs, bought some Christmas ornaments, sampled some Schnapps native to the region, ate some cake, sent off a parcel and lots of postcards, had dinner at a burger joint decorated with birch trees and finally watched the sun set over the square while drinking hot chocolates and cointreau, sad to say goodbye to Heidelberg but excited to find out what’s in store in Rothenburg.

Germany, Day 7: Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head

This morning we woke up early to grey skies and wet cobblestones – looks like we brought a piece of Vancouver with us after all.  After a 2 hour train ride via Mannheim we arrived in the cozy Black Forest town of Freiburg in Breisgau.  This town is famous for two things – its UNESCO World Heritage cathedral and minster (pictured later), and little canals that wind through the city called bachles.  In the summertime you can find people cooling off their feet in these canals and children pulling toy boats on string.

_mg_6870_mg_6895

Legend has it that if you fall into one of these, you will marry a Freiburger and judging from the men’s style in the area, I wouldn’t turn that down.  Minus the man buns.  So many man buns…

After a short walk from the train station, we were in the historic old town, ready to do our Rick Steves walking tour.

_mg_6875_mg_6881_mg_6885_mg_6890_mg_6891_mg_6898_mg_6900_mg_6902_mg_6904

After learning about the downhill and adjacent buildings, we came upon the historical and visual focal point of the city, the Freiburg Munster (minster).  Its giant, spiny tower can been seen from everywhere in town and is as tall as it is wide. It occupies the middle of a huge square.

_mg_6908_mg_6916_mg_6918_mg_6922_mg_6914

We came to the front door right at noon and the giant bells chimed, calling the faithful to mass.  We decided to come back to it when mass wasn’t in session, so we moved on.

We walked down what originally looked to be a side street, but turned into a beautiful cobblestoned street, draped in arbour which blooms wisteria in the summertime.  Because it was Sunday most of the shops were closed, but we still found a lot of things we would spend our pennies on, including a new hat for Pa and a beautiful wool coat for Ma.  They will have to wait for another day.

_mg_6930_mg_6932_mg_6936

An interesting part of the cobblestoned road is that in front of a lot of the businesses are mosaics that indicate what kind of shop is there:

_mg_6926

A more sobering thing we noticed in the ground stones were a few seemingly random copper ‘stones’ with writing on them in front of some of the old apartments.  They were in German, but we could make out names, birth dates, death dates (usually between 1940 – 1944) and one chilling word that ended all of them: Auschwitz.

By the end of our walk we had worked up quite a hunger and decided to try the recommended Hausbrauerei Feierling for lunch and beer.  I ordered a beer which was slightly smokey and flavourful, and had possibly some of the best bratwurst I’ve ever tasted.    We settled up and headed back towards the Munster so we could get a look inside.  The rain had let up and we liked the walk we took before so much, we walked past the same way.  When we had gotten back to the Munster mass was done so we were free to walk about the church.

_mg_6955_mg_6956_mg_6958_mg_6964_mg_6966

The church’s stained glass was sponsored by different workers, tradesmen and craftsmen back in the medieval time, so a portion of the window is dedicated to that worker’s profession (bakers, tailors, cobblers, etc).  After our walkabout the castle it was time to hit the road and headed back to Heidelberg, sharing a train car with a bunch of drunken football rowdies (go St. Pauli, I guess).

We ate a delicious dinner at the Italian restaurant next door to our hotel and then moved over to our hotel for some hot chocolate.  The sky cleared up and the air chilled and we sipped our hot drinks in anticipation of a special guest on our trip, my friend Argie.  Argie works with me in the tower of terror known as our job and is hanging out with us for a few days on her way back from Budapest.  At 1900hrs a black Mercedes pulled up and Argie stepped out excited to be done her 11 hour train sojourn.  She met Ma and Pa and we chit chatted until it was time for bed.

Germany, Day 6: I Can See For Miles and Miles

Today was our first full day in Heidelberg.  We had planned to go to Stuttgart to visit the Mercedes Benz Museum, but we all woke up late, I had a, uh, headache, and Pa wasn’t previously as excited to go as he was before, so we made the decision to stick around Heidelberg instead.  Heidelberg is mostly famous for its partly ruined castle, Schloss Heidelberg, which is perched on the side of the high hills that surround the city, and is accessible by way of one of Pa’s favourite contraptions, the funicular.  We had a lazy breakfast in the hotel restaurant and ambled over to the funicular, conveniently located next to the square over from our hotel.

_mg_6680_mg_6690

There are actually two funiculars on the hill – a newer modern one that takes you from the bottom to the castle and halfway up the mount, and then a creaky wooden 125 year old one that takes you to the top.  We decided we wanted to see the castle first, so we exited the funicular and headed down the marked path, past a couple of small shops and cafes to the partly ruined castle.

_mg_6708_mg_6710_mg_6722_mg_6726

The castle is cool and different – its a mishmash of different styles as it was chronically being hit by lightning and parts of it got damaged.  Construction started in the Renaissance and eventually stopped, leaving half of it ruins and the other parts in differing states of crumble.  The castle overlooks the city and on a clear day (like the first part of today), you can see all the way to Mannheim.

_mg_6714_mg_6774

The castle is enormous.  We spent the better part of the morning and afternoon wandering around the grounds, with a brief stop in the castle cafe to have our standard beer/pretzel/apple strudel.

_mg_6716_mg_6731_mg_6737_mg_6746_mg_6750_mg_6764_mg_6767_mg_6806_mg_6808_mg_6810_mg_6821_mg_6826

A relatively recent feature of the castle is you can get married in a sacred or civil ceremony there, so we got to see a few different bridal parties of varying fanciness.  I am a creeper at heart, so I had to get a couple of snaps in.

_mg_6789_mg_6793_mg_6798

We had had our fill of castle so we headed back to the funicular station and got on board ye olde funicular.  The funicular cars are adorable and shake and sigh through the 10 minute ride to the top of the hill.  The top of the mount didn’t have much to offer – a closed falconry, a derelict boarded up restaurant and more spectacular views.

_mg_6839_mg_6848_mg_6853_mg_6854

We decided that it was time to head back and got on our little shaky funicular, then the smooth modern funicular and headed to the hotel restaurant patio for beers and so that I could write out some postcards.  The next few hours were filled by dinner, ice cream, and a frantic shop at the Lindt chocolate shop and as the rain started, we headed in for the night.

_mg_6864

Germany, Day 5: On the Road Again

Today we woke up to a mercifully cloudy sky and cooler temperature – for the first time since we’ve been in Germany it was under 27 degrees.  We packed our bags, settled our hotel, said our goodbyes to the Mosel Wine Valley and headed to the train.  At Koblenz we hopped off to catch our connecting train to the Baden-Wurttemberg city of Heidelberg for our next set of days.  For those of you who believe that German trains run on time – they don’t.  Our train was 30 minute late today, and the train on our platform before that coming from Zurich was even later.  At about 1430 hrs after an unremarkable journey through Bingen, Mainz and Mannheim we wandered off the train and into the ancient university town of Heidelberg.  We hired a very friendly cab driver who dropped us off at our hotel, Goldener Falke.  We felt like we hit the jackpot – a beautiful 19th century building with a restaurant and patio on the ground floor and faces out into a main square filled with cafes, a cathedral, and a fountain.

img_6616img_6617img_6618img_6619_mg_6621_mg_6623

One big difference that we’ve noticed between Heidelberg and the Mosel Valley is the number of tourists.  We sat in the square this afternoon to take a breather from the previous 4 busy days and watched many tour groups come through and heard many different languages spoken.  Pa and I had a couple of Heidelberger beers (another pilsner) and I wrote out some postcards.  _mg_6625_mg_6630_mg_6639_mg_6642

We had an excellent dinner of coq au vin, beer and strudel at the hotel restaurant, took and stroll around the square and turned in to watch some BBC news._mg_6663_mg_6665_mg_6666_mg_6668_mg_6676_mg_6679

Germany, Day 4: Burn Baby Burn

Today was a day that I was really excited about.  I had been looking forward to taking a boat up the Rheine (Rhine) River and looking at all the castles, sipping beers, sunbathing with the German men who seem to take off their shirt even if they have no business taking off their shirts.  Another scorcher of a day was in the cards but it was nice heading out early in the cooler air.  We took the train by way of Koblenz to Bacharach (yes, just like Burt Bacharach) to start our KD Rhein cruise, already in progress (the cruise starts further south in Mainz but there’s not a lot of castles that far south).  Bacharach is an adorable little town and I kind of feel bad that we didn’t get more time to poke around.

_mg_6345

_mg_6361

We got on the boat and grabbed some chairs next to some wildly gesticulating Italians who engaged Pa in a conversation (“I think they said something about red wine”).  The Rheine was and still is an important shipping route in Europe as it reaches from Rotterdam to Switzerland.  Many of the merchant barges are privately owned and lived in and we saw many of them putting up and down the river.  Back in ye olde days when Germany was made up of hundreds of little kingdoms, robber barons would set up castles and forts along the Rheine and levy taxes and tariffs for those sailing up or down the river, often setting up a huge chain from one side of the river to the other to stop boats.

_mg_6375

_mg_6362

Pa and I bought a couple of overpriced beers and Ma had some water and we settled into our seats.  The river did not disappoint – castles in various states of repair and disrepair around every corner.  There’s a still a romantic in the basement of my chilly heart, so seeing some of these robust stone castles with sleepy little wood timbered villages below made my blood run a little warmer.  A lot of these castles have now been converted into hotels, with one being purchased by an eccentric Japanese bajillionaire who wanted to turn the castle into some sort of Japanese tourism hot spot, but the German government put the kibosh on it and now the castle stands vacant.

_mg_6379_mg_6385

_mg_6392

Most of the castles were built in either the 12th or 13th century and a lot of them were destroyed by the invading French army in the 19th century and had to be rebuilt.  Napoleon blew up an impressive looking one to show how much more impressive his explosives are.

_mg_6400_mg_6413

Another part of the cruise that I was really excited about was seeing the Loreley Rock.  This is the narrowest and deepest part of the Rheine and was apparently quite treacherous in the olden times, causing many shipwrecks.  Apparently to people back then it was more plausible to blame a river siren named Loreley for distracting sailors than narrow reefs for all of the scuttled ships.  There were many songs and poems written about Loreley and they’ve even erected a statue of the schone madchen.

_mg_6424_mg_6429_mg_6442

The cruise was about 3 hours long and we got hot hot hot.  I even got a bit of a sun burn.  We saw about a dozen or so castles total.

_mg_6453

_mg_6466_mg_6468

_mg_6498_mg_6502_mg_6508

_mg_6536_mg_6542

After our boat moored at Koblenz we were up to our elbows in castles so we disembarked and headed towards the bahnhof to catch the train to Koln (Cologne) for our next UNESCO Heritage Site building.  The train ride itself was 2 dull hours of mostly field and industry, but when we got into Koln, we could see the spires of what was once the tallest building in the world:

_mg_6547_mg_6548_mg_6550

The Kolner Dom (Cologne Cathedral).  Everyone you ever meet in your life could tell you how big this building is and it still would not prepare for its gargantuan size.  The Dom was started in the 1200s, took 700 workers and 36 years.  What I was most excited to hear about  was it contains 3 football field lengths of stained glass.

_mg_6565

_mg_6569_mg_6576_mg_6582

The Dom, like 95% of Koln was badly damaged by Allied bombs in WWII but because the frame was so strong, it was able to retain most of its structure.

The inside of the Dom became a pilgrimage site for two reasons – there was a statue of Madonna of Milan and the cathedral contained the bones of the (alleged) three magi (of ‘We Three Kings of Orient Are’ fame).  The bones are housed in a huge gold and silver box by the alter.

_mg_6589_mg_6601_mg_6612

After we finished gawking at the Dom, there was a second priority in Koln that we needed to take care of – kolsch beer.  Kolsch is a style of beer that originates from Koln and is served in a tall, slim glass.  It’s a lighter, pils-style and apparently one of the best places to get it is an old brauhaus (brew house) called Peter’s Brauhaus, a block over from the Cathedral.  The Brauhaus looked exactly like you would expect it to – low ceilings, dark woods, big long tables.  Pa and I ordered bratwurst and kolsch, Ma had goulash (and water).  6 kolsch beers and a few apple strudels later we were completely full and ready to head back to Cochem for our last night spent in the Mosel Valley.

 

Germany, Day 2: Oh I Wish I Had A River…

_mg_5953

Cochem Train Station

Today we had to get up bright and early to catch the train to a remote location.  We hoofed it down to the train station, bought our tickets from possibly the most disinterested man in Germany and hopped on the train eastbound, our destination: Moselkern.  Moselkern isn’t really notable for anything, except for its proximity to our destination this morning.  We were met at the train station by Taxi Charly who charged us an unreasonable amount of Euros to take us inland, about 3 km from the river, up the terraced vineyard-riddled valley walls to a plateau, into a forest and dropped us off at a car-park.  Following the marked, steep, paved path, we walked down until the forest revealed to us its treasure:

_mg_5963

Burg Eltz

Burg Eltz.  Burg (castle) Eltz has been in existence since the year 1157, was never destroyed by war or invaders and is still maintained and sometimes lived in by the Eltz family, the current Count and Countess being in its 33rd known generation.  We took a tour with the very  knowledgeable Lisa who told us much of the history of the castle including armour, decorations and practicalities (all the staircases are counterclockwise spirals so that attackers going up the stairs would struggle swinging their sword in their right hand).

_mg_6006

_mg_6020

After our excellent tour we decided the castle would be an excellent place to have our first beer of the trip.

_mg_6022

We headed to the marked muster point for people taking the shuttle up the mountain and encountered a rather large queue: as it turns out, the castle’s regular 20 person shuttle had broken down that morning so everyone was stuck with the 8-seater van.  In the line in front of us were about a billion senior citizens, all of us baking together in the 30 degree heat, waiting for the van.  The castle staff were lovely and brought umbrellas to shade us all from the sun and crates of cool mineral water to quench our parched mouths.  After about an hour, it was our turn to board the van and we zipped back up to the car-park where we met our cabby, sped down the valley, hopped the train in Moselkern back to Cochem, just in time to grab another beer at a bustling city centre cafe.

_mg_6025

The beer was delicious and our waiter looked like Sir Ben Kingsley.  He also told me my German accent was perfect (what).

We had heard that taking a Mosel River cruise was highly recommended so we had planned to take one westbound and get off at the tiny TINY village of Beilstein.  So at 1500hrs we shuffled aboard a boat with many of the same elderly tourists we had waited in line with at the castle (ah!  Die burg fraulein!).  We were able to snag a table on the upper deck where we ordered some drinks and drank in the scenery.

_mg_6047

It’s difficult to describe how many vineyards line the Mosel River.  Not just the sheer number of them is astounding, but also how they are laid out. From river bank to valley-wall peak, steep rows of grapes flourish on the sunny hill sides.

_mg_6075

At 1600hrs we docked at Beilstein, and right away we were smitten at how charming this tiny hamlet is.  It was nearly inaccessible for hundreds of years which left it pristine and untouched by more modern architecture.  These days it features mostly inns and cafes, with a ruined castle and now decommissioned monastery thrown in for good measure.  Ma was jonesing for some apfelstreudel which we quickly located at one of the bistros.

_mg_6080

We then had about 20 minutes to explore Beilstein before the last boat left, and honestly it was just about enough time.  The town is so small, there are no ATMS and probably not much to do, but I could honestly picture myself there for about a week just drinking wine and beer, reading, writing and pretending the rest of the world doesn’t exist as the peaceful Mosel ambles by.

_mg_6084

_mg_6086

_mg_6090

_mg_6093_mg_6099_mg_6102_mg_6112

_mg_6119_mg_6121

We caught our boat back and enjoyed some mineral water as the sun started the set and the valley cooled.

_mg_6132_mg_6138_mg_6145

We got back into Cochem at around 1830hrs where we headed back to our in and shared a sweet riesling on the shady terrace.

_mg_6164

Cochem

_mg_6178_mg_6183

 

Germany, Day 1: Looks Like We Made It

Today we left YVR for Germany for 25 days of beer, Bauhaus, Bavaria and burgs (castles).  We decided to fly with KLM because they’re clean, efficient and friendly (and the meals come in little Delft boxes).  The nine hour flight was relatively non-eventful and we landed in Amsterdam at 1000hrs.  Then began our train saga.  We took a train from Amsterdam to Utrecht, then an ICE train from Utrecht to Koln (Cologne to us Anglos, station seen below.  More in a later post as we will be visiting Koln in a few days.), Koln to Koblenz and finally Koblenz to Cochem, which is our home base for the next few days.

_mg_5913

_mg_5925

Cochem is a darling little town in the middle of the Moselle Valley, Riesling wine country.  The train from Koblenz to Cochem was definitely the most picturesque part of the journey, following along the Mosel River, flanked by vineyards, sleepy towns and castles perched on hills (more photos on a later day).  We checked into our inn, Weingut Haxel at around 1830 and admired the shady patio of the inn’s adjoining wine space.

_mg_5926

_mg_5928

_mg_5931

We crossed the street to a sunny patio to fill our very empty bellies and sample a glass (or 2.  Or 4, in my case) of some of the local Riesling, enjoyed the setting sun and cooling off and headed back to our inn so we can be fully charged for our first full day of sight seeing.

_mg_5937