Town along the river with vineyards on the hills.
Trail through the woods to the castle.
Castle in the woods.
Please read Part 1 first (see below).
On Saturday, we headed for the wine museum hoping to learn a little bit more about the local wines. About all I knew was that they mostly make Rieslings in sweet, halfdry, and dry. The wine museum was funny in a House-on-the-Rock kind of way. Grandpa collected all the old-time tools of the trade and housed them in the old wine-cellar. He built a big party-room to extend his collection and give space for town “meetings.” The highlight of the tour was the wine tasting at the end. There was a mature woman working at the tasting bar and watching three little red-haired kids playing in the party-room. As we walked up the bar, I was thinking, “Boy, I’m not sure tasting wine at 9:30 in the morning is a good idea.” Then I saw the woman pouring “juice” for one of the little kids. Looking closer, it was red wine and she kept telling the kid “langzamer” which happens to mean the same thing in Dutch as German, “slower.” So, next time the little ones are starting to drive you nuts, just remember that in some places it’s OK to give them booze at 9:30 in the morning! The corollary is to watch what Grandma is serving the kiddies.
For our afternoon activity, we wanted to see the Berg Eltz castle, which Rick Steves calls the best castle in all of Europe. We got in the car with the trusty TomTom and set it for the Berg Eltz castle. Everything was fine until we hit some construction with a detour. The TomTom reset and tried to have us drive over a foot bridge, then it reset again and we seemed to be on the original path following the detour signs on a narrow road up a very steep hill. At the top of the hill it had us turn onto a small farm road, then onto an even smaller farm road. I decided NOT to turn on the dirt road that seemed to go right through the mustard field. Of course at that point, we came upon a truck stopped on the road and there was no room to pass. Turning around was an adventure because there was a very steep drop off on one side and a hill on the other. I did a 49 point turn and shut off the TomTom. I drove back the way we came and followed the signs to the Burg Eltz parking lot. Of course this was the Park and Walk lot, but it was better than rolling the car off the side of the mountain.
It ended up that we had a lovely hike through the deep dark forest. There was a gurgling creek, tall pine trees, and ferns and ivy on the ground. It was still cold, wet, and rainy and the trail was muddy but it was like an enchanted forest. After about 40 minutes of scrambling up the muddy rocks, we arrived at the castle. This castle is unusual because it’s still held by the original family that built it and it was never destroyed during any of the wars. One section of the castle is still being used by the current generation, but they’ve opened the rest of the castle for tours. The castle was cool in a very literal way. By the time the tour was over, we were both frozen. Good thing we had a 40 minute hike to warm us up on the way back to the car!
At this point, we decided to go to a nearby town and get some hot tea and watch people go by. It was getting a little bit late in the afternoon and the sun was breaking out through the clouds for the first time all weekend. We found a little ice cream shop in a cute town square. It was in the sun and out of the cold wind. A few minutes there and we were feeling quite a bit warmer and ready to eat some ice cream. Apparently, the Germans know how to make ice cream, unlike the Dutch who have not yet figured this out. You’d think in a country where people drink milk at every meal that they would have good ice cream, but really it’s awful. So, I was thrilled to have yummy REAL ice cream. The town wasn’t so interesting though, so we drove back to the hotel and decided to check out some of the wineries nearby.
The first winery we stopped at was a small cellar (think basement with a garage door) run by a little old lady. We asked for dry white wine, but she was pushing the half-dry. Well, the point of tasting is to try new stuff, so we tried it and it was really good and not too sweet. We did taste her dry wine, but we agreed with her that the aromatics seemed to be lost. When we told her we live in the Netherlands, she said her daughter lives in the Veluwe region of the Netherlands. After we tasted the wine, we spotted some kirshwasser on her table. We asked to try it. As she served it, she said it’s really good with champagne. I knew we had a bottle of champagne at home that someone had given us, but I don’t really like it so we hadn’t opened it yet. We bought the kirshwasser to go with it. Now at this point, I should explain that all of this communication happened with us speaking English and her speaking German. It’s funny how much we were able to understand and we really enjoyed talking to her.
Our next stop we a yuppy-looking wine shop with all the modern décor fitting more with Napa Valley than Mosel. The guy running the shop spoke really good English so I was finally able to learn a little bit more about the local grapes and the wine making processes. He also had some lovely wines. We tasted a really nice oak-aged wine that was like chardonnay. He had a good red wine similar to Bordeaux. We were having fun discussing the different flavors and techniques. Finally, he had us taste his special Riesling from the very top of the hill and from 2008 which was a really good year. Unfortunately, I really didn’t like this one! It was dry enough, but the aroma was like honey, which I don’t like. He was disappointed, but I still managed to buy 6 bottles of wine from him. These were by far the best wines we had tasted and of course the more expensive ones. Most of the other wines we tasted were about 4 euros per bottle (very cheap) and these were 7 or 8 euros. Considering that last time we were in Napa, none of the bottles were less than 15 dollars, I felt we were still getting a pretty good deal. And, my mission of learning a bit about the local wines was accomplished.
On Sunday morning, the sun was out and you could tell it was going to be a glorious day. Too bad we had to drive home. Apparently, all the other people in the hotel were leaving early and by the time I got up to shower, there was no hot water. I was also a bit tired of cold bread with meat and cheese for breakfast. Would it kill you to have a toaster? OK, maybe I was just getting a little cranky. It really is time to go home after all. The drive was pretty relaxing and we only hit traffic a few miles before we got to our exit. We were glad that we made the most of the holiday weekend even if the weather wasn’t very cooperative.
For our afternoon activity, we wanted to see the Berg Eltz castle, which Rick Steves calls the best castle in all of Europe. We got in the car with the trusty TomTom and set it for the Berg Eltz castle. Everything was fine until we hit some construction with a detour. The TomTom reset and tried to have us drive over a foot bridge, then it reset again and we seemed to be on the original path following the detour signs on a narrow road up a very steep hill. At the top of the hill it had us turn onto a small farm road, then onto an even smaller farm road. I decided NOT to turn on the dirt road that seemed to go right through the mustard field. Of course at that point, we came upon a truck stopped on the road and there was no room to pass. Turning around was an adventure because there was a very steep drop off on one side and a hill on the other. I did a 49 point turn and shut off the TomTom. I drove back the way we came and followed the signs to the Burg Eltz parking lot. Of course this was the Park and Walk lot, but it was better than rolling the car off the side of the mountain.
It ended up that we had a lovely hike through the deep dark forest. There was a gurgling creek, tall pine trees, and ferns and ivy on the ground. It was still cold, wet, and rainy and the trail was muddy but it was like an enchanted forest. After about 40 minutes of scrambling up the muddy rocks, we arrived at the castle. This castle is unusual because it’s still held by the original family that built it and it was never destroyed during any of the wars. One section of the castle is still being used by the current generation, but they’ve opened the rest of the castle for tours. The castle was cool in a very literal way. By the time the tour was over, we were both frozen. Good thing we had a 40 minute hike to warm us up on the way back to the car!
At this point, we decided to go to a nearby town and get some hot tea and watch people go by. It was getting a little bit late in the afternoon and the sun was breaking out through the clouds for the first time all weekend. We found a little ice cream shop in a cute town square. It was in the sun and out of the cold wind. A few minutes there and we were feeling quite a bit warmer and ready to eat some ice cream. Apparently, the Germans know how to make ice cream, unlike the Dutch who have not yet figured this out. You’d think in a country where people drink milk at every meal that they would have good ice cream, but really it’s awful. So, I was thrilled to have yummy REAL ice cream. The town wasn’t so interesting though, so we drove back to the hotel and decided to check out some of the wineries nearby.
The first winery we stopped at was a small cellar (think basement with a garage door) run by a little old lady. We asked for dry white wine, but she was pushing the half-dry. Well, the point of tasting is to try new stuff, so we tried it and it was really good and not too sweet. We did taste her dry wine, but we agreed with her that the aromatics seemed to be lost. When we told her we live in the Netherlands, she said her daughter lives in the Veluwe region of the Netherlands. After we tasted the wine, we spotted some kirshwasser on her table. We asked to try it. As she served it, she said it’s really good with champagne. I knew we had a bottle of champagne at home that someone had given us, but I don’t really like it so we hadn’t opened it yet. We bought the kirshwasser to go with it. Now at this point, I should explain that all of this communication happened with us speaking English and her speaking German. It’s funny how much we were able to understand and we really enjoyed talking to her.
Our next stop we a yuppy-looking wine shop with all the modern décor fitting more with Napa Valley than Mosel. The guy running the shop spoke really good English so I was finally able to learn a little bit more about the local grapes and the wine making processes. He also had some lovely wines. We tasted a really nice oak-aged wine that was like chardonnay. He had a good red wine similar to Bordeaux. We were having fun discussing the different flavors and techniques. Finally, he had us taste his special Riesling from the very top of the hill and from 2008 which was a really good year. Unfortunately, I really didn’t like this one! It was dry enough, but the aroma was like honey, which I don’t like. He was disappointed, but I still managed to buy 6 bottles of wine from him. These were by far the best wines we had tasted and of course the more expensive ones. Most of the other wines we tasted were about 4 euros per bottle (very cheap) and these were 7 or 8 euros. Considering that last time we were in Napa, none of the bottles were less than 15 dollars, I felt we were still getting a pretty good deal. And, my mission of learning a bit about the local wines was accomplished.
On Sunday morning, the sun was out and you could tell it was going to be a glorious day. Too bad we had to drive home. Apparently, all the other people in the hotel were leaving early and by the time I got up to shower, there was no hot water. I was also a bit tired of cold bread with meat and cheese for breakfast. Would it kill you to have a toaster? OK, maybe I was just getting a little cranky. It really is time to go home after all. The drive was pretty relaxing and we only hit traffic a few miles before we got to our exit. We were glad that we made the most of the holiday weekend even if the weather wasn’t very cooperative.
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