Friday 10th August
Rudesheim - Boppard - Koblenz
We awoke this morning on the Rhine River - we have now left Bavaria . Vineyards are on every hillside to right and left of the boat. We arrived into Rudesheim just after breakfast. All aboard a small road going train to the centre of Rudesheim to 'Siegfried's Musical Instrument Museum'. I was expecting to just see glass cases of old violins etc. but in fact it was room after room of mechanical musican instruments. There were the ones that the monkey grinder would use, and a few Edison Phonograms and pianolas, but what surprised me were the ones that had 7 and more instruments. There was one that as well as drums and bells and piano it had 6 violins. Most had been made around the 1900's. They had all been brought back to life by the collector Siegfried - some had been found dismantled and stored in boxes. It was a quite remarkable collection and I was surprised at how much sound they could produce. We had a bit of a sing-a-long. It was a really good time.
From there it was off up to the top of the hill on the cable car. It was nice looking down on the rows upon rows of reisling grapes growing on the hill side. On top there was a monument built in 1877 to commemorate the unification of Germany. It is a great look out spot. Back down the cable car and a walk through the shops and then on back to the boat.
1.45pm we departed for Boppard. A wine tasting of the Reisling grown in the area was the entertainment. It was a lovely wine. Seeing we were having a wine tasting in the afternoon I had a beer with lunch. The brand is 'Bit Burger' and is really nice. This is a very beautiful area castles up on the top of hill sides, old ruins (some of those are the schnapps visitors from yesterday) and of course many churches. Rows of grapes going from top to bottom and then criss cross and then side to side depending on the terrain. It is really beautiful.
At 5pm we leave by bus, travelling back the way we have just come, 45 minutes, to Reichenfeld Castle. We passed this castlte earlier in the day. It is one that has a tower that then has four small towers attached, one on each side, near the top of the tower. It looks like a Disneyland castle. I said to Den I'd love to be able to go into one of those shaped towers just to see what they were like - never dreaming that I would be able to do just that today. We arrived at the castle - greeted by a drummer - offered more drinks - and then a tour of the castle. The last owner of the castle had been a keen hunter. Every wall in every room we went into was 'decorated' with mounted antlers of all sizes, mostly small ones. It really took away from the whole thing. Any way once we had mentally re-decorated, we really were impressed with the castle. Most of the building had begun 1000 years ago. At that stage it was a toll gate. Each castle had a flag system to let the castle further down the Rhine know when a boat was travelling along so that none of these greedy toll collectors missed out on collecting as much as possible from the passing boats. The original owner of this castle had become very corrupt and was eventually executed, much to the relief of the nearby villages who had also suffered from his corrupt ways. There was always a great deal of fighting ad wars in this area as the French would have liked their boundry to go through to the Rhine and not surprisingly the Germans had other ideas.
The staircases were made from stone, with the side panels being red sandstone. The views were to both directions of the Rhine. The rooms were still furnished as they had been left by the last owners who left in 1900s. The castles along the Rhine are now mostly privately owned but since one was bought by a Japanese chap who had the castle taken down, every stone numbered and rebuilt in Japan, there are strict rules about what you can and can't do with your castle. And so I got to see from one of the small side tower, as I had wished for earlier in the day. It was just a few steps up to a small floor and a window. Not even big enough for any furniture.
It was then down to the banquet hall. More food and drinks. It was a great night, and so back on the bus and we travelled another 50 minutes to where our boat was now docked in Koblenz. We will leave here at 3.30 am and travel to Cologne.
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