I had my eye on a pair of 'gloves' so we went to buy those first. Also bought a bright pink scarf. Only Five Euro each.
Caught a morning boat to Braubach to visit a castle. The boat was supposed to stop at different stops along the way, but it seemed to miss out two. I became a little concerned when I thought that maybe we would miss our stop. Turns out, based on what tickets they sell, they stop at those stops only, or if someone is standing on the dock waiting to be picked up. Seeing as I had told the man when we were getting on we were going to Boppard because I couldn't say Braubach, I thought I better check. The waitress didn't speak enough English to know what I was talking about, so got the waiter. He said I needed to talk to the information man. He happened to be eating lunch so I had to interrupt him and his colleagues to tell him I wanted to get off the boat at Braubach. I felt a bit embarrassed. It turned out we were the only people getting off there, so just as well I asked. In fact, I have just reiterated what I tell my students - the only silly questions are the questions you don't ask. Justin would rather just go by hunch. Not a great idea when you don't speak the language and can't translate anything!
Being a Sunday we were pushing our luck expecting anything to be open. And it wasn't. Tourist Information closed 5 minutes before we got there. Tourist train wasn't running either. So we had to walk up the hill to the Marksberg castle. See picture for height of castle... (it was just like Saint Elmo Castle in Italy all over again - Justin made me walk up a hill for two hours to the castle, only to find there was a funicular (cable car) ride that took 10 minutes!)
Actually it wasn't as bad as it looked. At the time it felt like forever, but the informative info-boards on the way up broke up the walk, just a shame they were in German. Give me 6 months here and I'm sure I'd be able to speak some. It's not as complicated as I first thought.
Before we headed up to the castle we had a nosy around the town.
The old marketplace
The sign on the door reads 'Anno Domini 1610'; that's an old house.
I will conquer this hill! (yes it's cold...and windy)
Note the wall which isn't straight...
Make your own interpretation of this one...
The castle is one of the only well-preserved castles on the Rhine. It was still lived in up until 1945 when it was taken over by German Castle Preservation Trust (or something like that). The rooms are so well preserved and set up, it's probably the best castle I've been to. Can't say I've been to HEAPS but I've sure seen a few in the last 48 hours! The lady who took the tour delivered it in German but we were loaned an English tour book that told us everything we needed to know.
Some of the coats of arms from the rulers of the castle
The 12 pound and 6 pound cannonballs that were shot out of the cannons are on the right, and our tour guide is standing on the right.
This is the view of the toilet from outside. Guess where it ends up...
Wine cellar
Bedroom
Must've been short back then...
The toilet from the inside.
The doorway to this stairwell was so narrow Justin's shoulders were too wide to go through the door without going sideways.
Armor room, with a few other weapons not shown here
Torture chamber, make your own conclusions
Our tour finished at 2.50pm and the boat back to Boppard, where we wanted to go next was at 3.05pm. What do you think the chances were of us making it back to the ticket office to return our guides, and get down the hill to make it on the boat? Well, I don't think if could have run faster if I was part of The Amazing Race! We got down that hill, overtaking a lady on the way who was a little surprised by us, and onto the boat, only to be greeted by the same man who I had spoken to earlier about getting off at Braubach, who laughed a little as us because we were huffing and puffing.
At Boppard we took at chair lift ride up the hill to get a fantastic view of the Rhine River where it has the 'Bendiest Bend' on the Rhine. It was a fantastic view. But in true Curragh-Robinson style, we were again pushed for time as we only had 10minutes to take photos before we had to get back on the chair lift to go back down. You can walk up and down the hill, but watching the people doing it with their Nordic walking sticks, I decided this was stupid idea. A quick look around and just enough time to buy a postcard and send it, we headed to the train station to head home, only to discover the train we thought we were catching only went on Saturdays... Have no fear, they run so often we just waited for another one. Got to try some chocolate peanuts that actually tasted more like snickers M&Ms which I think should be invented.
You can just see the chairlift going up the hill
The view from the chairlift on the way up
Realising that we hadn't eaten lunch because of all our rushing around, we have just sat down in a traditional German restaurant for tea. I'm pretty sure I had half a cow on my plate. Strangely, I've been in Germany for 3 days now and yet to eat saukraut (not sure how to spell it, as I said, haven't eaten it yet...) which was one of the things I was looking forward to most. Aside the sweet Riesling, spatlese and Auslese of course. As posed to this mornings sounds, we are now being serenaded by Elvis and such artists of that era. Quite the contrast. :)
Enjoying my goblet of vino
Off to Belgium tomorrow to finally meet Ann and stay with her for two nights. Really looking forward to being shown things by a local, and visiting the chocolate factory in Brussels. Bring on the chocolate!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:St Goar, Rhine River, Germany
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