Burg Eltz (Monday 18th September 2017)

First job for the day was to stock the larder so off to Aldi we went. As you’d expect it’s exactly same as in Australia even down to the materials used and design of the front door. Of course, all Aldi brands look vaguely similar to the name brands for a given product. I don’t like the way Germans sell cheese in supermarkets. Everything is packaged in plastic and pre-sliced and quite frankly, rather tasteless. One can’t buy a tasty cheese with real “bite” for love nor money. I thought the red cheddar might offer some hope but, no, it was a miss also. At least the wine is cheap and good.

Today we decided to do our last castle for the trip so we drove over to Wiesenchem to Burg Eltz. I’d seen photos of it and read travel commentary about so it was on the list. Kerry ended up driving most of the way while I organised Wednesday’s adventure via WhatsApp. We’re going to meet up with my old IBM account rep in Luxembourg. He’s owes me a dinner for a favour I did for him before he returned to Belgium a few months ago. WhatsApp must be the best communications app going around. We use it all the time to keep in touch with Emily whether she’s in Paris, Hong Kong or Moonee Ponds.

 

Along the way we followed a beautiful little stream for may kilometres, Because I wasn’t driving I was able to look down at the water, pick where the trout would be lying and wish I had my rod with me. The Burg Eltz lies on a bend of a river that also looks like it would be full of trout. When we caught the shuttle bus from the castle back up to the car park later in the day I found a lovely little dry fly on the floor of the bus. Surely that must be a sign!!

 

 

 We arrived at the castle early afternoon via a lovely 15 minutes walk from the car park through the forest. For sure, it’s very impressive but I reckon the people who created the brochures had access to a better angle than I did. The guided tour (this time in English) was only EUR 10.00. We learned about the history of the castle and the families who had lived there. The castle dates back to 1200 and has been in the same family since then. Originally three brothers inherited it from their father so each family line, over the centuries, built and improved their own homes there. One of the lines died out in the 17^th century leaving the castle to the remaining two who still own it to this day. It’s effectively a private museum with all the art and artefacts being owned by the families. Many of the pieces actually date back to the 15^th and 16^th centuries. Photographs were strictly verbotten on the tour. Kev, I found a “secret passage” or two, one that was disguised as a closet, but because of the restrictions I couldn’t get a photograph of it. The tour took about 45 minutes, we wandered around for a further 30 minutes and then caught the bus back to the car-park. There we had a picnic lunch in the car and headed off around 4:00pm. As we weren't far from Cochem, where we had failed to reach yesterday, we decided to head there.

 

 

Cochem is a lovely little village on the Mosel, overlooked by a castle high on the hill above. The streets of the old town were pretty busy with tourists. Kerry checked out a few souvenir shops and clothes shops and the we found a cafe on the main street. There we enjoyed a Coke and Riesling followed a cappuccino and an expresso. Why was I drinking Riesling while gazing out over the Mosel, I hear you say. Well, I’m yet to find a Moselle to drink. I can only presume that the wine Moselle comes from way further upstream in France. So what I enjoyed in the cafe was actually advertised as “moselriesling”. Gary L, I’m sure you can set me straight in this.

 

On the way home we stopped here and there for photographs and the evening sun on the hills, the vines and the river was, once again, spectacular, arriving in Traben-Trarbach just on dusk.