Berg Eltz and Koblenz

August 30, 2013 - We are really getting more and more settled as the days go by.  Ryan made the 8U soccer team.  He loves it!  Erin tried out for and was selected for the Choir.  She is also in the middle of Basketball tryouts.  And will start Hip-Hop on Monday after Choir. 

We received out Air Shipment on Thursday morning.  They packed a lot of junk that we really don’t need, but we now have all of our clothing so that is good.  Our bikes however did not arrive.  The latest word is that they didn’t fit on the air shipment so were put on the sea shipment.  Let’s hope so!

Friday, Erin & Ryan were off school.  We headed two hours south to see Berg Eltz.  Never ones to take the normal way, we parked at a small hotel and hiked the 3,4 kilometers to the top of the mountains to see the castle.  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moselkern)

 

 

 

Erin and Ryan were not happy when we got to the top and someone mentioned something about the shuttle bus.  The walk was beautiful and not too steep, ok, maybe in a few places.  But we were prepared for it.  Ryan found a “lucky rock”, which he carried all the way to the top.  He said “with it, we make it, without it, we don’t”.  Well we did make it.  I can’t say if it was the rock or not. 

Construction on the castle began sometime before 1157 (yes that makes parts of it over 850 years old) The 33^rd generation of the same family currently owns it, but only visits for conferences a few times a year.  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eltz_Castle)

 

The walk back down was much faster than the way up, obviously. 

 

From there we decided to check out the town of Koblenz.  The drive there was BEAUTIFUL!  Just random castles all along the Rhine River.  Also, it was full of vineyards.  They seem to use every inch of available space, all up the sides of mountains.  I don’t know who is picking these grapes, but I’m glad it isn’t me!

 

Koblenz was a great town too.  We had dinner at this fabulous restaurant called Pizza Hut.  Have you heard of it?  I highly recommend!  (In 15 days we have eaten at McDonalds, Burger King, Pizza Hut, Subway and KFC)  Then the kids got ice cream (ok I did too) and we walked down to the river.  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koblenz)

 

 

Is that really an entire store that only sells White objects?  Yes it was.  Seems like you could really exhaust your inventory quickly.

 

Koblenz is located at the confluence of the Moselle and Rhine Rivers.  Where they meet creates a point of land with a large park and former military fortress.  The other side of the river rises steeply to high cliffs for lack of a better way to explains.  Sound familiar, Pittsburgh?  We thought so too.  Also, they have a Cable Car system, but it’s a little different than the Monongahela ones.  We’ll get back to that!

Anyway, we walked to the confluence to see a humongous statue of Wilhelm I. So impressive! Luckily I got this pic so you can understand the size.  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_I)

All this time, I was eyeing up the Cable Cars.  Ryan was all for it but Mike and Erin took some convincing.  In the end, I think they were both happy they did it.  All’s well that ends well.  I will admit, I was scared, but I had to be better than Mike and Erin, so I didn’t let it show.  Once we got to the top, we immediately got back on because if not, Mike and Erin were grabbing a cab!

After that let the kids spend some time in the fountains then headed home.  I can only imagine how many miles (or kilometers) we walked, but it was all well worth it!