7 May 2009 Up earlier than usual so that Roger could catch up with blog writing. The short walk into the centre of Speyer dominated all the way by the Cathedral. We walked the length of the main street lined with outdoor cafes to the only surviving medieval gate tower. From its top we had a view over the town and surrounding countryside and a glimpse of the Rhine. The Romanesque 11th century cathedral was stunning. It certainly lived up to its classification as a world heritage site. Its unadorned interior of red and yellow sandstone let the building speak for [View Full Entry]

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6 May 2009 Trier is on the site of a Roman settlement founded in 15BC and became the capital of the Western Roman Empire by the 3rd century AD. It has many monuments and buildings to see from that era and later. We spent the day in the town and then drove 200k south east to Speyer back on the Rhine. [View Full Entry]

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5 May 2009 We continued our delightful way down the Mosel to another twin town surrounded by vineyards, Bernkastel-Kues, which had plenty of fine buildings and another ruined castle to walk up to. On the way down from the castle we met a British couple, the first tourists from home we had seen since the start of the trip and amazingly they lived less than a mile away from us in England and had remembered seeing our van parked in the drive when they walked past our house. For lunch we had grilled perch with sauerkraut and mashed potatoes, a mixture [View Full Entry]

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4 May 2009 It has been a subject of debate over the last few days whether we should continue the trip along the Rhine or Mosel river. In the end we chose the Mosel and what a good decision it was! We first drove south along the Rhine to Koblenz and then turned south west along the Mosel. The road runs alongside the river for mile after mile as it winds along most attractively with vineyards clinging to the steep hills on both sides. We stopped the night at Traben - Trarbach, a twin town on both banks of the river. [View Full Entry]

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3 May 2009 Another 20 mile day of cycling along the Rhine this time southwards. We first went to Remagen where we enjoyed the Sunday market. Then over the ferry to Linz a town of many fine half timbered houses. The cycle track for the way home was mainly on minor roads and took us through several attractive villages. We also passed the remains of a bridge which was destroyed in March 1945 (we couldn’t work out by which side) and never rebuilt. When I was updating the blog at the local internet café I established that Blues had been promoted [View Full Entry]

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2 May 2009 Today was the Rhine in Flames Festival day and the weather was perfect. However it turned out to be a bit of a disappointment for us. The festival takes place after dark and is a 26k procession of about 60 illuminated boats past where we are camping with six firework displays on the way climaxing in Bonn. We had hoped to ride on one of the boats but the campsite were unable to get us a ticket. They recommended we watch it from a vantage point in the hills at the back of us. We spent the day [View Full Entry]

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1 May 2009 Today was a public holiday in Germany. Under cloudless skies and with what seemed like half the population of the city we did a 19 mile cycle ride along the Rhine to Bonn and back. Bonn was formerly the capital of West Germany prior to reunification when the parliament was moved to Berlin. There are two squares in the Aldstat district, the old town. One had a political rally and the other a craft fair today, both of which were really enjoyable. The camp site here has an open air bar with many tables around it. We couldn’t [View Full Entry]

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30 April 2009 A lazy day with a walk around the village and a gentle cycle ride along the river to the nearest town, Mehlem, to do some shopping. [View Full Entry]

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29 April 2009 Another walk, this time along the Rhine to see another Dom, this time in Cologne and the largest and tallest in Germany. We had a guided tour of the huge and most impressive cathedral and the guide explained that it was built on the site of an old roman church between 1248 and 1880 to house the shrine of the Three Kings. This is a bejewelled and gilded sarcophagus said to contain the remains of the Kings brought there from Milan as spoils of war in 1164. There is also magnificent stained glass, the oldest crucifix in existence [View Full Entry]

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28 April 2009 On a day with light rain we walked into the centre of Aachen through the old town gate and visited the Dom (cathedral) where we saw Charlemagnes Palace Chapel, an outstanding example of Carolingian architecture built in 800. This was followed by a tour of the cathedral treasury which included many fines shrines holding many ancient biblical relics. In a very pleasant old town centre the other main building of interest was the gothic Rathus with statues of 50 German rulers on its front elevation. After getting back to the van we drove to Cologne and easily found [View Full Entry]

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