Retired Nomads Part 4: Cochem & Winningen, Germany

Wednesday, July 9

We started with a walking tour of Cochem, Reichsburg Castle & the Moselle Valley Wine Tasting.

Since the Winery could only hold half of the group at a time some of us had the wine tasting first. Nothing like several glasses of wine and a shot of honey vodka at 9:00 in the morning!

The steep slate hillside vineyards of the Mosel are renowned the world over. The owner, Andreas Schlagkamp told us the family history of the winery and was quite entertaining. He is the 11th generation to operate the winery. We sampled 4 or 5 different wines and had a shot of honey vodka which was quite good. After the tour we walked back to the bus to continue to the walking tour portion of the tour.

Schlagkamp Winery & Wine Museum

Riesling

We walked through town for a short walking tour past the medieval town gate, St. Martin's Church, Capuchin monastery (now a culture center) before catching small vans to the 1,000-year-old Reichsburg Castle, conquered by Louis XIV in the Nine Years’ War and later purchased and restored in a splendid Gothic Revival style by a Berlin businessman.

from the bus to town

back in town for the walking tour

a phone booth?

17th-century Capuchin monastery

Cochem Cemetery

We decided to walk instead of taking the vans so we could take photos and stop at the overlooks. We had some time before our time slot for the guided tour, so we wandered and took more photos of the views.

start of the guided tour

ceiling

small chapel in the bedroom

views from a balcony

well

back in town at the cemetery

After the visit of the castle, we boarded the vans back to the town center where we had free time until we caught the last shuttle back to the ship. We stopped at the chocolate shop/bakery that we bought chocolates in yesterday to have apple strudel. We looked for a suitcase to replace Greg's that had a broken wheel when we arrived at the airport in Paris but didn't find one that was suitable.

apple strudel

apple strudel (right before lunch when we got back to the ship)

We had lunch back on board and then had scenic cruising on the Moselle River to dock at Winningen.

many vineyards and small villages along the Rhine (all have name signs of the winery growing them)

going through the locks

several castles along the way

top deck

my mother's maiden name was Lehman (not spelled with a men)

dinner menu

Winningen is probably lesser known than other wine towns but that was part of the charm of the small wine village. After dinner we had an evening walking tour

Scattered throughout Europe, planted in city streets and sidewalks, commemorative brass plaques eternalize the lives that were lost in the Holocaust. Called the Stolpersteine (in English: “stumbling stones”), the plaques commemorate the victims of the Nazi regime.

On the walk we heard the story of the Weinhexenlied, or “wine witch song.” The figure in the center of the fountain represents the wine witch and is said to entice the fountain to reward the efforts of the season’s wine harvest and production with wine from its spout.

Horch received an engineering degree and worked for Karl Benz before founding his own company, A. Horch & Co., in 1899. After leaving his initial company due to disputes, he founded a new automaker, initially also using the Horch name. However, legal action prevented this, and the company was ultimately named Audi, a Latin translation of "Horch" (meaning "to listen").

Birthplace of August Horch who founded both the Horch and Audi automobile companies

We finished the evening at an historic winery for a tasting of the region’s famed Riesling as the same man that did the organ performance played accordion music. Our guide danced with the owner and led us in a "seated dance" to the music.