2022年3月22日
I parked the old Audi at the still-deserted carpark and walked down to the river.
The Audi is a relic from the fossil fuel age and consumes diesel. I had this very passe (sorry, can't find the French accent on my keyboard) feeling this morning standing at the Shell Tankstelle filling up with litres of this ghastly stuff. I hope that electric cars will soon come down in price, so that I can afford one and not need to drive this vehicle. But it is solid and comfortable, and on the drive from Langen to Rüdesheim am Rhein, I had been able to relax - as at first the airport, then the Rheingau, had floated by in the early Sunday morning sun. Plan? to meet a group of hikers and walk off into the hills - "Pastime with good company".
Rüdesheim am Rhein is a cliche for tourist brochures - the quaint old wine bars, the vineyards themselves, the imposing monument at the top of the hill, and of course the river itself.
And here I was at that river. Everything seemed asleep, the river placid.....
However, there was no denying the strong current pulling at the hawsers of the landing stages.........
....and at the boats themselves............
We haven't had any rain for weeks, and as a result the water level is low. But there is plenty of driftwood .....I had a sudden flashback to the漂流物 at Izu Hantoう (the peninsular in Shizuoka), except that you rarely see bamboo on the shores of the Rhein......
Evidence of recent powerful winter currents.....
I walked towards the station to meet my fellow hikers. That meant crossing the railway. Everything here is sqeezed into the narrow strip of land between the river on one side, and the steep vineyards at the other. Goods trains rumble through, sleek international trains glide by............
and over the road the elegant hotels seem to try and ignore the railway and look out over the water to the further bank....
I'm sure I could detect the aroma of coffee drifting over on the breeze....
I'm not a great "group" person, and often like to explore places at my own pace. But walking with a group of 20 or so people from all different countries is great fun. Today I counted 12 nationalities in our group.
So off from the station we started. Past the Brömserburg Castle, behind which a gothic mansion is tacked on to a medieval tower.....very Rüdesheim!
The vineyard walls are home to many plants, including this....looks almost edible doesn't it? No!
Up we climbed out of the town. We were soon on the well-beaten track that is the "Rheinsteig", with the imposing ruin of Burg Ehrenfels before us......This is great stuff!
It was that ideal walking weather - not to hot and not too cold. True, when we stopped for a lunch break I had to put my jacket back on, but so what?
Turning round, we see Bingen, where the river Nähe joins the Rhein....
There is usually a photo opportunity on these walks, and I took a sort of line up photo when we arrived at the Niederwald Denkmal (didn't get everyone in though 😅)
sometimes you have to stretch to get that angle right !
As somebody said to me as we returned back to Rüdesheim, "what a lovely day, all these people from all different countries just enjoying themselves...."
Yeah, it was great ....すごかった....long may it last.....!
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Very enjoyable writing and photos, Nigel. The river area looks like it holds many days of fine photos walks.