Day Trip to Cochem

Yesterday Jim and I went drove down to Cochem which is a little over an hour south of Bonn. Cochem is a little picturesque German village along the Mosel River. Of course, there was a castle above the town. It seems that all little German towns along a river have a castle in the town. I think we could probably spend every weekend visiting castles, and it would take us a year to see them all.

We walked up to the castle which was a classic turreted castle but we discovered that it was built recently (for European standards) in 1877. We decided against going in as the tours were all in German.

The Mosel Valley is known for white wine and there are vineyards along the steep riverbanks. In Cochem, there is a wine shop on every corner. You can get a Weinprobe (don't worry this doesn't actually involve any probing) to sample 4 different wines. We sampled some white wines but didn't fall in love with anything we tried so didn't end up buying any bottles.

Cochem was a little overrun with day trippers and bad clothing shops, but it was an enjoyable way to spend a few hours wandering around the town.

This will be my last blog posting for about a week. Today is the last day that I will have Internet access at the hotel. Our Internet at our house is being installed on Friday afternoon but then Jim and I are going to France for a long weekend.

I'll have pictures from our cycling weekend in the Arndennes mountains next week. Jim's friend Andrew is renting a house for a week so we are tagging along over the weekend.