We arrived in Koblenz this morning around 8:00, and were going on our first excursion at 9:00 to the Marksburg Castle. Before disembarking, another Viking cruise ship rafted next to us and the passengers had to pass through our boat to get to land.

We took buses to the castle, which was built in 1243. The walkways up to the castle were treterous; originally for the horses the were not easy walking.  One interesting  feature was the modern outdoor plumbing that entailed a bathroom on the second floor in the master bedroom, and there was a hole. The hole led no where, just emptied the waste outside. Not something you’d want to walk over. The people used to drink 3 liters of wine a day, but it was only 5% alcohol, and they mixed water into the wine. We saw the torcher chamber, the armor room with multiple coats of armor and a chastity belt. There was a beautiful small church with painted ceilings. Nancy and I liked the kitchen, Bowman liked the doors, and John liked the torcher chamber.

After leaving Koblenz, at one point where the river narrows and is at its deepest, there’s a steep rock to the left when traveling south called the Lorelei. According to the legend, it was here where the beautiful maiden used to sit and sing sweet songs. The poor sailor who was lured to his doom by her Singing.

We drove back to the ship, which was now in a different location. We had another lovely lunch, set sail, and then we started entering the small German cities on the Rhine that we were all waiting for. Up until now the view from the top deck has been steel mills, cargo ships, cows and flat land. Now we were in wine country, rolling hills and both castles and churches.

Towns we passed along the way included in the order In which we traveled

• Rhine valley vineyards – the longest stretch of Reising vineyard in the valley
• Boppard – where we saw a beautiful church with the bells ringing
• Bad Salzig – where we saw two castles owned by feuding brothers. Legend is that one shot an arrow from his castle over to the others, and accidentally killed him
• Oberwesel – Schonberg Castle, and one of my favorite churches (St Werners) so far. It’s orange on the bottom.

just after dinner we made a left turn and moved from the Rhine to the Mainz on our way to Miltenberg. But we don’t arrive there until about 2:30 tomorrow afternoon. While typing this blog, I was shocked to feel a jolt, like we hot something. When I opened the curtains, all I saw was a metal wall. We were in a lock, about 15 feet below www level. It was a little creepy, but I watched us rise, and at one point our balcony was level with the ground and I placed my hand on it. When we rose to the top, the light turned green and we were allowed to proceed. Wild