Looking at the listing, we found our train to Cochem and hopped aboard. After a short ride, we arrived in Cochem, a rather small town right on the Mozel. Walking down the streets, we got a feel for "crazy" european drivers who were taking the quick turns fast and barreling down the straight roads. After a short walk we found the visitor station and discovered that there is a bus that takes you up to the castle Reichsburg in the courtyard outside. For 4 euros we were headed to the top of another steep hill. As we drove through the town, we saw the tour guides that Rick Steves talks about in his videos, one was holding a paddle with a red dot and telling about the history of the town, while pointing out the local merchants to buy trinkets. On the drive up the narrow street, we were surrounded by grape vines, it is amazing how steep the locals will grow their vines.
After getting off of the bus, there was a cobblestone path to the top. From here you could get an impressive view of the grape vines and there were even some rows labeled. Along the walk up was a tall rock wall on our right with imbedded stone chairs for the more weary traveler. When we got past the first gate, we saw the display for the falconer- there are more times then just 11am (since we had missed that one)- we were ecstatic, both of us really wanted to see the falcon show and our guide book said 11am was it. After our tour we will be coming back down for this one! Heading up above the falconry, we got a wonderful view of the Mozel and a small town on the other side too. Through another smaller gate, and we were in the gift shop where we could get our tickets. While Mark got those, I looked around and fell in love with this cute little sheep on one of the back shelves- he has felt ears, a fuzzy wool-like body and cute little wooden legs with a little plaid collar and two bells. After getting the sheep we learned that the next tour would start in 7 minutes, so we hung out for a bit outside of the shops doorway.
Our tour guide was dressed up in German attire and gave us english copies of the tour- so this was another German tour. And most of the people on the tour spoke German, there were also some Italians, but no more Americans. It is rather odd to go on a tour with German's, they are very quiet, they don't ask any questions to the tour guide, and their children are very well behaved. After a bit, we figured out that the tour guide was telling the tour more than our little English version, so we started asking questions about the "oohs" and "ahhs" at the end of her German speeches. We learned that the lower part of the castle was built by Franconian Palatine counts around 1000 AD. As with most German castles, this one was destroyed by French soldiers in 1689. Then along came a rich Berlin merchant, Louis Ravene, who rebuilt the castle as a 19th century chateau. His decedents were forced to sell the castle in 1942 to the Reich and since I was born (1978) the town has owned the castle.
The rooms that we toured included the dining hall (beautiful wooden ceiling done in poker-work, which means that the patterns were burnt in and then painted- the room also contained a fake door for symmetry), the gothic room (with appropriate gothic arches and a beautiful secretaries desk with wood that seemed to ripple, accomplished by cutting the wood next to the roots), Romanesque room (which held a beautiful 16th century stove and two secret passageways, one was an escape for the doctor down to the town monastery and the other led up to the bedrooms), room above the last gate (contained a mermaid lamp- we rubbed her tummy for good luck), walked down a staircase the wrong way (for sword defense- assuming your aggressor was coming up the stairs) to the hunters' room (containing 5 liter tankards showing the amount of wine one monk was allowed to drink and yellow bulls-eye glass panes in the stained glass windows which look like the bottom of coke bottles), the Knights' Hall (the largest room in the castle with the heavy curved ceiling carved and stuccoed and supported by large oak pillars), the Weapons room (containing armor for a 7 foot tall Austrian), Balcony (which Mark got some great views from), the room connected to the Balcony (contained a silver lined drinking horn and a secret doorway under the stairs), the well (150 feet deep, fortunately the sun was out and we could watch her drop water to the bottom), and as we walked out we saw the witches' tower (the only original part of the castle) and a large mosaic of St. Christopher on the west side of the main tower.
Then we headed back down to the courtyard to eat our lunch (turkey sandwich from the train station for Mark and a left over Wienersnitzel and hard roll sandwich for Laura). We tried to help some italians, telling them that the tours were upstairs, but Italian is too far from Spanish- pointing helped the most I think. As a crowd gathered for the falconry, we shuffled through the gate and looked at her three owls, a buzzard eagle, hawks and falcons lined up aside one wall of the castle. Each bird had what appeared to be a large dog house (hip high) with a bar in the shade for them to roost on and a large rock placed about two foot in front for them to get a bit of sunlight. From the rock to the back of their house was a metal cable (like a dog run) that would let the birds fly out to the rock and back.
Initially the lady Falconer put all the birds in their houses and blocked the entrances with a plywood door. Then she took out a little owl who squawked over and over. Giving two gents leather gloves, she had the owl hop from one arm to the other squawking the entire time (getting treats from her leather satchel at each destination). After the older men had supported the little owl, some of the younger boys were eager to do the same. Next she took out the Harris hawk- called Harris. Grabbing the leathers on his feet, she threw the hawk to temporarily roost on parts of the nearby castle walls. Next she had him visit some of the observers- landing on a bald mans head, hopping from shoulder to shoulder along the guests- Mark had him sit on his shoulder for a bit! He said that the claws didn’t hurt, you just feel the weight of the bird. Next she took out the Maltese falcon. She launched him into the air and we all searched for his landing. After a bit he roosted on top of one of the turrets. Taking out a stuffed leather-like bird, the Falconer started swinging the bird-replica over her head, speeding up each time the falcon got close. It was amazing; the hawk would fly in between the crowd, the fence posts, over our heads, trying to catch that little leather bird. At the end she put the leather on the ground and the falcon happily attacked it- on one side was a pocket with some raw meat that the falcon devoured.
After the show, we had the opportunity to talk with the Falconer about the birds. The little owl she had at the beginning was a newer baby that they had gotten- I guess that was why he was complaining so much. We learned the names of the hawks and falcons along with seeing the large eagle buzzard Galadrial up close. It was an amazing show and encounter!
After refilling our water bottle, we headed back down the narrow street to the center of town and saw platform 9 3/4 right next to the train station (it was a bar, but don’t tell the Harry Potter fans that). Next we took a train down to Mozelkern. When we got there, the town looked deserted, we started following signs to information, but couldn’t find the information building, so we started following signs to Burg Eltz. Following alongside a little stream, we came to a pedestrian path in the woods. Continuing along, still next to the now wider stream, we came to a noisy metal bridge and continued on a dirt road. We walked past a nice inn, some tractors and a field, now with the stream on our right. Continuing on the path, we left the stream and hit the hiking path. Mostly the path was flat, but what our guidebook said was a 45 minute hike turned out to be an hour and 15 minutes. It seemed like we walked around a hill (thank goodness it wasn’t over the hill), with a rushing river getting farther and farther below us on the right. Turning a sharp corner we saw a large meadow and then the castle right before us. It looked amazing!
Walking over a narrow metal bridge and up several flights of stairs and we arrived just in time to purchase the tickets for an English tour in 7 minutes. You wait in the courtyard, the inner courtyard surrounded on all sides by the residential section of the castle. This was Rick Steve’s favorite castle, and I know why. This is one of only a few non-ruined castles in Germany, it is much lower to the ground and less visible than the other castles we had seen so far. Since it is original, it contained all the original tapestries to help insolate the walls. There were over 40 fireplaces (where most castles contained only 2 or so), and housed three families (originally from the same branch). The structure was built in the 11th century and is still privately owned (we saw a picture of the small family- who still come back to live there, so we couldn’t visit the entire castle). We were surprised at how small the rooms were because the structure looked so large when we first saw it, but the walls were very thick. Unfortunately we couldn’t take pictures inside, but before I knew that rule, I got a shot of some armor and weapons. In the main dining hall- the largest room in the castle, we also saw the “rose of silence”- to keep all that you heard to your self when you left- and the “jester”- to be able to talk freely. In one bedroom, the bed was up 2 feet from the ground and canopied to keep the heat. In that same room, the also took out the white washing to reveal the older Chinese-like flower paintings underneath. There was also a small sanctuary, jutting out from the walls so that no one was higher than God. We saw two women’s rooms (with clothes presses, spinning wheels and sewing odds and ends) and two men’s rooms (rather dark and lodge like with hunting prizes around it). There were also a large number of toilets, which you flushed by pouring a pitcher of water down afterwards. The last room was the kitchen, with its gigantic chopping block, amazingly large and scary wooden fireplace for cooking, a cold room just deep in the walls of the castle for storage and racks above our head to hang meats, pots and herbs.
After the hike and the tour we were looking forward to a nice meal in the café before we left, but since the café was closed, we got to try another traditional German meal- meat and cheese salad. Imagine square worms of ham and a light white cheese tossed in Italian dressing, and you have the meal. Mark really enjoyed it, but I enjoyed the sprite more. Feeling a bit refreshed, we walked quickly back (still took us an hour) trying to ignore our ever-present foot and leg pain to make it just in time for the train to Koblenz. Along the way, we saw a tall- almost spindly bridge with only 5 supports- and lots of pleasure boats along the Mozel. Once we arrived to Koblenz, we asked a ticket person at the train station about out how to get to Triberg tom. And then happily took a taxi back up to the fortress- best 13 euros yet!
Since we had already had dinner, we both got desert at sunset at the fortress restaurant of ice cream (vanilla and strawberry) and fruit (grapes, apples, cantelope, plum, raspberries). After we both took wonderful showers and 2 Advil each to dampen the pain, we slept blissfully!
