Day 3- Moselkern and Koblenz, Germany

Day 3- June 25^th

Today we took the train to Koblenz to see the Deutsch Eck. The Deutsch Eck is where the Mosel River begins flowing into the Rhine River. It didn’t sound that interesting to me, but it was actually a very pretty place. There is a neat statue there that you can climb to get a pretty view. After visiting the Deutsch Eck, we walked back to the train station to head to Moselkern. From Moselkern we took at 70 minute hike to the Burg Eltz. The hike was very pretty, except for the fact that it rained on us the entire way to and from the castle. The rain wouldn’t have been bad if we’d been prepared, but both of us forgot to pack an umbrella and Moselkern was a small town with one store that was closed when we walked by. I wonder what the people at the castle were thinking when we walked up with muddy shoes and rain-soaked clothes, I’m sure they were not impressed. Silly Americans! The castle was actually a very pretty site at over 700 years old and it is furnished just like it was 500 years ago. It was amazing to see how people lived that long ago. Overall, the castle was worth the soaking hike it took to get there.

Here is a picture of Jody on the hike to the Burg Eltz Castle (Notice the rain soaked clothes)

This is the Burg Eltz Castle

After spending some time drying out at the train station, we took the train to Cochem. Cochem is another quite town along the Mosel River, we didn’t spend much time in this town, just saw some more scenery of the Mosel River. From Cochem we took the train to Trier where we ate dinner in their market plaza and saw the Porta Nigra. The Porta Nigra is a large gate built by the Romans, when Trier was a Roman capital. After exploring Trier we took the train back to Mainz.

When we arrived in Mainz, Germany had just won the semifinal game in the Euro 2008 soccer tournament. To us it didn’t sound like that big of a deal, but in Germany soccer is life. It was one of the most ridiculous things I’ve ever seen, people were running in the streets, yelling, hanging out of cars, and honking. This was not a fun experience for me because I had no idea what was going on, add to it the fact that it was dark and we got lost on our way back to the hotel. Luckily a nice American was able to point us in the right direction towards our hotel and we made it safely back, but it is definitely a different cultural experience.