The end of the road

Just to let people know that we have arrived home safely and all is well. A big thank you to our lovely neighbours who keep an eye on the house and cut the grass while we are away. As we hope you gathered, we had a fantastic trip and we know we are so lucky to be able to do this.  Now we are slowly getting through the mounds of washing, tidying up the garden and preparing for winter.  So that is the end of our ramblings for a while, see you next year!

Homeward bound

Since our last post we have been in the Eifel region, dodging the showers, enjoying some autumn sunshine and definitely putting the heating on overnight – there was ice on the van this morning!

We left Koblenz on Monday and drove west to Gerolstein.  On the way Ray noticed some strange shaped hills and it gradually dawned on us (the signs to the Vulkanpark being a clue) that we were crossing the German volcano region.  By the time we realised, the main sights were behind us, so a visit to that area must wait for another trip.

We stayed at a good camp site just outside Gerolstein, where the pitches were on a terrace with an incredible panoramic view.  It was entertaining sitting watching the view appear and disappear as waves of cloud and rain came up over the valley.  As this was only the second day of the whole trip that we have been confined to the van, we couldn’t complain, and we hear it has been much worse in parts of the UK. 

Changing weather at Gerolstein - over 15 minutes

We then moved on to Monschau, very close to the Belgian border and perfect for a short stop.  Monschau is a fair sized town with picturesque black and white half-timbered buildings perched in a narrow river valley (with dippers, another favourite bird).  Now it is a great tourist draw, with lots of craft and gift shops and cafes, but it has a long history of cloth making industry, so is interesting too. We spent a day pottering about the town, walking up to the castle, visiting the ‘Red House’ – a huge private house which belonged to a cloth making family and is now on display like a National Trust property.  It has a particularly famous staircase, which is indeed impressive. 

 

The weather forecast for Sunday was very good, and it was absolutely right. We took advantage of the sunshine and went for a long walk along the river valley and back through a couple of little villages. While following the path through the forest, we were surprised by a large red fox which suddenly crossed in front of us.  One of the real pleasures of motorhoming is that you sometimes come across places you would never otherwise see – our find of the day was a ‘hedge walk’ (Heckenweg) round the village of Hofen.  Most of the houses in the village are surrounded by enormously tall beech hedges, many 10 m tall, and all immaculately clipped, some with ‘windows’ cut in them to let in the light to the windows in the houses.  They must have originally been for shelter, but it has really become an art form and locally they are clearly quite famous. It is an astonishing sight, but who would think of going to see a hedge?

Always take supplies with you into the forest..

Now we are back at Buysscheure, not far from Calais.  It has taken about 5 hours to drive here from Monschau, mostly motorway through Belgium, very bumpy, lots of road works, but it is done.  It is very quiet here at the campsite and has a very end of season feel – I asked about bread for the morning and was met with a shake of the head, a gallic shrug and ‘C’est octobre, madame’ as if people stop eating breakfast in autumn. 

The end in sight

We have spent the last few days slowly making our way down the Mosel from Trier to Koblenz.  The scenery is fantastic, with a good road following the river round many twists and turns, pretty villages and small towns along the riverside, and behind them, unbelievably steep vineyards planted on the hillsides.  Some of the vineyards have little monorails up between the vines, presumably to take workers and tools up, and grapes down.  We haven’t seen any harvesting yet, though lots of the vines have had excess leaves cut off to allow the last rays of sun to shine on the ripening fruit.

After Trier, we wondered if we would find anywhere to stop for the night before Koblenz, as there seemed to be so many motorhomes about.  But there are also lots of stellplatz – the very basic cheap and cheerful sites – some provided by the villages along the route, and some on private land.  We hit on the idea of turning up just before noon, and hopefully getting a space that someone had just vacated.   The plan worked and we spent a couple of nights at Lösnich, right on the riverbank, cycle path behind, and it was really lovely. We missed Bernkastel, the famous wine-town, by virtue of roadworks and diversions, but maybe Lösnich was better. We walked up through the vineyards into the forest, which was full of birds – treecreepers and nuthatches all over the place, and a crested tit, one of my favourites. 

Stellplatz at Losnich

 

One of the autumn delicacies we have seen advertised everywhere is a drink called ‘Federweisser’ eaten with a slice of Zwiebelkuchen, or onion tart.  Vegetarians, don’t get too excited, the onion tart comes with a good portion of bacon, but for meat-eaters, it is very tasty.  We are still not quite sure what Federweisser is – we think part fermented grape juice, but it tastes a bit apple-y, like mild cider.

My first Federweisser

Our next stop was at Ernst, just outside Cochem, another tourist hot-spot.  We nearly didn’t stop as the Stellplatz was most odd and not very scenic, with pitches arranged around two concentric circles, all asphalted and sloping every which-way – like parking on a sloping roundabout.  But it was where we wanted to be, and all turned out for the best.  We set off into town and found that there was a walnut fair going on (and why not?).  People are much more into foraging here, we saw people collecting hazelnuts in France, and here fresh walnuts are very much the thing.  So we had walnut-sausage in a bun for lunch, plus a glass of very nice Riesling, bought some walnut cheese, listened to the band and generally had a good time.  Later on we cycled into Cochem, carefully avoiding the walnuts falling out of the trees, or was that too much wine?  Cochem is pretty and  interesting, with a couple of castles and a very old centre, but very touristy – think Matlock Bath on a Sunday if you know Derbyshire.

Cochem castle

At the Walnut festival

Your thought we were joking...

 

We have had a brilliant run of weather, glorious sunshine most of the way, though it is definitely turning colder.  The last couple of days, though, have been quite showery, so we decided to move on to Koblenz.  The drive along the last part of the Mosel was lovely, it is obvious why people come here on holiday.  We are staying just outside Koblenz, and today we have been into the city to check that the Mosel does meet the Rhine (it does).  We seem to remember that Koblenz is twinned with Norwich, but didn’t see anything to say so.

Where the Mosel meets the Rhine

  It seems ages ago we were standing at the source of the Moselle in France – it is just over two weeks ago in reality.  Plan A is completed, we have done it, and now have just a week left of our trip.  The weather forecast is not good, so a bit undecided what to do next.  Will let you know.

Saarburg to Trier

After all the excitement of Metz city life, we needed a few days in the country, so took a short detour away from the Moselle for a look at another big river, the Saar at Saarburg.  We don’t know much about German holiday spots, but guessed this might be a good one from the number of camp-sites nearby, and it is a real gem.  Saarburg is a small town on a big river, but it could hardly be more picturesque. It is built on and around a rocky outcrop and manages to incorporate a canal flowing under little bridges lined with hanging baskets, endless pavement cafes, a waterfall with working millwheels,  and high up on the rock, a ruined castle and a couple of steepled churches.  All this and little cobbled streets of smart brightly painted old houses, and in the background, hills with vineyards.  By the way we have noticed that on a sunny day at 4pm in France the cafes are full of people drinking a small beer, glass of wine or soda, in Germany, at least so far, they are eating ice-cream sundaes and apfel strudel with lashings of cream!

Saarburg

Around Saarburg

Mosel and Saar meet at Konz

 We had really good weather at Saarburg so we spent one day cycling along the Saar towards Trier – and reached the point where the Saar flows into the Mosel as we must now call it.  Although, or perhaps because, we don’t speak French or German anything like fluently, it is very hard to go from one language to the other in the space of a few hours or kilometers. There is, of course, a tarmac cycle path right along the riverbank in both directions so the cycling is mostly flat and easy, with an occasional biergarten for coffee and cake along the way.  We also managed to do a really long walk through the hills and vineyards around Saarburg, so we saw all the views from all the angles.  It really is a pretty spot and we were sad to leave. 

Yesterday we travelled on to Trier – the number of motorhomes in the area is increasing rapidly, unless they are all, like us, driving round looking for somewhere to stay!  We had thought we would go to a Stellplatz at a winery, which had been recommended to us, but when we found it, it was full to bursting so actually didn’t look that pleasant, so we made for a camp-site nearby that we have visited before, which apart from a fiendish shower system, is a nice riverside site with lots of boats and barges going past.  And as of this evening a float-plane, which taxied down the river, turned, accelerated and took off right in front of us.

Crane?

Float plane on Mosel

 Today we have visited Trier – a city we visited last year and thought worth a return trip.  It has a lot of Roman remains, including bath houses, gates and an amphitheatre. On the banks of the Mosel there are some ancient cranes which were powered by human treadmills, now looking picturesque on the cycle path.  There is also the much restored Constantine’s throne room, which is now the evangelical protestant church in Trier and is a lovely building.  Every day in September the church is doing a 10 minute ‘thought for the day’ with music, homily and prayer, and we managed to catch it today.  It was good to sit there and reflect for a few minutes, even if we didn’t follow it all – we are almost certain it was about sheep as they gave us some wool to remind us of the theme.  Thinking of themes, we hope that the Harvest Festival Services at home go well.

Constantine's basilica

And finally - a bus stopped for a coffee break!

More from Metz

While at Charmes, we took advantage of the voie verte, (green way) or cycle track along the canal towpath, which in turn follows alongside the Moselle river.  10km upstream is the little town of Chatel sur Moselle, which has a huge castle complex, seemingly being lovingly restored by volunteers, to judge from the hand-written information boards.  The town itself is less than a one-horse- town (i.e no prospects for lunch), though it did boast a couple of donkeys (in a field, not on a menu).  With all this water around it is clearly a great place for fishing, in fact one chap had his fishing rod laid down across the cycle track and must have been in a world of his own as he didn’t respond to Ray’s cycle bell, and didn’t notice us at all till we rode close enough to stop and say ‘Pardon, monsieur’ in our best French.

Our next stop was at Toul, as we decided to bypass Nancy in case of more, or continuing, bus strikes.  We managed to find the small but perfectly formed ‘aire’ in Toul, just space for 9 motorhomes, 5 euros a night with water, electricity and a view across the canal to the town included.  It is outside the police station so we felt quite safe. We liked Toul – it seemed more of a going concern than some little towns, with proper shops and the most amazing civic flower displays – like something from the Chelsea Flower Show.  The town is seriously fortified with huge and complex ramparts all around its perimeter and some very beautiful old streets and buildings within its walls.  We are, of course, in the Lorraine area, and for lunch managed to find a ‘Formule Lorraine’ which included a huge piece of excellent quiche Lorraine with chips and salad, followed by a slice of nut cake, also delicious.  We didn’t need another meal till breakfast the next morning!

View from the aire

So now we are in Metz, which as Ray says, will be nice when it is finished.  We drove into Metz relying totally on Lady Satnav, as we didn’t really know where the campsite was.  She, and we, soon got confused by the number of diversions, as the whole city is a mass of roadworks, we think they are putting in a new bus or tram system, it is a massive undertaking.  Fortunately we began to see signs for ‘camping’ and arrived safely, if a little fraught.  This is a very busy camp site and not the best, but it is so close to the centre of town, and on the banks of the Moselle, so we are not complaining.  We have walked miles looking round the city, which is interesting as there are distinct areas built under different rulers e.g the old kingdom of Lorraine, the French monarchy and republic and the parts built under German occupation.  For those of you with a taste for the ‘flamboyant gothic’ architectural style, Metz is a must see.  There is also a very modern satellite Pompidou centre, I suppose like the satellite Tate galleries in England.  The cathedral is immense, with the tallest nave in France (apart from the two taller ones – who writes this stuff in the travel guides?) and some incredible stained glass, including three windows designed by Chagall, who I think is a local hero. And we liked the sense of humour displayed in a big temporary garden outside the Opera House, which poked fun at the traffic chaos in garden form.  Metz has seen Sheila get us into another bad habit - honey flavoured with nuts.  A speculative purchase at a small farmer’s market, in the foyer of a local supermarket, it has proved to be absolutely delicious.

Chagall window

Moselle at Metz

Today we are moving on again, always supposing we can find our way out of Metz through the roadworks, and going further downstream towards Trier and those Moselle vineyards.