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!