Today we began our day with a cruise down the rhine river while our cruise director pointed out all the beautiful castles along the rhine river and their histories. We eventually settled in Koblenz Germany where close to the end of the day I did a drawing of a massive statue.
The was the first of many castles along the rhine river and most of all of them were flanked by fields of grape vines. This was definitely wine country and we constantly marveled at the steepness of the slopes that the grapes were grown on. Harvesting must have been a very arduous task.
More beautiful cities and castles.
This white castle on the hill is Marksburg Castle one of the most prominent of all the castles along the rhine and eventually our day would lead us to a tour of the castle itself.
Another amazing castle, there was literally a ton to see and the later the day got the better the weather became also.
Our tour of Marksburg castle was interesting. It was ancient and there was not much done to modernize it in any way. We were able to see exactly how people lived hundreds of years ago and it was definitely a much harsher life then we have now. Just getting around the castle was very difficult, with wavy cobbled stone paths and tiny stone staircases it was a wonder that some of the older people in our group could actually do the tour.
A nice view of the rhine river from the top of Marksburg castle.
After the tour we went back to the ship for lunch. After lunch Pattie and I took the Koblenz cable car to the other side of the rhine and up into an old fort on the hill. Here is a view from the cable car above the rhine.
This fort was huge! This is a view from up top of the fort and looking down on the rhine river into Koblenz Germany.
We walked around the fort for about an hour where we saw some random sites including a modern art exhibit and an exhibit of the 40 year anniversary of Playmobile. It was all very strange and unexpected.
Here is a great shot of us descending the cable car back to Koblenz.
At this point I needed to get a drawing done and I knew already what I wanted to draw. We had seen this massive status from the ship and from the cable car so I sat in front of it for an hour while the sun was going down and drew.
Deutsches Eck (“German Corner”) is the name of a headland in Koblenz where the Moselle joins the Rhine. In 1897, nine years after the death of the German Emperor William I, the former emperor was honored with this giant equestrian statue.
