Koblenz and Castles

Friday, June 20

After my first good sleep so far, I was up at around 5:30 and went up to find the sun just peeking over the hills in the east. Hills! What a concept. The landscape actually looks a little like home. I could see that I had just missed a little town on the river, disappearing behind us, but a little while later a pealing bell from about where the sun was rising turned into another very small riverside town, with tidy homes right on the water, crowded in with a church, which explained the bell. It was 6:00, and, apparently, that bell rings at 6:00 every morning, waking the town whether they wanted it or not.

Again, the birds and the ship. I can hear the steady hum and feel the slight vibration that may be what is keeping Abbey awake, although she describes it as an uneven sound.

A tanker from the Unibarge company just passed us – almost silently, with just a bit of slicing-through-the-water sounds – and its name was the “Adios.” Probably a story there.

We learned yesterday that the Rhine is much lower than it should be at this time of year; the word “drought” was used. We're informed that we may need to change ships when we arrive at the Danube, unless they get substantial rains, as this one is too big for current Danube conditions.

Speaking of current (what? A pun? Stop it!), I saw evidence of a current in the river for the first time this morning, flowing around the channel markers. I'd love to ask the captain about sailing this ship up this big river – I've read a number of books about navigating the Mississippi (including Mark Twain) and it seems to be a constant battle with changing currents and shifting sands; it has a flow that makes sailing hard. How about the Rhine? All has seemed smooth throughout our journey.

Another town on the other side, where the sun is rising, with a big blocky church (Protestant?) and a smaller, spire-y church (Catholic). Bigger, older buildings, including what might be a Victorian resort hotel on the water. We're coming into a more built-up area. Some industry, a tank farm.

As we continue down the river, the hills become more robust. Towns and or suburbs are built on the hillside; everyone's got a view of the river.

I think the sound of the ship has gotten louder each morning. Still no more than a background hum, but now a substantial presence in an otherwise silent landscape. I wonder if this is because the current that we are sailing against gets stronger the further upriver we go.

Koblenz, at the confluence of the Rhine and the Moselle Rivers – the town name is a descendant of the word “confluence.” Tour was a little bit longer than an hour and a half. Along with Cologne, one of the oldest cities in Germany – Founded by the Romans over 2,000 years ago.
Beautiful overall, with lovely, extensive parks along both riverfronts, and a ridiculously massive equestrian statue where the rivers meet. The statue is of Kaiser Wilhelm I, grandfather of Kaiser Wilhelm II, leader of Germany during the First World War. Eighty seven percent of the buildings in Koblenz (including the equestrian statue) were damaged or destroyed during WWII. But not the Roman wall (the Romans built a lot of walls), much of which is intact, and on which is embossed in stone the symbol of the Knights Templar: an iron cross (see below). This symbol – which was used as a reward for valor in Nazi Germany, and still designates German military vehicles – has often been mistaken for a swastika, which it is not. This did not keep a vandal from defacing this particular 800 year old symbol recently, more's the pity.

Anyway – a very nice town, but we had very little time there. It's off to the Rheingold! Otherwise known as the Rhine Gorge (a gorge! Good heavens!)

This is the part of the Rhine where the castles (schloss for one, burgen for more than one – go figure). The river really does flow through a gorge, with cliffs as high as 433' (the Lorelei, the highest point in the gorge, named for a (I hope) mythological enchantress who lured boatmen to their deaths, much like the Sirens in Greek mythology). The gorge really looks like home more than any landscape so far; specifically, it makes me think of the drowned valleys in Delaware County which are NYC reservoirs – wooded, steeply sloping hills rising right out of the water. The river really changes character here; it's really flowing. You can see its muscle in the whorls and eddies and swirls, and where the gorge gets narrow, there are rapids, and rocks sticking out, making navigation more challenging.

And in this gorge there are 21 castles that are visible from the river. Most of them were built in the late medieval period, burnt and destroyed by the French in 1689, and many of them were rebuilt by the Victorians during the Romantic period in the 19th century.

They're pretty cool, and I'll include pictures when this journal goes online. However, they strike me as kind of theme-parky, as anything that has become a massive tourist draw does. Excursion boats about half the length of our boat (which is big) skim up and down the river, and the quaint, tidy towns that spring up wherever there is flat land (like in the fjords of Norway) seem wholly dedicated to tourism – not in a schlocky way, at all, but it's pretty clear that the towns are mostly hotels and restaurants. The gorge is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and therefore can't be updated – for example, no bridges - which is nice, but I never did find a real connection to history here.

This is the kind of thing that you should spend a couple days working your way through, learning the stories of the castle and the communities around them, learning about the economics that built them in the first place and the people who thought they were a good idea.

I can't figure out why castles on the high ground were a good idea. We hear over and over again that castles commanded the surrounding landscape (in this case, the river), protected the populace and discouraged enemies. Specifically, these castles in the Rhine Gorge were all (according to our onboard guide) built to levy tolls from passing shipping. But how? These castles are huge stone buildings, all or most of the way up the cliffs; the cost of getting all that stone there and putting it together must have been astronomical. And then what do you have? You've put yourself as far from the river as possible. What's to keep me from just sailing by? You've probably got a bunch of ruffians with boats at the water's edge to keep me

from doing that. Fine. So why do you need a castle most of the way up the hill? Wouldn't an efficiently-planned complex at the water's edge fulfill all the functions of a castle, and be a lot less susceptible to siege? And a lot easier and cheaper to build and maintain? A sentry post up on the hill would provide all the advance notice you'd need of traffic coming up and down the river.

If anyone knows the answer, let me know.

We're out of the gorge now, back to real life. The hills can still be seen behind us, but the land is getting pretty flat now. We're passing some small shipyards. The river is still flowing, but it has calmed down some.

Ha! I just went up to the roof deck because the lounge was getting noisy (and Abbey's in the room trying to make up some sleep), and I was told that the roof deck was closing down because of a number of “very low bridges” coming up.

Low bridge, low bridge, everybody down

Low bridge, we're comin' to a town.

You can always tell you neighbor, always tell your pal

If he's ever navigated on the Erie Canal.

Fifteen Miles on the Erie Canal by Thomas A. Allen

I'm looking forward to that! I think.