Boppard
Our
destination the next day was Boppard, also on the Rhine, but only 17
minutes away by train.
We arrived
to yet more rain and we immediately saw a sign pointing downhill
to the Sesselbahn (chairlift) so we followed the sign. It took us down
to the Rhine where we found a second sign pointing into the River for
the Sesselbahn! It was obviously wrong. We wandered along the river
and eventually found tourist information. Here we found a map that
showed us we had to walk the other direction along the river to find
the sesselbahn.
Because
it was raining harder now, we instead walked down a narrow shopping
street and spent a lot of time in the Christmas store. Eventually I
bought a wooden smoker for my collection.
As the
rain had now let up, we followed the river to the sesselbahn which
we could now see in the distance. It appeared to be running. At
the ticket office, I asked in German if it was open and if the seats
would be dry. The lady assured me they would so we bought tickets.
They
used sponges to dry the seats and we hopped on. Although the weather
kept the views from being as wonderful as expected, it was fun. We
were the only two people on the 20 minute ride. Halfway up, the drizzle
started again, so we put up an umbrella! Must have been a sight.
At the
top we followed signs to a cafe with an outdoor patio overlooking the
Rhine. Because of the weather, we went inside. We were the only two
customers and the family dog, Gina, decided she wanted to join
us. She sat between our feet the whole time we were there. Graham had
a pot of hot chocolate and I had Milch Kaffee. It was kind of funny
when I ordered. I said that Graham wanted "Heiße Schokolade" which
he heard as "Ice chocolate" and protested that he wanted hot not cold
chocolate.
Next
we walked a long a wooded path to a second cafe called the Vierseenblick.
From here the view of the river looks like 4 lakes rather than one
river because of the angle and the landscape. It was pretty but agian
we felt like we were getting the second class view because of the low
clouds and lack of blue skies.
On the
way back down the rain ended and we actually saw a few more brave souls
riding up.
We had
decided we would take the ship back to Koblenz, so we had a really
quick lunch in a cafe of baguettes (mine was salami, Graham's cheese)
and we raced back to the river. But when we went to buy our ticket
we learned we would have a 3 hour
wait
for
the
next
boat that would stop in Koblenz. We had read the schedule wrong. We
didn't have anything else to see or do, so we explored a few more streets
and took the train back.
We were
back in Koblenz by 2pm. We spend a couple of hours in the hotel writing
postcards, doctoring my poor feet and reading before venturing
out to the altstadt again to eat at a vegetarian restaurant we had
seen the night before. We were the only customers and the lady
running the place spoke absolutely no English. Thankfully I was able
to understand her instructions for the salad bar.
Afterwards
I limped back to the hotel by the shortest route. My friend Nella,
who had called earlier in the week, called again and warned me
of an impending rail strike and we had a nice chat. |