Across the Rhine and Back

Just a quick note to begin: It looks like our because-we can.net website was hacked. Which makes us really glad we decided to use this blogger site for our trip. It also means we can’t receive any emails until our ISP gets everything straightened out, but comments here are always appreciated even though we may not respond. Our choice is time on the internet or time out doing things. It’s easy to guess what we choose to do.



Why is it that Linda when Linda says “Smile” she has already taken the photo? Doesn’t matter though because the daily food photo for August 25th is our typical German breakfast. We had a question about potato pancakes for breakfast and I confess to not even knowing what they are. In this part of Germany breakfast is basically a large roll, heavily slathered in butter and piled with various cold cuts the likes of which you never find in the US, along with cheeses to die for. Add in some eggs and fresh fruit, and on occasion yogurt and cereal and that is what we eat. It means two big meals a day, the second being a choice of either lunch or supper. I bet most of you had a candlelight meal out at the local Italian restaurant last night. Look what all these hours of time change does, we have a candlelight breakfast. How did we ever get so lucky in Life?



Life on the Rhine isn’t just sitting on a park bench and watching the barges float past. Sometimes you actually have to do something. A few days ago we bought something really special that we have been carrying around with us. This morning Linda decided it was time to send that something special to her very special sister, Katherine. So here Linda is with the box in hand, which she promptly filled and took back the St. Goar post office expecting to spend some real money to ship it back to Ohio. Imagine her surprise when it only cost Euro 3.45 postage plus Euro 1.39 for the box to send it across the ocean. Katherine, if you don’t like it, send on to our US address and Linda will know what to do with it when we get back.



Morning took us across the Rhine on the ferry to St. Goarhausen where we planned to do some sightseeing and check out St. Goar from the east bank. Passengers on the ferry are charged a Euro 1.50, and St Goarhausen is small enough to walk everywhere we want to go. We realize our mode of travel does not allow us to go everywhere we could with a car, but we really don’t want to do that. I read in the forums about people who try to drive the entire valley in a day seeing at least four castles. We’ve toured several castles over the years and don’t really need to see any more up close and personal. Besides we can see three the moment we walk out the entrance to our hotel.



This will be us next week. Well, not here, but in northern France it will be us. That’s why we take tours as part of our time in Europe, to take a break from doing everything ourselves, and to see things what our mode of travel makes difficult. We also decided a lot of these people are German weekend day trippers on a one or two day weekend.



So what happens in St. Goar when we go to across the river to St. Goarhausen? Rhine on Skates. There were hundreds of inline skaters who passed by, unfortunately for us they were heading down the Rhine to Koblenz, crossing the Rhine and coming back through where are now, St. Goarhausen, sometime later today after we go back across the river to St. Goar. A few years ago we were here for the annual Fireworks on the Rhine Weekend, which we didn’t even know was taking place until we arrived. Sara N. Dippity seems to lead us where ever we go.



Another day, another church, well actually several more churches, and several more pipe organs. Over here, big church, little church, there is a pipe organ. Even finding a church with a pipe organ in the US doesn’t seem to be all that easy. And as far as contemporary services with guitars, etc., haven’t seen even the faintest glimmer of something like that over here.



So it is another food photo. Tough! This was our lunchtime picnic on the Rhine. We’d already eaten our brötchen and drank our wein, now it was time for the strudel. You will notice that Linda is NOT looking up and smiling at the camera like she normally does. That is because she is desperately trying to find a fork to get in a few extra bites of of either the rhubarb or cherry strudel while I am still taking photos. Smart Linda, ultra fast photographer Bob.
What follows is something a little different. I’ve been thinking about having what we fondly refer to as a “Connie Post” which would have about 45 photos and five sentences scattered through them with a total of 45 words, but I just can’t seem to do it. What follows is a mediocre imitation, but one with out words. It shows our supper tonight.






For anyone who is still reading, last night it was stomach for me and suckling pig for Linda. Linda wasn’t into eating the pig skin that came with her meal but I found it to be about the consistency of chewing gum. As for the stomach I was eating, she has no idea as to what it tasted like, which I will attribute to her own weak stomach. Long day tomorrow, with hopefully a post, as we journey to the Mosel Valley including a day trip to Luxembourg.