We continued our German adventures in Mainz, a relatively small city (population around 220,000) at the confluence of the Main and Rhine rivers, which has been an important location since Roman times. In the middle ages (around 1400), Mainz was the birthplace of Johannes Guttenberg, the inventor of the printing press. We visited the Guttenberg Museum, which contains many interesting exhibits of old books and printing presses. We even saw a demonstration of how the original printing press worked -- in German, so we didn't get much, but it was cool to see the page that was printed as a result.
The cathedral in Mainz is quite impressive.
Even more impressive is the Church of St. Stephan, not for the modest church itself, but rather for the spectacular stain-glassed windows designed by Marc Chagall near the end of his life. The windows, which depict scenes from the Old Testament, and were intended as a contribution to German-Jewish reconcilliation, ended up in St. Stephan as a result of Chagall's friendship with the church's senior priest.
Our next stop was the Mosel Valley. The Mosel River arises in the Vosges Mountains, and runs east-west through western Germany before emptying into the Rhine. The Mosel Valley region is even more beauitiful than the Rhine -- more vines, more little towns, and more ruined castles. But near the Mosel we were able to visit a fully-intact castle: Burg Eltz.
Burg Eltz, which sits in a forest, has been around for over 700 years, and has remained unchanged for about the last 500. Built and owned by three branches of a single family, the castle is fairy-tale-like when you first see it.
The approach to the castle feels like going back in time as well.
The tour of the castle interior is very cool, but no pictures are allowed, so you will have to go yourselves to experience it. We recommend it.
After Burg Eltz, we went for lunch in the lovely little town of Beilstein on the Mosel River. The vines run directly up a steep hill from the road along the river to the city's ruined castle.
Our view from lunch was spectacular. The river in the foreground, and another small town (almost village) in the background.
After lunch, we walked through the town and saw the site of the former synagogue, which dates from 1310. In the 1300's the leaders of Beilstein invited several Jewish families who had been persecuted and expelled from towns along the Rhine to settle there. By 1840, a quarter of the town was Jewish, but after the 1871 constitution provided political and civil rights to German Jews, most of them moved to larger cities looking for better economic opportunities. By 1933, only one Jewish family remained in Beilstein, and they were deported and killed in the Treblinka death camp. Amazingly, there is an intact Jewish cemetary above the town's castle.
While in the Mosel Valley, we stayed in a literal castle, now converted to a hotel, in the small town of Schloss-Lieser.
One of the best things about the Mosel Valley was the wine, which we prefered to the wine we tried along the Rhine. On our last day in the Mosel Valley, we biked along the river, which is very easy to do in this area. We ended up riding over 60 km, while stopping for two wine tastings. But first, we found the world's best vending machine.
Yes, that is a vending machine selling bottles of wine. You can see the RVs behind me, and it is clear that this machine serves the immediate needs of the campers who presumably have their own corkscrews and glasses.
We stopped for lunch at a winery in Trabben-Trarbach, a slightly larger town along the river.
The winery was on the hill you see in the picture above, so we had a good view of the surrounding hills and their ubiquitous vines.
Shana found the information for the area's Riesling Route, but as we were on bikes, we could not try all of the listed wineries ;)/.
Our final stop in Germany was the country's oldest city, and once a capital of part of the Roman Empire (we had no idea), Trier (rhymes with clear). Even before the Romans, the area is believed to have been inhabited by the Celts for 1,300 years. Under the Romans, Trier was the capital of the western empire (roughtly modern-day England, Spain, France and Germany) in the 4th century, and during that time was a favorite residence of the emperors.
In Trier we saw the ruins of the Roman baths, as well as the Cathedral, which is the oldest church in Germany. After Emporer Constantine legalized Christianity in the Roman Empire, he began the construction of two great cathedrals: St. Peter's in Vatican City, and this cathedral in Trier.
However, the most impressive building we saw during our day in Trier was the Basilica, which was the Emporer's throne room during the 4th century. It is considered the largest intact Roman building outside of Rome itself, although it had to be rebuilt after being servely damaged during WWII.
The building has been a Lutheran Church since 1856, but it retains the same shape/form that it had when it was a throne room. The picture does not do a great job showing how huge its single room is. To give you a better idea, note that each of the wooden squares that make up the ceiling is about 10 feet by 10 feet!
Well, that was the end of our adventures in France and Germany. We returned to San Sebastian by train from Luxembourg through Paris. We don't have much to say about Luxembourg City, where we stayed for one night, but we did have a very nice Vietnamese dinner there.
More to come soon on our summer back in San Sebastian.
Hasta luego,
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