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| Erin's Journal for 10-10-02 Today was our trip up the Rhine. Billed as a very romantic and scenic boat ride, we were excited to get going and woke up a couple of hours in advance. The hotel offered us breakfast inclusive in the price, so we ate a small continental meal (with a great cup of tea for me) before we grabbed our bags and walked out to the waterfront. The boat arrived promptly at 9:30am, and we went in and stowed our bags before finding seats inside. The wind along the water was brisk and cold, and I'd woken up with congestion and a sore throat, so we decided to give the sun some time to warm things up. As we sat in the restaurant-like boat, we talked to the Americans seated at the next table. There was a couple and the wife's sister, and the couple told us it was their 30th year of boating up the Rhine. The sister was on her first European journey, and had reactions much like mine - a bit of awe over the sights and experiences. We chatted with them for about a half hour, as the couple had lots of information about the various towns and castles we passed. Then we decided to brave the cold air upstairs for some good photos of the old castles. The wind was freezing, so we took some seats behind a glass barrier to cut the wind and sat in the sun for almost an hour before getting cold and retiring downstairs again. From there I drank some coffee while we sat and watched the riverbanks in warmth. It was a very relaxing, scenic trip, but by the time we landed in Koblenz 4 hours later, we were ready to be moving on. We walked with our packs for quite a while from the dock to the main train station, and barely made our train to Cologne. From there we had a little more time to catch our connection to Bruge, so we grabbed some food before getting on that 4-hour journey. The countryside wasn't all that wonderful here, so Glenn read while I tried to catch up on some journals. We pulled into Bruge a little after dark, and were stuck with no map, as information was already closed for the day. We studied a large wall map to get our bearings in the station, then set off to find some of the budget hotels we'd looked up the day before. We wandered quite a ways in the dark before finding a street we recognized, and found we'd gone the wrong way. We trekked all the way to the other end of the street, only to find that the hotel we wanted was full. We trekked all the way back the other way, and were able to find a hotel at last. We checked into the dorm rooms they had, as they were cheaper, but were pretty disappointed with the facilities. Too late to move that night, though! We went back downstairs to the restaurant there, which was quite cozy and wonderfully decorated, and ordered some really good dinner. Then we crashed, and I dosed up on Nyquil to help sleep through my cold. |
| Another Rhine castle |