Day 6 - Sep 6, 2009 Last updated: 10/8/09 8:00pm PT
We stayed in Bacharach, Germany, on the Rhine River.
The hotel we stayed at had free wifi, but I could not get it to work, so I ended up buying some time at a different hotel/restaurant. There were no Boingo hotspots here either. The waitress at Hotel-Restaurant Altkölnischer Hof was very nice, getting me setup with their wifi (only €1), so we went there for dinner.
‘Downtown’ Bacharach. Not much going on here.
Burg Eltz is a castle that has been owned by the same family since the 1100’s (33 generations). As you can see by the scaffolding in some of the pictures, they actively maintain the castle. The admission price helps take care of the place. Again, pictures were not allowed inside. Most of the tours of the castle are in German, but if you ask, you can get an English tour, which is nicer because the size of the group is much smaller. The group ahead of us had over 20 people. Our group had 6, us, 2 other Americans and 2 French people who didn’t want to be in the crowded group. To get to Burg Eltz, we took two trains, each about a half hour ride, then hiked for an hour uphill one way (the guide books say that it takes normal people 90 minutes).
We took an English speaking tour because I only know about 5 German words, and I learned them from watching the TV show Hogan’s Heroes. The kids here all speak English fluently. Our tour guide couldn’t have been more than 25. I’m embarrassed that I barely know enough to order food, and most of the time that consists of pointing.
The ticket machine at the train station in Bacharach had an English button. The ticket machine at the train station in Moselkern, for the trip back to the hotel, did not do English. We were very proud of ourselves. We figured it out.