Today was the day when Odile had to return home for work, so we were up early for the 2-km walk to the station for her 8:15 train, stopping off at the village bakery as breakfast at the hotel didn’t start until 8. Her journey, which should have had her home by 1 PM, fell foul of Deutsche Bahn’s ongoing problems when her train from Saarbrücken to Paris was cancelled without warning, entailing a 4-hour wait for a French TGV that was unable to go at its usual high speed because it had to carry twice the normal load of passengers. As a result, many people, like Odile, didn’t have seats and had to sit on the stairs of the double-deck carriages. She finally got home at 7 PM.
Meanwhile, I was having another great day on the trail, arriving at my destination before her train had even left Saarbrücken. She’d have been better off staying (but work was calling).
After seeing her off, I went for breakfast, served in the hotel next to our rather anonymous one. It was a good spread and it set me up for the day.
I finally set off at around 9:15.
There was nothing particularly remarkable about this stage of the Moselsteig, especially after the Calmont the previous day. Despite a positive elevation of 520 m over the course of the day, there were no steep climbs and it was a gently undulating trail that followed the river, mostly in the vineyards until the village of Briedern.
With rain forecast for 1 PM, my goal was to arrive in Beilstein before it began. This meant sticking to a pace of just over 4 km an hour to cover the 17 km to my destination.
There was a brief climb out of Ediger and then the trail followed the river from above with some fine views, all the way to the village of Senheim, where it crossed the Moselle.
I was feeling a fairly strong twinge in my calf after the previous day’s tricky descent from the Calmont. I would stop regularly to do stretching exercises and the pain also eased on every uphill section, so I seemed to have it under control.
After Senheim, the trail climbed gently back up to the vineyards where there were quite a few people at work, harvesting the grapes before the forecast rain arrived.
Above the village of Mesenich, there was an interesting sculpture park along the trail. Alongside more abstract works, there were sculpted portraits of local people, mostly wine-growers, but also the village priest and a few other notables. I found this particularly moving, giving value to ordinary but important people in the life of the village rather than politicians or other historical figures.
After Mesenich, there was a section of trail in the woods known as the Briederner Schweiz, Briedern’s Switzerland, because of the trickier, almost mountain-like terrain. Once again, there was a warning notice at the side of the trail, saying that good balance was required. There was an alternative route that avoided this section, but I stuck to the main trail. it was indeed a little more technical, a narrow path on a steep slope with lots of roots and rocks to climb over, but no worse than anything seen until that point (and certainly nowhere near as bad as the descent from the Calmont). As this trail left the village of Briedern behind, there were occasional views of the river far below, but it was mostly concealed by the trees.
The tricky section of trail ended just outside Beilstein. There, I came across an old Jewish cemetery in the woods, like the one outside Zeitlingen a few days earlier. This one was much bigger however, testifying to a large Jewish presence in the area in the past. There was a sign just outside that said the last gravestone dated from 1942, surprising given the situation in Germany at that time. There’s no doubt a tragic story behind that scrap of information.
From the cemetery, there was a brief descent to the ruins of Burg Metternich that stand above Beilstein. There was a café inside the ruins but only accessible, it seemed, after paying the 3-euro entry fee. So I gave it a miss, especially as it was now just after 1 PM and the rain seemed imminent.
Just next to the castle, I finally realized what the metal tubing I had seen snaking through vineyards over the last few days actually was. The small hopper on it at the top next to a tractor showed that rather than tubing it was in fact a track allowing for harvested grapes to be transported up and down the steep vineyard slopes.
From there, it was just a short walk down into the village of Beilstein. I saw a sign for a café in the abbey part way down I set off in that direction. However, on rounding the final corner, I found the place closed for its ruhetag. So I backtracked and continued on down to the village where I found a café for a warming bowl of soup and a slice of apple strudel.
Replenished, I carried on to the hotel that was just by the river, but found a sign on the door telling me that I needed to check in at a hotel back up by the abbey. So I set off up the hill again. The rain was falling quite heavily now and when I arrived at the other hotel, a guy at the reception desk told me to head back down to the hotel where I would be staying and that he would meet me there to give me the key. I realize the reason for this complicated state of affairs on entering the hotel that was too small to have a reception area. It was a beautiful old house, tastefully redecorated, with very comfortable rooms and a small restaurant on the ground floor. I spent the rest of the day there as the rain didn’t let up until late in the evening, reading, relaxing, and writing this blog. I also did a lot of stretching exercises and tried to keep my calf warm as the pain was still there and warmth or heat could supposedly relieve it.
I had an excellent dinner in the restaurant downstairs, cooked by the guy who had given me my key. His slow-cooked local beef with a herb risotto was pretty amazing, as was the wine produced by the hotel owners. The Moselle valley is definitely the be place for fine dining in Germany!
Footsteps 