When things were great AND terrible...

From the noise and action of the Nurburgring - to the peace of the Moselle Valley....

 

 

This was probably my favourite part of the trip.  We stayed for four nights in a Bed and Breakfast in a small village by the Moselle.  For us, it was the perfect location.  The village was really quiet but the busy, tourist town of Bernkastel was only a two mile walk down the tow path.  Effectively it gave us the best of both worlds.  We parked up the car and walked everywhere.

 

This was our base.  When the weather was good breakfast was served on the terrace.

The owner and the rest of his team were SO friendly and kind.

It was lovely...

 

This was the main square in a village just up the valley.

Away from the 'tourist traps' the area is very quiet and tranquil..

 

This old house in Bernkastel looks like it's defying gravity.

I was completely sober and vertical when I took this picture!

 

Mark did his best to eat his own body weight in puddings and ice-creams...

 

... while I couldn't resist this local dish

(Grilled pork steaks on toast with mushrooms and hollandaise sauce,

plus a generous salad)

"Now you see it...."

 

"... Now you don't!"

 

After a couple of days we learnt how to plan our routes so that we could climb up through the vines.

It gave us a fresh perspective on the area and made the walks a little more rigorous.

This is a view of our village during the walk that we did on the third day (about 11 miles long - which worked off some of the calories!!!)

 

At the end of the 19th Century many of the wine producers built big gothic mansions by the river.  These buildings still serve as a 'front' for the businesses (with offices, storage and beautiful homes).

This was one of our neighbours in the village..

 

I felt that we'd only just started to get to the know the region when our 'time was up' and we were on the road again.  This is definitely the down-side of touring. This photo was taken at the beginning of the most difficult day of the holiday...

 

The heat in the car was immense as we travelled away from the Moselle and through the hills to the Ardennes.  The exterior temperature was probably in the low 30s but all the engine heat came back into the cabin of the car, and we were cooking.  What should have been a pleasant and interesting drive became an exercise in managing heat exhaustion.  (We found out later that all the previous driving had simply broken a seal and Mark was able to fix everything with a roll of black sticky tape - but that was another day!)

 

We decided that the only logical thing to do was to keep moving and go straight to our hotel.

From the word "Go" this third hotel wasn't quite right...

I've written a Trip Advisor review that summed it all up nicely (if you're interested click here - I'm 'Gullymog1' from Worcester)

 

The holiday picked up again nicely after all of this, but I think we were thoroughly spoilt by the great food, country-side, walking, accommodation and general 'value for money' of the Moselle.

 

I'd have stayed there forever - seriously!