Germany's Rhine and Mosel Rivers

Cologne

Here's a picture of the railroad bridge over the Rhine river (6 tracks, busiest in the world) as seen from the tower of the Cathedral. This old cathedral has two immense spires which rise high above everything else. The cathedral really dominates the city's skyline.

I took a 1-hour scenic boat ride on the Rhine here, and went through a couple of museums near the Cathedral. These museums display Roman artifacts from the city's past as a city of the Roman Empire. Included is a complete floor, unmoved from where it was found, depicting scenes in thousands of tiny colored tiles.

I also enjoyed walking through the pedestrian streets in the area of the cathedral, with lots of activity and street performers and musicians (which are much more common in Europe than in practically anywhere in America).

There are a number of castles along the Rhine, the most famous being the Rhinefels and Marksburg castles. The Marksburg is shown here from its vantage point overlooking the river. This castle is very old, with a long history and is open for tours. You'll see it's very thick walls, old furnishings and examples of armor and will hear about it's history. It's the only castle in the valley that was never destroyed (others are either partly in ruin or have been restored - for another original castle see Eltz Castle described further down on this page).

Many other castles exist, but most of them are privately owned, often used as hotels or restaurants not able to be viewed in their original condition as is this. I saw Marksburg because I drove along the north side of the river. There are no bridges for a very long stretch, so you're more or less limited to visiting castles on one side of the river only. I've heard that the best castle to visit on the south side is Rhinefels at St. Goar, across from the Loreley rock. I went by Loreley, but it wasn't obvious to me why it's so popular as a destination. It's just a rock. There's a hotel above the rock which supposedly has good views, but their parking lot was marked as private, for customers only, so I passed up the view.

There is no need to adjust your set, the building on the right really is leaning considerably over into the street. The leaning tower of Pisa is not the only thing in Europe that leans. Many of these old buildings aren't perfectly straight and level, this one is especially off-kilter. This is in the town of Limburg. While it's not on the Rhine, it is in this region (along the A3 Autobahn north of the Rhine). I chose this as a convenient overnight stop to put me within driving distance of the Frankfurt airport the following morning, and was pleasantly surprised to find such a nice old town center. There's a large church on the top of the hill that has been "restored" with a multi-color paint job over the stone (most other stone churches you will see are their natural stone color). When I first arrived in town there didn't seem to be many places to stay, but I finally found several near the train station. Looking for the train station in a town that has one is often a good strategy for finding a room, often there are hotels near the station or room finding assistance for train travelers.

Moselle River

• Trier has several old Roman buildings in good condition, including this gateway building called Porta Nigra,
  
  these Roman Baths,
  
  and this Roman Amphitheater
  
• Eltz Castle is worth touring (unlike many of the old ruined or reconstructed castles you see elsewhere, this old castle is still intact).
  
• Cochem, Zell, and Bernkastel-Kues are several other interesting towns.