It turned turned out to be a very long day for me. I awakened at 1:30am and couldn't get back to sleep. I was under the influence of jet lag. So I used the time to update my blog. Precisely at 6am, the engines came to life and the captain maneuvered the ship into its way into the channel and backed down the river a mile or so to a turnaround basin.
Our first breakfast in the Main Dining Room was well stocked and we enjoyed great conversation with a couple from Minnesota. Afterwards there was a demonstration by the pastry chef of the making of a Black Forest cake followed by the requisite sampling! Chad, our cruise manager, gave a talk on all of our upcoming ports and the shore excursion options. One can take one of the free ship shore excursions, book a special one for a fee, or just go walking or use one of their bicycles to tour.
Around noon, after passing through 4 sets of locks (very cool and there are 14 in total for the entire trip), we arrived in Breisach and tied up next to the Edelweiss, another cruise ship. We ended up needing to walk across their ship to reach the shore. After a hearty lunch in the Main Dining Room, we scanned off the ship and boarded our buses for our walking tour to two small Alsatian villages. I should mention that it was just above freezing and it was lightly foggy outside. My Long Johns came in handy!
This is wine country and the Alsatian area has been under the control of either the French or Germans over the past few centuries. Many of the place names are German, but French is the spoken language as it's under French rule now. In the first little village, Kaysersburg, we were led around on a walking tour and then allowed to wander on our own for about 45 minutes. We saw storks and the town is in the final preparations for the annual Christmas market. My wife was in her element as a German teacher with all the decorations and architecture! We found a few souvenirs, and got some euros at an ATM. All to soon we reboarded our bus, and were whisked off to Riquewihr, which was a smaller village surrounded by a medieval wall with guard towers and gates. There was even a large Christmas store that was interesting to walk through.
Back on board, we were served an amazing peach tea at the gangway. It was formal night and I found the laundry area to iron my dress shirt and met a fellow traveler who was doing the same. We ended up spending the evening with he and his wife. It turned out their relatives were from the same area as my wife. Much of our dinner conversation was about family names and where those people lived along with a bit of motorcycle talk. It's a very small world. There was also a captain's toast, and Chad gave a short presentation on the next day's port of call: Strasbourg. It's the capital of the Alsatian region and we're planning to do a walking tour there. Throughout the evening we passed through at least 4 more locks on our way down the Rhine.
Just after 9pm we finished dinner and my body said it was time to go to bed. So I did and it felt wonderful. I slept through for 9 hours!
More adventures await us for tomorrow!
Riquewihr is the village that Disney animators used as the inspiration for the Beauty and the Beast animated movie.
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