Dateline: Boppard, Germany. If there are typos, blame them on the German keyboard which has the y and z keys transposed, and the : is in the wrong place too. Oh, the joys of overseas travel. We cruised the Rhine this morning, past the Lorelei rock and statue, and past a whole bunch of castles including one on an islet in the middle of the Rhine. Very picturesque places.
Yesterday we were docked in Speyer, a cathedral town upstream from here. The Romanesque dom or cathedral there is very impressive, although not so stunning as the Gothic cathedrals from later periods.
Cruising the river is much like driving on an Interstate highway. It is a main thoroughfare for moving cargo and, to a lesser extent, passengers. Cargo is serious business on the Rhine, lots of river tankers, bulk carriers, container ships, as well as specialized ships dealing with particular cargoes like gases. All of the above are long and slender so they'll fit through the locks. All are shallow draft as the river isn't always very deep, maybe only a couple of meters.
Passenger travel on the river is mostly touring rather than serious point-to-point travel. That latter is handled by high speed trains which run freqently. Many firms run hotel boats on the Rhine, Viking is a big one, KD for Koln-Dusseldorf is another, and our firm - Grand Circle - is no slouch either, although it limits its passengers to Americans and a few Canadians. GC runs maybe half a dozen or eight ships on the Rhine and Danube.
Note: Travel blog posts II thru IV are already written but will be posted later when I get access to a place to plug in a thumb drive.
