Day 9: Drachenfels /Beethoven's Big Concrete 3-D Head

Saturday morning we got up and enjoyed a traditional German breakfast of sliced meats, cheeses and fresh rolls. Jeramy was gracious enough to let us do a load of laundry and suggested she was going to take us to a nearby castle ruins. This was particularly exciting because Leighann had desperately wanted to go to Neuschwanstein Castle and when we had initially planned our trip we had allocated a day, but when we realized the Monday was Pentecost or Wit Monday a German holiday and the train schedule was severely limited we opted to cut that day out of our trip.

We hopped on a regional train and about half an hour later we were at the ruins. The ruins are situated high atop a hill near the Rhine. Realizing that there wasn't much up top except for a very expensive touristy restaurant we decided to grab some lunch at an outdoor cafe. After my 2nd tasting of currywurst during our trip and a pint of hefeweizen we walked up the hillside towards the ruins.

There is actually a tram which takes you up the hill, but we decided to walk the 40 plus minutes to reach the top. There are actually many things up the side of the hill. Apparently Drachenfels is the legendary location for where Siegfried slayed a Dragon as told in Wagner's 19th Century opera. There is a Castle about a third of the way up the hill which was under renovations as well as a Reptile museum and several beer gardens. Along the way there are several look out points where you can see the river below. Finally we reached the top, a good trek we spent about half an hour looking out over the city. Jeramy tells us that during the summer there is a river festival and massive fireworks displays take place. The top of Drachenfels is apparently a very popular place during the fireworks for obvious reasons.

We walked back down the hill and decided to take the 5 PM ferry back to Bonn. The ferry was spectacular we sat in chairs on the upper deck, I sipped on my Fransikaner Hefeweizen and Jeramy and Leighann drank Radlers (half lemondade half beer). The ferry had this slide and at the bottom a rocking horse like you might see in playgrounds. We watched several near disasters, I imagined the children getting off the slide as a particularly rambunctious child swung wildly on her horsey, I had these visions of either the kids getting off the slide getting cracked by the jockey or the jockey getting thrown from her horse. I thought you'd never see this on a ferry in North America the 1st time some kid cracked their head open the parents would file a lawsuit and the slide and horse would be removed from the ferry. I notice this general attitude in Germany and Jeramy confirms that basically if you do something stupid and you get hurt it's your own damn fault.

We arrive back in Bonn at the Ferry dock and decide to walk to the famous Beethoven statue. We walk along the bank of the Rhein and along the way we walk by a docked party boat blaring it's "raining men" the deck of the boat is packed with men dancing, yep a gay cruise we look to our left and sitting along the benches are Nuns reading scripture, I wondered whether the Nuns timed their readings on purpose. It was probably just a strange coincidence.

 


 We find the statue and at first I am like what is up with that it looks kind of strange, but then when you look at the statue straight on you realize that it's 3-D. It makes for a pretty cool picture it almost looks like it's been computer enhanced, but no 3-D glasses required.

We headed back to Jeramy's and along the way back we realize that people seem to be setting up TV sets on cafe streets and I realize that tonight is the Champions League Final between Inter Milan and Bayern Munich. Munich is about 500 KM away from Bonn, but still the Soccer fans in Bonn are clearly behind  the German powerhouse. We decide to go out to eat and the outdoor cafes are packed with fans. We grabbed some dinner at a local Vietnamese buffett and decided to call it an early evening as a fay out in the Sun and the long hike had exhausted us, plus we knew we had a big day ahead of us at the World Hockey Championships in Cologne.