Februrary 19 - Drachenfels

Welcome to the first of the Sunday excursions. If anyone has a better name, please let me know as this sounds a bit like a school trip.

But the plan is to make Sunday the day to explore Germany. Today was Drachenfels. The Lorelei Rock is less than 2hrs away buy train, so that will make a great day trip as well. There's also plenty to check out in Bonn; the Beethoven house and museum plus a zillion other art and science museums here as well. The immigration department give you a bunch of vouchers for free entry to most of these places as part of becoming a German resident. So that's pretty cool :) and we haven't been to Cologne yet. That's only 25 minutes away so no excuses there.

So Drachenfels. Drachenfels literally takes me to the edge of the map - at least to the edge of the map I picked up from the tourist office. But, as Mike G pointed out, this trail forms part of the mighty 320km Rheinsteig and was just too good an opportunity to pass up. I can now say I've walked a section of the Rheinsteig. Well a section of a section, at least :)

Drachenfels is Dragon's Rock in English and is the name of the hill above the Rhine. The ruined castle right on top of Drachenfels was built back in the mid 10th Century. Built originally by the Archbishop of Cologne, it was built with the protection of Cologne as its raisin d'être. Originally, the castle consisted of a keep, chapel and quarters for staff but by the 15th Century, after being severely undermined, it's effectivity as a defensive outpost had reached its limit. Newer technologies and advancements made the keep on the hill redundant. Further undermining due to natural erosion and the extensive mining of stone near the site contributed to its further ruin.

That's the factual stuff but the legends are far more entertaining. The best is probably the mountain's connection with the famous Nibelungenlied. In the story, Siegfried, our hero, is supposed to have killed the dragon Fafnir in its lair on this very mountain. Siegfried then bathed in the dead Fafnir's blood to become invulnerable. Who said these Germans didn't mind about of gore in their legends!

Further stories of sacrifices being made to the dragon merely add to the fun!

Mention was made earlier about stone being mined on this site for centuries now. Two quite cool things from this. Firstly, stone was extracted from Drachenfels for the Cologne Cathedral (or Dom, as it is known locally). In fact, there are stories and engravings purporting to showing the laying of the foundation stone of the Dom and that the foundation stone was taken from Drachenfels.

Secondly, remember that the Dom was built from the mid-13th to late 19th Centuries. But a major part of the works was undertaken in the early 19th Century and, of course, the Dom wished to source their stone from Drachenfels, in keeping with the rest of the construction. However, at this time, this was right in the middle of the German romance with the natural world and the beauty within. The ruined tower looming over the Rhine from the heights of Drachenfels peak was perfect for the romantics. But less perfect would be the scarred and ruined landscape left from a return to massive stone extraction from the site. So, back in 1836 we saw one of the first flexings of the muscle of people power. A charter was taken up to halt all stone mining in and around the Drachenfels site. The committee won the support of the local prince and there was and has been no stone taken from the site since. Very impressive for the first half of the 19th Century!

So that's the original castle on the peak of Drachenfels.

The journey there was interesting as well. I decided to try and walk the entire journey. According to GoogleMaps the distance to the peak is about 12k. If Allan is reading this, that sounds like a gentle 6hr Rogaine. If there are any gentle Rogaines :)

But it was too good an opportunity to refuse as the walk basically followed the banks of the Rhine until I reached the small village of Konigswinter. Follow the signs through the village and voila (or whatever the German equivalent might be) there you are. Strangely enough, it was that simple. The Germans love a signpost, whether that be for a street, a lane, a village, a bridge. And they love the idea of walking along the river so both sides of the Rhine are set up with walking and biking tracks (separate for much of the time). Certainly for the 12k I never had to schlep thru muck and mud; just solid bitumen or nice gravel like around the Tan track in Melbourne.

One thing I forgot was the amount of river traffic on the Rhine. Low slung barge-like vessels (to pass below low bridges, I guess) but they haul an amazingly wide variety of cargoes. A lot of oil and gas as well as bulk gravel, sand and other building materials. Occasionally you'll see one filled with containers. And very occasionally a car carrier. I say cars, but I saw one with cars, some trucks and, right in the centre, about 20 perfectly new green John Deere tractors. It seems that all manner of items and goods sail the mighty Rhine. I believe even people (from day trippers to full on cruises) will be more visible when the warmer weather kicks in. But even now there are still small ferries that range across the Rhine where bridges are too far away. For €1.10, they'll even take walk up passengers, as I found out later this day.

So loaded up with some awesome Brotchen (bread rolls - whole meal and super fresh) filled with cheese and ham, I headed out.

About 2 hours later I arrived at the base of Drachenfels. There is a rack railway that runs directly up the hill to the very peak. Here is a picture of one of the original steam engines that did the lugging.

How cool is that! A large gear on the train grabs hold of the rack that runs along the centre of the entire length of the track, permitting the train to literally pull itself up the gradient, about 20% for you geography nuts. Now here is a picture of the electric car that now plies this once mighty railway.

Oh how are the mighty fallen :) I do understand that the last steam train that ran was in 1958 when it derailed and killed 17 people. A tragedy that set the demise of the 'little engine that could' but to replace the mighty steam engine with this electronic transport travesty may make sense but begins to signal the end of romance in transport.

So I walked.

Halfway up, I made it to the Schloss. Words can't describe the beauty and the romance of this castle. My little iTouch camera also can't really make it sing the way it did in real life. But this view when the sun came from a high part in the garden comes close.

Begun in 1882 the Schloss was planned to be part villa, part mansion and part castle. And, strangely enough, it manage to achieve all three options. It was the dream of Stephan Sartor, who began his professional life working in bank, but who made serious money speculating on the stock exchange. And then made incredibly serious money helping finance the Suez Canal. The irony remains that he never lived in the Schloss and died a bachelor without any offspring to inherit.

Over the years it has been neglected, spent some time in the 30's time as a Catholic boys boarding school, was severely damaged during WWII and left empty for most of the 60's and 70's. Its only been since 2006 that the State Foundation of North Rhine-Westphalia took control and restored the castle to its glory, mainly by reviewing old photographs and then spending a heap of money.

But the result is nothing short of astonishing really. The rooms, their fittings and furnishings are simply magnificent. And through basically each window, there is the magnificent view over the Rhine valley, back to the cities of Bonn and Cologne. Simply breathtaking; and the house is absolutely open. You can climb to the top of the flag pole tower, you can go through the old coach house and, of course, you can walk through the house and it's magnificent gardens. Well worth the 6 Euro entry fee. Plus, although all of the advisory notes spread throughout the house are in German, they offer an English translation in a book for you to carry and read. Conveniently, this is also available as PDF file from the website (http://www.schloss-drachenburg.de/content_EN/downloads/downloads.html).

But it didn't open til 12 noon so I headed up to the old ruin.

And what a walk that was. The weather started to cloud in and the track began to become more goat trail than the pedestrian super highway that was the Rhine trail. The higher I went, the worse the weather became until, once I made it to the summit, snow flurries kicked in; and it was wonderful. Watching the snow blow and eddy around the ruined towers really provided a sense of occasion to the visit. Pus the views from the top were nothing short of remarkable. This view looking south of Drachenfels, to the river and the town of Bad Honnef is spectacular

And here are is one image of the ruin itself. It's difficult to imagine that you're standing beneath stones that were raised almost 1000 years ago.

Humbling, eerie and awesome (in the literal sense of being filled with awe) are some of the words that come to mind. There was just a feeling of history that seemed palpable.
On the return trip, Konigswater was having their own Carnivale parade through the main streets. The concept is so simple; everyone dresses up and the folks in the parade throw sweets and gifts to those watching the parade. Everyone seems to dive for the sweets but the kids are the quickest, of course! The smaller the village, the simpler the procession. Apparently, Cologne, as the festival centre of the region, is massive with people coming from all over to enjoy. But there was something neat about the Konigswinter parade. Local folk, local musicians; everyone seemed to know everyone and there was an over arching feeling of happiness that was infectious.

No one is sure when these parades started but the first rules of engagement (undertaken when people started to get too drunk and unruly) can be dated to the 1820's. So it's one of those time immemorial things.

Having stuck around to watch this for a little while, I finished up back at the river and caught the ferry across to the Bonn side of the river. I did this simply to walk back on the other side of the river and because it did reduce my journey by the width of the Adenaur Bridge. However the real benefit was really only noticed when looking back to Drachenfels. Again, the sun was out and the river provided a gap and a new perspective where the entire Drachenfels site was revealed to the spectator; both the Schloss and the medieval ruin shining in the late afternoon sun.The little iTouch wasn't up to making this image work at all, sadly. But the view was splendid. If going again, I'd make sure to get across the river and see this splendidly spectacularly wonderful view :)

Talk to you all soon - Ian