8 Nights in the Rhine Valley

Germany is a great destination all year round. It has an outstanding landscape and offers unlimited choices to the traveller. It is rich in history and culture and has amazing geographic variety. Wherever you go there is something interesting to see and do. For families there is an abundance of affordable places to stay and the hotels welcome babies and young children.

May-September is a lovely time to visit. Sunny skies are likely and much of life moves outdoors. Beergardens and cafes bustle at all hours and outdoor events and festivals enliven towns and villages.

The Rhine Valley is a river valley straight out of a picture book - steep cliffs, vineyards, a castle on virtually every hilltop and pretty villages everywhere. UNESCO has recognised the importance of the region by designating the Upper Middle Rhine Valley a World Heritage Centre.

The Rhine rises in Switzerland and flows through the Netherlands on its way to the sea, but most of its 850 miles goes through Germany. It has been a chief trade route for over 2,000 years. Legend and history await around every bend of the river. From Mainz to Koblenz the river winds through steep vine-covered hillsides dotted with little towns whose names are synomous with German wine.

The landscapes are dramatic with vineyards clinging to steep hills, numerous castles and dreamy wine villages. Each village has at least one wine festival per year - the most famous is the Rhine in Flames series of festivals when water, lighting and fireworks are combined.

The highlights of our trip were:

- Boppard - this was the perfect base for us on this holiday. The town is quaint - cobbled, narrow streets with lots of restaurants, bars and ice-cream parlours and is only a short distance from most of the main sights. Umissable in Boppard is a ride on the chair-lift - the views up and down and at the top are amazing.

- Rudesheim - the Drosselgasse, cable-car ride and vineyards around the town are superb.

- Bacharach - possibly the most beautiful and scenic village I have ever visited, it is straight from a fairytale.

- Burg Rheinfels - towering above St Goar, these extensive castle remains are wonderful for children and adults alike to explore.

- A cruise to the Loreley - the dramatic bend in the river where the legendary siren sang.

Quick Tips:

The websites www.germany-tourism.co.uk and www.rip.info.de are both useful.

Germany is a very safe country in which to live and travel with low crime rates. Theft against travellers is rare.

Roadways along the Rhine tend to have quite heavy traffic - many stretches we drove along had roadworks and delays. Allow adequate travel time for your journey. The most scenic part for driving is the mid Rhine between Mainz and Koblenz.

When you enter a restaurant normally you will not be seated. Walk in and select the table of your choice. Food and drinks are reasonably priced in Germany - even though this is a tourist area. Most restaurants (all of those we visited) do not accept credit cards - cash only. Also some places tended to be quite smokey - with people smoking next to you at the next table.

Bars can have either table and/or counter service. Often drinks consumed are simply marked on a beer mat to be paid for on leaving.

Traditional German cuisine is very meat oriented - lots of sausage, sliced meats, stews and schnitzels. Most meals we had to order an extra side salad just to get some "greens".

It is customary to tip taxi drivers, bar and restaurant staff - 10% is standard.

Be sure to go on a cruise down the Rhine - you will go through gorges and past ancient castles and vineyards. It is a really good experience.

Spend a summer evening in a beer garden. These offer low-cost and unpretentious fun on summer nights. You can order platters of hearty food with your meal.

Best Way To Get Around:

We flew into Cologne-Bonn airport. It is a hub for low cost airlines and handles both domestic and international flights. We priced up different flight options from the UK - Boppard, our destination was almost equidistant from either Frankfurt or Cologne. We chose to fly with Easyjet - by far the cheapest option. The flight time from England was 1 hour 20 minutes, flights were comfortable and on-time and the airport was bright, modern and efficient.

Getting around Germany is incredibly easy. The train network is comfortable, reliable, fast and reasonably priced. There are plenty of trains from Cologne to different locations in the Rhineland.

We chose to hire a car. We booked on-line from the UK and found Thrifty rentals to be the cheapest option. The German roads are excellent. The motorway network - the Autobahn - officially has no speed limit but to increase safety and control pollution, a lot of segments have suggested speed limits.

Our journey from Cologne airport to Boppard took about 1.5 hours. Roads are well signposted and very easy to follow.

In the Rhine Valley public transport is also very good. There are frequent trains and buses, but we found driving offered more flexibility to get around. You can reach out of the way places more easily and stop at different places to be wowed by the views.

There are no bridges over the Rhine between Mainz and Koblenz. If you want to cross the river you have to use the ferries. Most little towns and villages have a ferry. We crossed a couple of times from Boppard - it cost 3 euros for a car and driver and 1 euro each per extra passenger. We also used the ferries in St Goar and Rudesheim - these were priced similarily. The ferries run all day. We never had to wait longer than about 10 minutes to cross the river.

This hotel is a 3-star, family-run establishment situated right on the Rhine. It has just 19 rooms. The owner, who is American and his German wife are welcoming, helpful and informative on the area and its attractions.

We arrived before their check-in time at 12:15 but were able to go straight to our room. We had booked a superior double room with balcony and view of the river. It cost 96 euros per night for us and our 3-year-old son, this included breakfast.

The room was quite large - big bed, sofa bed for our son and lots of wardrobe space. Rooms are a little basic and not modern with the decor, but are clean, comfortable and adequate. There is no mini-bar or fridge. The bathroom was tiny, but had everything we needed and the shower, although small was extremely powerful.

The great thing about this hotel is the view. Our balcony, which was quite spacious, had the most beautiful outlook over the Rhine. We loved sitting out in the evenings, glass of wine in hand, listening to the river and the activity down below on the Rheinallee. During the day it was also fun to watch all the activity on the river - cruise ships, pleasure craft and a constant stream of barges all with interesting cargoes constantly coming and going.

Breakfast is continental style - quite a nice selection of breads, cold meats and cheeses and they bring you a boiled egg. The breakfast room is bright and sunny and also has a nice view over the river.

There is a small sun terrace on the second floor with two reclining chairs - we never used it. Also in a house behind the main hotel building they have a fitness room and a computer room/library. You get free Internet access on their (old) computer for 20 minutes and free wireless LAN in the computer room.

The hotel does not have its own parking. There is free parking 700 yards away or spaces directly outside cost 2.50 euros per day. We purchased from the hotel a 7-day pass which cost 10 euros. We never had any problems finding a space in this area.

We enjoyed staying in this hotel. I liked the fact it is family owned and run. It is not the most luxurious but has everything you need and the views are superb.

We caught the ferry to Bingen from Rudesheim. The car ferries across the Rhine are great - most towns and villages have them as there are no bridges in this area. The boats hold about 10 cars and just go back and forth all day long. On board you can see just how fast the Rhine flows - get out of the car and have a look over the side of the boat - it's amazing.

Bingen is quite a nice little town. Down the ages it has been a centre of wine trade. It is on the edge of four areas where different types of grapes are cultivated.

This is the place to discover and try Eiswein (ice-wine), the coincidental result of a bad wine in 1830. Not to my taste - it is very sweet, but worth trying. It can only be made in Germany because of the unique climatic conditions.

We did not spend long in the town of Bingen, but drove up the hill to Klopp Castle. It is 116 years old and was built on Roman foundations. It towers above Bingen in the centre of the town. Now the town hall, it is set in lovely gardens with nice places to sit, a tower to climb and all around beautiful views. It is very quiet and peaceful up there - a great place to sit and catch your breath.

Bacharach is about a 15-minute drive from Bingen and the same from Boppard. A 900-year-old village, it is one of the most scenic places in the Rhineland - maybe one of the most scenic I have ever visited - it is truly picture postcard perfect. Round every corner is a perfect photo opportunity and everywhere is immaculately kept.

Bacharach is filled with half-timbered buildings with steep rooflines. The buildings are beautiful and the flower displays on each of them are stunning.

The village is behind a 14th-century wall - the walls are actually the best preserved in the Middle Rhine. Wall construction began in 1322 and took 44 years to complete. Much of the wall still stands as solidly as it once did. We enjoyed walking along the ramparts. It is fun to do, but you do not get the best views of the village from the walls.

Bacharach is full of cosy inns, wine cellars and beergardens. All of these give it a really lovely atmosphere.

We had dinner in a lovely beergarden in a courtyard - the Posthof. Dinner and drinks for the three of us cost just 35 euros. A harpist played in the centre, it was busy and buzzing and the food, though simple was delicious. It was just the way to round off a lovely day.

Koblenz is the place where the Rhine meets the Mosel River. It has small, cobbled passageways that connect square after square and pretty streets.

The town, founded by the Romans in 9 B.C. was destroyed by the Allied Forces in 1943 but some old bits do still survive. The Basilika St Kastor is a church, built in 836 that once saw Edward I sell his crown when he was strapped for cash. The old part of the city still has a Medieval atmosphere.

In the town hall courtyard there is a bronze statue called the "Schaengel." This means "young scamp." It is a mischievous little boy, said to symbolise the high spirits of the Koblenz people. Every few minutes he squirts a shower of water from his mouth onto the pavement and onto anyone else who happens to be in the way. Children love it - we had to drag our son away, despite watching it for about 15 minutes.

The riverside promenade in Koblenz has been acclaimed as the Rhine's finest. It extends for 34 kilometres - we spent a lovely hour strolling along the promenade, eating ice-creams and watching all the activity on the river. There were some really large cruise ships - one from Russia - docked there. These were interesting to look at.

We parked our car at the Deutsches Eck (German Corner). It cost just 2 euros for 24 hours parking and there were lots of spaces there.

The Deutsches Eck is the point where the Rhine and Mosel rivers meet. There is a famous national monument dominating the site. The monument is of Kaiser Wilhelm I and was completed in 1897. It is absolutely enormous. We climbed all the steps to the very top - well-worth the effort for the great views.

The Ehrenbreitstein fortress across the river towers above Koblenz. In the massive rock on which it stands there is a 300 metre tunnel from the car park to the chair-lift. It was an air-raid shelter during the War for 10,000 people.

You can catch the ferry from the Deutsches Eck to the fortress.

During the Rhine in Flames, Ehrenbreitstein is the culmination of an evening of fireworks. It is set ablaze with lights when a flotilla of ships sails past. We did not see this, but it must be an amazing spectacle.

Koblenz is a really nice, laid-back, quiet place with lots of cafés and bars and places to stop for a drink. It is a great place to just stroll at your leisure and go where the fancy takes you without feeling you have to check-off a list of famous sights. We spent a very pleasant 4 or 5 hours there.

Having heard the story of the Loreley in German lessons at school, I have always been intrigued and wanted to visit this famous rock - finally on this trip I managed it.

From all over the world thousands of people travel each year to see the Loreley rock. The legend is that a blonde siren would appear in the twilight, sitting on a rock on the approach to the rapids in the river, combing her long hair and singing. Such was her beauty and alluring smile that sailors would be captivated to the point of distraction and they and their ships would be lost on the rocks. The poet Heinrich Heine said that sometimes on bright moonlit nights a strange singing can still be heard...

We visited the Loreley twice - first of all on a cruise from Boppard. There are lots to choose from, we picked the Loreley Line because the timings suited us. The ship was spacious and comfortable and had open decks front and back. They had a restaurant and bar on board.

We sailed gently past vineyards, castles and pretty villages. The captain gave a commentary here and there in English on particular castles and points of interest.

After about 1.5 hours we reached the Loreley. You can see clearly the treacherous bend in the river just beyond the rock.

Hidden rocks at the deepest and narrowest point of the river create swirling rapids. It gets so narrow - less than 50 metres wide - and the current flow intensifies dramatically. Electric signals now guide ships but some vessels still use tugs to pull and guide them through. One hundred years ago this part of the Rhine was judged so dangerous that ships bells were rung to tell sailors it was time to pray.

When you travel along the Rhine you see large white boards along the river bank marked with numbers. These tell the distance in kilometres from Basle in Switzerland.

Our cruise allowed us to get off in St Goar and rejoin a later ship. I would recommend doing this - St Goar is pretty and a nice place to spend a couple of hours before you cruise back down the Rhine.

On a different day we drove back to the Loreley and went to the top of the rock. They have a visitor centre there and several view points. You climb up steep steps to get to the top of the rock, but at 140 feet high the views are beautiful. Skip the cafe/bar there at the top and go to the Backstage Beergarden at the back of the open-air stage. It is lovely, peaceful, great service and lovely views.

There is a statue of the Loreley on an island on the river. We drove to it and walked along the island to the statue - don't bother. It is about half a mile, along rough ground and you actually get a better view of the statue from the roadside.

We visited the Marksburg Castle on the way to Koblenz from Boppard. It is only about  a 10-minute drive from Boppard and you cannot miss it. From a distance (and close up) it looks beautiful, set on top of a hill towering above the little town of Braubach.

The Marksburg was built in 1100 and additionally fortified over the centuries. It is the only Middle Rhine fortress which has not been destroyed or changed in character by restoration during the Romantic period. It was threatened throughout the ages, but was never directly attacked.

It costs 1.50 euros to park in the car park below the castle. It costs a further 4 euros entrance fee.

Unfortunately you are not permitted to just wander around the castle - you have to go as part of a tour. Guided tours take place very frequently but are always in German. Tours in other languages are by special arrangement only and tend to be for large coach parties.

If you ask when you are paying, they can give you a leaflet in English which gives basic information on the castle and summarises what you will see during the tour. My husband and I both speak German so it was fine for us, but I think it would have been a bit of a struggle and quite difficult if you didn't.

The rooms in the castle really do bring to life the Middle Ages. You go up rugged stone steps and along the riders stairway hewn into the bedrock. There are towers and cannons to look at before you go into the inner fortress.

They have a wine cellar and a fascinating 17th-century kitchen. There are lots of cooking utensils in the kitchen and the fireplace is interesting. It is so large that a cow could be grilled there whole. They still use the kitchen area for candle-lit banquets.

You go through a bedroom and into the Great Hall where there is a Medieval toilet fixed into a wall.

The Knights Hall is particularly impressive. It has models of knights in various different suits of armour all through the ages. The guide actually let some of the children try on a knight's helmet which was fun. The display of armour and weapons here is supposed to be one of the best - outside of the Tower of London.

Down in the dungeons they have lots of torture and gruesome punishment instruments.

The tour takes about one hour.

From the castle you get great views of the river below. Outside the castle there is a small gift-shop and a cafe. Once you have finished the tour however there is nothing much else to do. You only need an hour to visit here.

Arguably the most spectacular of all the festivals along the Rhine is the "Rhine in Flames" events.

Koblenz claims to have staged the very first celebration along the Rhine in 1766. Today, an 80 strong fleet of sailing vessels travels 10 miles along the Rhine from Spay to Koblenz via Braubach, Brey, Rhens and Lahnstein.

500,000 people line the shores to watch 8 firework displays in less than 90 minutes and 30,000 watch from boats. 10 miles of promenade are decorated.

At 11pm, when the flotilla reaches the Deutsches Eck (German Corner) in Koblenz where the Rhine meets the Mosel River, the Ehrenbreitstein fortress appears to be set alight with Bengal lights.

There is big demand for tickets to sail on one of the flotilla of boats. They offer dinner and then sail to Koblenz to watch the fireworks. This is the best way to see things - obviously if you stay on the shore you only get to see one fireworks display, but if you are on a boat you see all of them. You need to book well in advance and the cost is around 50 euros.

We unfortunately couldn't see the fireworks by boat - it was too late and too much for our son, so we contented ourselves with watching the boats sail by at Spay and saw the fireworks there.

We had dinner earlier in the evening at a riverside restaurant in Boppard and watched the seemingly endless procession of pleasure craft and cruise ships going up and down the river. At about 9pm they all "parked up" and waitied for their signal to travel in sequence in the flotilla to Koblenz.

We drove to the beautiful village of Spay and watched from there. The promenade was decorated with lights and lots of people were out. There was a huge beergarden with music, dancing and a great atmosphere at the river's edge.

When the first of the ships arrived at about 10pm a huge fireworks display was set off. It was quite good to see this from the promenade but would have been fantastic from a ship.

The flotilla were all lit up and decorated with lots of lights so it was lovely to watch them sail past. Before the last boat went past us, we could already hear the next fireworks in the next town along.

The carnival atmosphere in Spay lasted way after the fireworks and last boat had passed. The people there seemed to be going to carry on with the party into the early hours of the night.

We spent half a day in Rudesheim. From Boppard it took about half an hour to drive there. The journey is lovely - you travel past vineyards, through pretty little villages and along the banks of the Rhine.

Rudesheim is one of Germany's best known and most romantic cities. When we visited it was extremely busy and packed with tourists but that did not lessen its appeal for us.

We struggled to find a parking space, but eventually managed to get a spot close to the wine museum. The wine museum is on the edge of the town situated in an old castle building. Entrance is 5 euros. They give you a palm computer so you do the tour at your own pace, whatever order you want and it is in your own language. It was really interesting - lots of exhibits about wine, wine-making and the history of this industry. We found it informative and fun - even our 3 year old enjoyed it. Children can touch some of the exhibits and the fact it is in an old castle adds to the fun. You go up and down narrow steps and walkways from one area to the other. It is not for the less mobile. At the tower at the top you get stunning views of the river and the vineyards. We spent about 2 hours in the museum - only actually got to listen to about one third of the tour, due to an excited and impatient child!

The Drosselgasse is Rudesheim's best known street. It is extremely narrow - 114 metres long and just 3 metres wide. It is quaint, cobbled and lively - full of bars, restaurants and shops inside lovely old buildings. Three million tourists visit annually - it seemed like half of them were there while we were - however the atmosphere is great and we loved it. Some years ago the cobbles on the street became so slippery they had to be replaced. The old cobbles were later sold as souvenirs. We stopped in one of the many beergardens, had a drink and listened to an oompah band play.

Near the top of the Drosselgasse is the cable car ride. We had to queue for about half an hour to get on - but it was worth it. A round trip costs 6.50 euros. The cabins are open, really comfortable and as they glide upwards you get a prime view over the vineyards. You climb 1,400 metres in 10 minutes. It is really peaceful, smooth and quiet as you go up. We did not have to queue to get back down again.

At the top there is parkland, woods, amazing views and the huge Germania monument - also crowds of people. The monument is over 100 years old and came about following the unification of Germany following war with France in 1870 and 1871. It's fun to climb all the steps to the top - the views are fantastic.

St Goar is a pretty little town with a busy riverside promenade. The town is lorded over by the ruins of Burg Rheinfels.

On the main street there is a shop selling souvenirs, wooden Christmas ornaments and lots of cuckoo clocks. It is worth having a look inside.

Over the shop window is the largest free-hanging cuckoo clock in the world. It is 30 years old, 3.5 metres high and 2.5 metres wide. The clock was hand-made - carved from wood and handpainted. It took 7 months to build. It has 2 faces - a cuckoo pops out either side every half hour.

We wandered around the town, browsed in the shops, had a drink and then had a look in the church in the centre. We then caught the tourist land-train which takes you up the very steep hill to Burg Rheinfels.

Burg Rheinfels is one of the mightiest fortresses of the Rhine and is a must-see. It was built in 1245 by a local count as a base for his toll collecting operations. Now it has the most extensive castle ruins in the Rhine. The size and labryinthe layout is amazing.

You have to pay at the car-park if you drive there. Entrance fee to the castle is 4 euros. They have leaflets at the entrance in English, giving information on the castle and two suggested walking routes to take to explore the interior and around the outside of the ruins. It is useful to pick one of these up as they tell you what to look at along the way, and which rooms etc. you are entering.

We stayed about 2.5 hours in the castle and did both routes.

The medieval ruins and tunnels provide a really impressive glimpse into the defensive structures of the castle. The underground passageways were originally to be filled with explosives in the event of impending attack.

Both of us and our son really enjoyed exploring and going in and out of the dark corridors, up and down some of the really narrow stairways and into the subterranean tunnels and mine galleries. In some of these you need to have candles or torchlight - we gave those ones a miss.

Regrettably we had not brought our own food - this is a lovely place to have a picnic. Inside the castle there are no places where you can buy food or refreshments.

Be sure to also check out the little exhibition they have - lots of miniature soldiers, cannons etc. and really interesting.

Boppard, one of the most popular resorts on the Middle Rhine is bustling, lively and surrounded by beautiful scenery. We used it as our base for touring the area - it was ideal.

The main street, Oberstrasse, is mostly pedestrianised with souvenir shops, ice-cream parlours, cafés and quite a nice Christmas shop. Just off the main street you can see the remains of Roman settlement over 2,000 years old. The Tourist Information Centre is on Market Square. We found it a bit limited, but they produce an English "newspaper" on the area which is fairly interesting.

The Church of St Severus dominates Boppard. Its towers date from 1150 and the belltower has one of the oldest complete sets of medieval bells in Germany. Each night at 10pm a bell rings, preserving a tradition from when Boppard was a walled town. Most inhabitants then worked in nearby fields and forests. The bell signalled for them to return before the gates were closed for the night.

Unmissable in Boppard is the chair-lift. It is a short walk from the centre of the town and goes to Gideonseck and Vierseenblick (view of four lakes). It has been going for over 30 years. You climb steeply upwards in open-chairs - 240 metres in 20 minutes. Not for those fearful of heights, but you get the most amazing and beautiful view of the town and the Rhine as it curves through the countryside. At the top you stroll through the woods to the top of the cliffs. At Gideonseck you get a view of the river curving around. Vierseenblick is special because from this point the Rhine looks like four sparkling lakes. There are cafés at the top and a children's playground. A round trip costs 6.40 euros and it is open 10am-6pm. My 3 year old son was able to ride on my lap.

Boppard has lots of bars and restaurants. All of them offer a variety of wines from the area. About 600,000 vines are grown by local families - vintners for generations. 80% of the wine produced is Riesling. We ate out each evening but would particularly recommend Schnuggel Elsje - a tiny Italian restaurant and a traditional German place called Weinhaus Romerburg. Both cost in the region of 40 euros for dinner for 3 with drinks. Neither accepted credit cards.

The Rheinallee is a lovely promenade - it is great to stroll along and watch the activity on the river. Our son loved doing this each morning. It never ceased to amaze us how busy the river was with commercial and leisure traffic. It is fascinating to watch all the barges with their varied cargoes going up and down the Rhine. The railway at the side of the river is also really busy. 750 trains a day use this section - on average a train passes every 2 minutes.

A train ride on the Hunsruck railway to Emmelshausen is also interesting - the steepest non-cogwheel railway in the country.