River Cruise Oct 6/14 - part 2 - Cochem

On docking in a town called Cochem, there were no tours per se, but a couple of suggestions were made as to what we might like to do.  We chose to take the chair lift to the cross overlooking the valley, and Jeremy Van Dyke, our "journey manager" led us to where the chair lift (Sesselbahn) was located.  Although he didn't join us, Jeremy bought tickets for the dozen or so of us who chose to do this.  That was very generous and totally unexpected.

 
 The Sesselbaun took us up a very steep and rugged terrain.  There was a path, and you could buy one-way tickets, but thankfully we were given round trip ones!

It was a pretty rugged trip from the lift to the cross, but this was a pretty amazing view of the valley to award us.  The ship in the picture is the Rembrandt.

The cross is a pretty good size, as compared to one of our fellow travelers, Vic, and at night we saw it from our cabin lit up.  I tried really hard to get a picture of that to no avail.

What a lovely view of the Moselle River Valley!  Interesting to note, almost all of the buildings had dark roofs, whereas in Heidelberg, they almost all had red roofs.

 

We walked from the cross to an even higher perspective for another fabulous view.

A look at this awesome former imperial castle, built prior to 1081, rebuilt in 1868, was reward enough for the extra climb.

 

And back down to the town we go.

This amazing mural in the main square gives a bit of a history of the town, dating it to at least the 9th century.

A typically narrow street.

I suppose since Cochem dates to Medieval times, this is a ligitimate  decoration.  :-)

This is a leathery leaf from one of the smooth-barked trees that we have been seeing a lot of.  We have heard a couple of names for them, but I have decided they are probably Sycamore Maples.

   

 We were up close and personal with this big fellow!

 

And it's back to the boat to overnight in Cochem.