Rhine Valley

On Saturday, 28 August, the weather was looking a little crazy. It would be sunny for a little while, but you could see major rain clouds in the distance. Brian and I decided this was a perfect day to take the Honda and visit a vineyard on the Rhine River so that we could enjoy a book, a glass of wine, and some rain showers.

I had found a couple of possible choices online, but when we went to the first one and it wasn't quite what we were looking for, we decided to just start driving around that region to see what we could find. We drove up and down some tiny, windy roads with amazing views of endless vineyards.



We ended up finding Schloss Vollrads, the perfect spot we were searching for. This vineyard had umbrellas outside in a nice garden area where we could sit and enjoy a relaxing afternoon.

When we first arrived, it was sunny outside, so we wandered around the beautiful property.



Then we picked our table and just relaxed! It was a perfect afternoon. We enjoyed some sun and some great rain storms, too.



After a few hours, it was time for dinner. We wanted to go back to a really great restaurant that we had previously visited in that area in December 2008. Because it was a couple of towns away, we thought it would be cool to drive the tiny roads through the vineyards instead of taking the main "highway". The roads were mostly paved, but some of them looked like this!

They all had great views

On our drive, we discovered an abandoned castle! I mean, it wasn't hidden or anything, but only one tiny road leads up to it, and the brush surrounding it is overgrown. Royalty obviously hadn't lived there in a long time :)



We couldn't just drive by, so we went inside to check it out. We had a great time wandering through it - castles are way more fun when they aren't touristy!

The view from the top floor was amazing!

Of course Bri wanted to go higher to see if he could get an even better view :) This man sure loves to climb!

A serious hail storm moved in, so we left the roof-less castle in a hurry. On to dinner! We made it to the little restaurant in the town Assmannhausen (funny name, right?) and ate a delicious German dinner of pork and potatoes, of course. I love the country, homey feel of that place - I wish I had taken pictures or could remember the name of it! It's made of all rock and wood, so it just feels old and comfortable.

On our way back to Frankfurt, we got stuck in traffic behind a big group of bicycles, so we pulled into this place for a cup of coffee and dessert to give the traffic time to clear up. I think it was a great reason to extend our day trip just a little longer :)