Cycling Day Two

Since today wasn’t a very long ride, we decided to pay a visit to Trier, where we had moored overnight. It is a very beautiful city with lots of interesting architecture. First stop was Porta Nigra, a large Roman city gate which has been wonderfully preserved and is a designated UNESCO World Heritage site. Another historic site we visited was the UNESCO World Heritage amphitheatre which dates back to 100 AD and was built to hold 20000 people.

After stops to buy me a sim card, Karen a fleece and Richard a ball cap, we headed out of town over the Kaiser Wilhelm bridge bound eventually for Mehring. The mosey along the Mosel was not quite as scenic as yesterday, but still very enjoyable. We were down a man today, as Irv didn’t think his leg could do very well after his tumble yesterday. One interesting stop was at Villa Urbana, a reconstructed Roman estate which was only discovered in the mid eighties. It shows a little of how the early Romans might have lived. The location also provides stunning views of the vineyards in the surrounding areas. A bit of a grunt to get to, but well worth it!

On our way from Villa Urbana, we came upon a machine that was harvesting grapes and dumping them into a special truck. We also got to see the harvesting machine at work in the vines.

Onward to Mehring and back to the ship for a well-deserved beverage, followed by a briefing for tomorrow’s ride. An Indonesian dinner followed by the captain’s magic show in the lounge, and that ended our day.