Today was a day trip to Capri so a coach picked us up at the hotel and took us down to the harbour to wait for our ferry to the island. The manoeuvring they do is interesting, coming into the harbour and swinging on a bow anchor through 90° and the revers back for loading. Some of them don’t run as clean as the others. Our boat was packed with rows and rows of seats, Thankfully the sea was like a mill pond, which is not always the case. The crossing is quite short and we were soon docking in Capri Harbour, same technique with the anchor and swing this time 180°.
Then it was on to mini busses, these are just like miniature coaches taking about 20 people to go up the mountain to the cable car station where there was an opportunity to take the chair lift and that is what it ism a single suspended chair, to the top of the mountain.
Last night again we boated through the night, mooing in Cologne at about 4-30AM. The people it the top deck posh cabins were heard complaining about the noise as they rigged the gang plank to the top deck. This morning was departure day, not an early start but had to vacate our cabin by 9am. Howard our travel manager was onboard to meet us, issue our seat and carriage numbers for the journey to Brussels and at 10am lead us on the short walk to Cologne station. This was useful as I wasn't aware of this access, always using the other side of the station. We had well over an hour to waste before our train was due, so time for a wander and buy a snack for lunch and even find a seat for half an hour.
Our ICE train arrived spot on time and whisked us off to Brussels, here our time was much tighter and thankfully the ICE train arrived on time, it was then a very brief walk to the Eurostar terminal where we checked in straight away and through to departures. Compared to St Pancras this place is quite Victorian, no auto returning tray system for the security trays, a man picks them up after use, puts them in a slot and pushes them back to the input. Here there is no drive conveyor to take your bags into the x-ray, you have to push and feed them in . Passport control were working at their normal speed with no fingerprint of camera, just look at the passport and stamp you out, unlike the next UK automatic scanning system. The embarkation lounge is off the side of the duty free shop in bit of a building site and you come back through the shop, mixing with the passengers coming in for the next train to get to the platform. It made me wonder how many people catch the wrong train. Again a good run arriving at St. Pancras just 5 minutes late. From here it was the Victoria Line to Victoria Station, we even got seats, but I am sure every time we leave this station we use a different exit and cant get our bearings. We had a short walk to the Best Western hotel Victoria Place that we had booked, not the same one as last time by the train lines but on the corner of Warwick Way. This turned out to be first class for the price we paid and we will definitely use it again. Rather boringly for dinner we went yet again to Cyprus Mangal for an excellent meal.
A later start today as we weren't due to moor until 9.15 am in Rüdesheim, we had been travelling since just after midnight but had to wait for a Viking River Cruise ship to leave so we could have their berth. Where all the Cruise boats moor they have to
reverse out back to the main river. So as we made our way up to the moorings there were several boats coming down backwards. I have seen videos of the cruise ship movements in Miami but its not a patch on here, with boats going backwards for a quarter of a mile leaving, sliding past the others coming in to take up a recently vacated berth. Not only that but there is a constant ferry service crisscrossing the main navigation channel.
As we were on a GRJ holiday it was only right that we travelled into town on two land trains. This should have been a scenic journey but the weather was very cold and damp so the carriage windows were misted up so we didn’t see much.
In town we did our own thing wandering through the streets and market stands as well as enjoying a traditional coffee made with hot flaming Brandy.
As well as being famous for its coffee its also known for its mechanical devices, as the museum is guided tours only we didn’t have time to go round but we did visit the shop, then it was time to head back to the boat, again by train.
Back onboard again we ate in the upper lounge, much better views from up here and we were about to set off, doing our backwards bit to the main river and then cruise through the Rhine Gorge to Koblenz. This would be our only daylight cruise, unfortunately the lovely clear weather we have had on previous days had left us as we passed the many castles on our way down through the gorge.
This is not only the first time we have sailed during day light hours but its also the first time we have been onboard for afternoon tea with sandwiches and cakes. When we reached the mouth of the Moselle the captain turned about 120° to port and did a very nice ferry glide before putting the power on to take us to our moorings. Something that use to be seen in this country but are common on the continent are side slips often used rather than dry docks.
There was a guided tour of Koblenz on offer but we decided to just go alone and wander round the town visiting a very modern church complete with a peace bell.
Another first for us was being in a market as it was getting dark so we could see the illuminations much better and a visit to yet another church.
We returned to the boat in good time as tonight was our gala diner, but before that we would be getting information on our debarkation in the morning and also all the crew would be presented to us with a bit of carol singing. The Gala diner was 5 courses not the normal 4 and I didn’t see anyone wearing a Dinner Jacket and bow tie. It was also time to settle our account, ours came to just under £20, we hadn’t been on board much during the day time and with unlimited wine with dinner I really didn’t want any more to drink . Again the boat would be sailing while we were in bed.
