Rhine Valley - Home to countless castles, endless vineyards and breathtaking scenery!

River Rhine is one of the major rivers in Europe and flows through Switzerland, Germany and the Netherlands. This blog post is specifically about a small 65 km stretch out of the 1233 km length of the river! The Upper Middle Rhine Valley is the the section between Bingen and Koblenz. 

Very few locations have something for all, this is one such region. If you are a wine lover, here you will be surrounded by vineyards and local wineries (German: Weingut). If you love hiking and wandering around in nature, you will get plenty of options. If you are a history buff, you can immerse yourself in the study of various castles and their intriguing stories. If you are a cycling enthusiast or love to ride your motorbike, you can ride along the Rhine and witness picturesque scenery. 

Finally, if just want to have a relaxing time away from the bustle of the city life and sit next to the river and soak up the sun then this is the place for you! 

Welcome to the Rhine valley!! 

In Germany, if you stay in NRW or Rhineland-Palatinate then most of the cities along this route can be reached with public transport but it will take double the time compared to a car especially on a weekend due to reduced frequency of the trains. However, it is possible! 

Here are my top 5 picks for this route:

1. Königswinter
2. Koblenz
3. Boppard
4. Sankt Goar
5. Rüdesheim

Popular activities include:

• A river cruise on the Rhine
• Wine tasting 
• A cable car ride to reach the top of a hill for views of the valley
• Hiking trails
• Cycling 

Most of the towns have a tourist information center and they gladly provide information about hiking trails, wine tasting or other events happening in the area. Each place has something different to offer and you can take your pick based on what you want to do 😎. So here we go!

Königswinter

I am starting the list with the first interesting place on the route if you are travelling from Düsseldorf, Köln or Bonn. Königswinter is famous for the hilltop called Drachenfels. The word translates to Dragon rock. You can see gorgeous views of the Rhine valley from this 321 m high hill. On the top you can find the ruins of a castle with the same name built in 1167.

Nearby there is a modern looking castle called Schloss Drachenburg. You can trek up to the hill top or take the train 'Drachenfelsbahn' to reach faster. 

Koblenz

Koblenz is where the rivers Moselle and Rhine meet. The point of confluence is called the The Deutsches Eck and it is a stunning must-see place. Once we reached the main train station (by ICE from Düsseldorf), we walked (2 km) to reach this Ecke (corner) seen in the picture above. After admiring the view we headed to the ticket counter of the cable car (Seilbahn) which took us across the Rhine to the other side 😍. I thoroughly enjoyed the cable car ride and more so because it was autumn and the leaves had turned yellow making the hill in front of us look stunning. 

Once you reach the top, you can visit the Ehrenbreitstein Fortress. 

Another popular activity is to take a boat tour from Koblenz. For me, my most favorite boat tour has been the one from Rüdesheim. More on that later😉.

Boppard

Between Koblenz and Boppard there are two castles worth noting - Stolzenfels Castle and Marksburg Castle. We plan to visit them the next time 😊

If you are travelling by car, Boppard is the perfect place to stop for a coffee or lunch by the riverside. There are many restaurants with outdoor seating overlooking the river. 

Like most other towns on this route a sesselbahn or a cable car is never far away to reach a hilltop with amazing views. We skipped it as we wanted to reach the next destination and also return back to Düsseldorf the same day. However, we did make time to roam around and explore the town. My friend had researched in advance and took us to see the roman ruins Kastell Bodobrica in the middle of the city! Each of these towns have a lot of history from the medieval times.

Sankt Goar

If you search for 'Rhine valley' or 'Rhine Gorge' on Google maps, it shows you a point in Sankt Goar. The region is hillier and Rhine gets narrow around this section. A bit further from Sankt Goar, the river makes a turn and is at it's narrowest and deepest. This led to many shipwrecks in the past. So, to spread the word and warn the captains of the boats a legend was created about Loreley 👻. If you take a boat ride, do look out for a statue of a lady in the middle of the river. Actually, a boat ride is most recommended in this section of the river as the castles are much closer and the scenery continues to be beautiful! Don't worry, it is safe nowadays! 😄

Next we visited the castle ruins of Rheinfels seen in the picture above. The car goes right till the entrance of the castle. There is a ticket to enter. The friendly ticket clerk told us to spot Castle Mouse on the left and Castle Cat on the right after reaching the top. The castles are really named like that! It was funny to imagine two castles playing the game of cat and mouse 😂. The views from the top of the castle are absolutely gorgeous!

On the other side of the river is a famous observation deck on the hill called Loreley rock. It is quite touristy and famous. We have not visited it yet. 

Rüdesheim

Rüdesheim is a picturesque winemaking town by the mighty Rhine river. Roaming around the old town area felt like flipping through the pages of a fairy tale book. The town has beautiful landscape on one side and picture perfect houses on the other.

Normally what tourists do is, take a cable car to reach the top of a hill, walk up to the Niederwalddenkmal monument then walk through a park to reach the other side & take a chair lift to reach the riverside. From there take a boat back to the city center. Rüdesheim is certainly not a quick stop, it requires half a day just in Rüdesheim and including the traveling time it is a full day trip!

Once you reach Rüdescheim look for Rüdesheimer Seilbahngesellschaft on the map to take the cable car. You can hike too, but I have not done it yet so can't say how much time it will take. The view of terraced slopes with vineyards everywhere make the cable car ride highly enjoyable.

On the way down, the experience of the chair lift can feel a bit scary for a first timer. It is surprising to see that it does not stop completely (only slows down) when you have to get in or get out and your feet dangle high above the ground. I know now that open chair lifts are quite common in skiing regions throughout the world but the first time it felt an adventure 😁.

During the boat tour you will see castle ruins on both sides of the river every few hundred meters. Some were used for defense; some were used for collecting toll and some on the hill tops were residences. Right from the early medieval times Rhine was used heavily as a trade route and continues to be used even today🚢.

That brings me to the end of this post.

If you found this interesting or have already done this road trip and want to find something similar, head over to the Moselle Valley! It is comparatively less touristy and makes for a great city break. If you have visited both, do let me know which one you prefer! 😊