Today’s first stop was Melk and visit to the Abbey. Me Jenny and I have visited the Abbey before and decided to sit this one out for a slow quiet morning.
But we could see it from where the ship was docked…
Then we cruised through the Wachau Valley – one of the prettiest sections of the Danube and as the day was so incredibly fabulous with the sun making man appearance, we popped up onto the deck to take it all in… and were served a little taste of the wine (Riesling) grown in this valley…
Don’t mind if I do!
There’s a bit of a story – there is a statue of King Richard along the shore which marks the spot that he was captured. He was taken to the nearby fortress in Dürnstein as a prisoner. One of his faithful servants – a musician searched for the King by going around to all the fortresses and playing his loot. He knew he had found him when the King sang the lyrics of his favourite songs back to him.
This fortress is at the top of a town called Dürnstein. It has one main street and a population of 870. They are famous for their apricot products – chocolates, schnapps, liquors, jams, etc… And this was our next stop.
This is where Gertrude and Johann live.
And then they have this fabulous blue tower…
This is Stift Dürnstein – a former monastery, now a museum, school and apartments. It’s distinctive blue tower makes an impression along the Wachau Valley.
There were sundial clocks around the courtyard, but I’m not sure how they would work….
Then we wound our way back through some small back streets to find the water again… not hard when the town has only one main street and a river.
It had some lovely old stone buildings…
It also had some amazing doors…
The Danube, as we know, is no stranger to a flood and here they have rulers measuring the highest flood waters and the years they happened.
This one looks high on this building, but it is situated quite a bit higher than the water line – the black plaque marks the highest flood in 2002.
This is closer to the water and gives you a much better idea of how high the water rose… notice they had to built another section of wall so the ruler could go higher! 2002’s measurement was 10.5 metres!
The view up and down the river…
The town across the river is called Rossatz. There has been some sort of ferry system in use since 1358. We were wondering what they would have used back then as the river moves pretty fast.
Apparently it was this wooden barge… Check it out here at:
The Spitz Danube River Historical Open Air Shipping Museum
Now, there is a motorised ferry boat to get people across.
The ferry terminal.
Next stop… Vienna!
fabulous photos and a really interesting blog. Thanks Shell!