What's Up Al ? 遊記隨筆 生活點滴

The roads criss-crossing the Mosel river valley had to be one of the most romantic, scenic and fun drives around the world. In particular, we came in from the west and starting from the town of Trier, the valley opened up and kilometers after kilometers of vineyards could be seen climbing up the steep valley hills, with the harvests shimmering in the golden Autumn sun ray. The gorgeous vista was complimented by the beautiful and petite hamlets of villages on both sides of the Mosel River, often connected via short bridges; the villages stood in pride with its proud churches with soaring spires and in a distance, majestic castles built on strategic lookout points to hunt down potential intruders in the past or more likely nowadays, troops of tourists. Of course, Mosel had been known to produce excellent wines for over a thousand years, in particular, the mouth-watering, sweet-scented and aromatic white wines made from the Riesling grapes was the more well-known.
We drove through the Mosel all the way to Koblenz where the Mosel joined the mighty Rhine River at the confluence of Deutsches Eck and we drove back up again as we could not get enough of the lovely scenery. Just for our own record, we drove pass and spent quality times at these memorable beautiful villages : Bernkastel-Kues (twin-villages straddling the Mosel), Cochem (a majestic hill-top castle with stunning Autumn leaves), Zell (a cheerful drinking cat), Bruttig-Fankel (sleepy twin-villages with cosy Bed and Breakfast Haus), Beilstein (a glass of chilled white wine and afternoon snack stop overlooking the setting sun). Of all the castles which stood watch over the Mosel, we visited two castles of note, the Burg Eltz and Marienburg-Zell. The former was hidden inland and tucked away in the middle of a forest which made for an interesting side-trip from the Mosel for an hour or two; it was well worth the time as the castle was delightfully constructed with a dramatic forest backdrop; and the latter was right there next to the Mosel and we had a grandstand view as the Mosel made a dramatic ox-bow river bend. We felt exhausted as there were so many places worth visiting and vied for our attention and sure the Mosel left us with a fond impression !

Waving good bye to these hard workers, we drove on passed the famous Loreley - "the Rock" standing proudly in the way of the Rhine for centuries, forcing the river to swerve around this steep promontory of headland. We actually came across the Loreley viewpoint twice, up and down the river and the headland was very much beautified by the seasonal Autumn leaves of gold and sienna red. We made an early stop in another Rhine village, Braubach and spent the night in a spooky old farmhouse-cum-hotel, completed with creaky wooden stairs, dimly-lit meandering corridors and weird hand-drawn paintings from the hippies era; I should also mention out of fairness, that the farmhouse room on the attic was rustically decorated with modern comfort and the German breakfast was a feast ! And we soldiered on to the once-German-capital, Bonn, the birth place of one of the great composers, Beethoven. We milled around town for a few hours, having parked our car way outside the city boundary to avoid the road congestion and took a bus to the Bonn Hauptbahnhof. Having Rhine-ing up and down, we were ready to join up again with the Mosel River for a relaxing drive back to Belgium. Phew !

Despite Luxembourg's high profile reputation as a major banking and finance centre in the world, we found the city to be very peaceful and had an village vibe in the air. But the city's traffic problems were not to be scoffed at, so we parked our car in one of the many underground car parks, Monterey; just a 10 minutes' walk from the "The Most Beautiful Balcony In Europe" - Le Chemin de la Corniche ! First thing first, the car park was quite impressive as we were not expecting to circle 5 storeys underground to find a space, but at last, whew ! We enjoyed the early Autumn air and wandered around this orderly city, no car horns, no pedestrians rushing around and green parks at every turn. We made our way to the UNESCO-lauded Le Chemin de la Corniche - an overhang from an ancient castle rampart (the original defense structure built around 900 A.D.) with a gorgeous view of the city, quite beautiful, but definitely not the MOST beautiful ! Another memorable vista was the Passerelle, also known as the Luxembourg Viaducts - delightful-looking bridges engineered and structured to resemble the ancient Roman viaducts (see photos below) and we spent a great deal of time admiring and walking underneath these "art forms", amongst the many sweaty lunch time joggers. We had a sunny picnic lunch at one of the parks nearby and readied ourselves for our next motoring destinations - The Mosel River in Germany !

Waving goodbye to the seasonal monsoon rain in Hong Kong, we arrived in Brussels, to be greeted by a glorious morning of immense cobalt blue sky ! We really hit the ground running this time as we had a good night's sleep on the plane and we could not wait to explore this so-very-European capital. We took the train to Gare Centrale, a whopping 30 Euros for two return tickets for the 30 minutes' journey - we would just have to get used to the European "standard" again ... Laughing off this exorbitant extraction from our wallets, we smiled all the way in the clear late Summer air to the Grand-Place and we were immediately impressed with the majestic structures and the warmth of the European atmosphere. Of course we said Hello to Manneken Pis (the famous boy statue having a wee) as well as visiting the Royal Gallery of Saint Hubert (a cosy covered walkway full of coffee bars and chocolate shops) and we soldiered on towards the Hysel Stadium on foot, aiming not to get lost along the Brussels canal ways. After two hours of vigorous pacing, we were defeated as we heard from the locals that The Atomium and the Parc des Expositions were another 5km to go ! So we took the Metro to Hysel and feasted our eyes on the impressive stainless steel scientific structure. For those scientists amongst you, Atomium was built as a unit cell of a iron crystal, magnified 165 billion times. Jet lag began to set in, and we took the Metro to central for an early night in.
Having picked up our car from Brussels Airport, we motored for an hour along the pleasant Belgian hills and arrived in the city of Liege - a mostly French-speaking principal economic and cultural centre of the region of Wallonia and perhaps more famous for its tasty Boulets à la Liégeoise (Meatballs From Liege). Close to where we parked, we chanced upon Chef Philippe, who's menu included the famed meatballs in all different sauces and indeed this dish was delicious and we were more than well fed (see photo) ! So we spent the whole afternoon exploring Liege's Ourthe River, parks, cathedrals and gorgeous narrow alleys and we also made the effort to scale the 374 steps up to Montagne de Bueren where we took in the panoramic views over the city skylines. Chef Philippe surely fed us well as our stomach was still quite full when we headed back to our motel close to the Highway exit and called it another successful day out.