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| Rüdesheim |
On September 25 my friend Marlena and I joined the spouses
club on a journey through beautiful Rüdesheim. The town of Rüdesheim was first
settled by the Celts and received its town rights in 1818. Its livelihood came
primarily from winegrowing, shipping, and timber rafting. Our first stop was the Niederwalddenkmal monument. The
monument was finished in 1883 and was constructed to commemorate the foundation
of the German Empire following the Franco-Prussian War. The 125 feet tall
monument represents the union of all Germans. After learning about
Niederwalddenkmal we took a beautiful hike through a vineyard toward Ehrenfels
Castle.
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| Niederwalddenkmal Monument |
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| Niederwalddenkmal Monument |
Ehrenfels is a ruined castle able the Rhine Gorge. The
castle is located on a steep eastern back of the river amid extended vineyards.
The grape variety Ehrenfelser is named after the castle. The castle was
re-built in 1212 as a customs post controlling the shipping on the Rhine. The
castle was heavily damaged in the course of the Thirty Years War and finally
devastated by French troops in 1689.
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| Ehrenfels
Castle |
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| Ehrenfels
Castle |
During our hike we were also able to catch several views of
the “Mouse Tower” or
Mäuseturm. This is a stone tower on a small island in the
Rhine. The Romans were the first to
build a structure on this site. It later became part of Franconia,
and it fell and
had to be rebuilt many timies. Hatto II, the
Archbishop of Mainz,
restored the tower in 968.
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| A View of Mouse Tower |
The story of how it came to be called the “Mouse Tower"
comes from a folk tale. This popular legend goes as follows: Hatto II was a
cruel ruler who oppressed and exploited the peasants
in his domain. He used the tower as a platform for crossbowmen and demanded tribute from passing
ships, shooting their crews if they did not comply. During a famine in 974 the poor people were without
food, and Hatto, having all the grain stored up in his barns, used his monopoly
to sell it at such a high price that most could not afford any.
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| Mouse Tower |
The peasants were getting angry and organizing
to rebel, so Hatto devised a cruel trick. He promised to feed the hungry people
and told them to go to an empty barn and wait for him to come with food.
The
peasants were overjoyed and praised Hatto heartily, and all of them traveled to
the barn to await his coming. When he arrived with his servants, he ordered the
barn's doors shut and locked, then set the barn on
fire and burned the peasants to death, derisively commenting on their death
cries with the words "Hear the mice squeak!" When Hatto retired to
his castle an army of mice
attacked him. He fled the swarm and took a boat across the river to his tower,
hoping that the mice could not swim. The mice followed him and rushed into the
river by the thousands. Many of them drowned, but even more crawled onto the
island. There, they ate through the tower's doors and crawled up to the
top floor, where they found Hatto and ate him alive.
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| Gondola Lift |
In 1298 the Mouse Tower
became an official customs collection tower. It was destroyed by a French army in 1689, and then rebuilt in
1855 as a Prussian
signal tower. After hearing the story of the “Mouse Tower” we continued on to
the gondola lift, which took us back up toward the monument. We then concluded
our morning with lunch at a local restaurant and spectacular views of the
Rhine.
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| Gondola Lift Over Vineyard |
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| Our View From Our Table At Lunch |
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| Our View From Our Table At Lunch |
