We continued along the Saar bicycle path today to Konz, where the Saar joins the Mosel. From here on we followed the Mosel river bicycle trail.

The weather was cool the whole day – an almost perfect temperature! It was overcast with occasional strong winds. It threatened to rain several times and we even got a few drops, but never got wet. It was very enjoyable to have a day’s ride without feeling overheated.

We did a side trip off the path at Trier to have a look at the Porta Nigra (Roman city gate dating back between 186 and 200 AD).

       

It took a while to get back onto the path again, as it took us through some semi industrial areas on the outskirts of the town and this was confused with road works.

From here the route became very scenic, as the river snakes back and forth through a hilly landscape.

       

The hills are all covered with vines, in some places you can hardly believe that they could cultivate on such a steep slope.

     

We saw rails set up along the vines – to help move grapes and equipment up and down these steep hills.

The villages we passed through were very scenic and all very neat. There were a lot of places offering wine tasting, food and rooms. There were also lots of cyclists along the route – it is very popular and rightly so. The bike path is of very good quality, mostly wide and tarred, and well signposted.

We stopped at Bernkastel-Kues, a beautiful town on the river, also with a ruined castle up on the hill.

        

We found accommodation in a gastehaus in the old town (the pink building to the right in the picture below). This was the nicest and best value accommodation we had in a long time. The room is large and in an exceptionally neat house in the centre of town. She has just three rooms to hire out, but runs it very professionally.

We spent some time walking around exploring the town, drinking a beer and buying some food.