Cochem, Germany

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After breakfast, we got off the ship for our tour in Cochem, Germany. There were three parts: first, we walked into town and took a city tour, then boarded a minibus that took us up to the Imperial Castle. After the tour of the castle, we got on a tour bus and had a winery tour in another town.

It was really cold when I got up in the morning, and my watch said it was snowing. Yet, when we started the tour, it was just cold and rainy. The tour guide, Silvia, said that it only snows about 5 times a year, so I guess this morning was one of them!

The Imperial Castle was very old and was almost demolished by Louis XIV in 1689. Then Louis Ravene bought the castle in 1866 and renovated it. It took 10 years to renovate it, and he only lived in it for 2 years before he died. In each room, his initials, LR, were hidden somewhere in the room. There was a witch’s tower that was one of the only things not demolished by Louis XIV, and legend is that a witch protected it.

After the castle tour, we went to a wine tasting in another town, and it was fun. We had 2 glasses of Riesling wine and a red vinegar peach aperitif. After the wine tasting, we returned to the ship in time for lunch. In my rush to get on the ship to use the bathroom, we forgot to scan our cards, so during lunch, they asked that a couple of guests from specific rooms report to guest services. Imagine my shock when I heard our cabin number called. I left the table and ran to the check-in scanner, where they scanned our cards.

After lunch, I took a shower while Don went to the sun deck and watched as we sailed down the river. At 3:30, the captain showed a video about how the ship operates. Then we were able to go to the wheelhouse and walk inside. There were 2 groups, and I was in the first group, and Don was in the second group. While he was in the wheelhouse, I stayed on the sun deck and was able to watch us go through the lock. After that, we sat in the lounge until it was time for Elliot to give his port talk.

After the talk, it was time for dinner. They had wedding soup and a charcuterie selection on the table. Then we got dinner from the buffet featuring German food. The chef also walked around giving out big soft pretzels.

We were docked in Winnigen, and people went on a wine tour after dinner, so I thought we would go ashore to visit the town. But after dinner we went up to the sun deck to look at the town, and it was really dark, so we didn’t see anything that we wanted to go ashore.

Original photos by Pat Hensley

Trier and Bernkastel

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Trier is Germany’s oldest city and is full of Roman ruins. Before breakfast, we walked out on the deck, and there was frost everywhere. We had a delightful breakfast and then met for our tour at 8:15. We took a bus to a church and started our tour. It was very cold! A lady with another group had slipped and hit her head, so an ambulance was called. We saw a lot of nice architecture, and luckily, our tour guide was a retired architect. We also saw the childhood home of Karl Marx. The highlight of the tour was the Black Gate, known as Porta Nigra. Then we had 45 minutes of free time, so we walked around the town. We visited a department store that had four floors, but it was quite warm. When we met back to get on the bus, we heard the lady was okay and would return to the ship.

When we got back to the ship, we had lunch. I had curried cauliflower soup, penne pasta, and a chocolate chip sundae. It was delicious. While we were at lunch, our ship went through a lock, and it was fun to watch it out of the dining room window. We were only inches from the wall on each side!

After lunch, we went up to the lounge and hung out for the afternoon. We saw the beautiful countryside full of vineyards as we traveled down the Moselle River. I knitted on my socks while I visited with Jane and her mother, Betty (from Charlotte). Then we sat and visited with 2 ladies from Pennsylvania, whom we had lunch with. At 4:45 pm, Elliot gave a talk about Bernkastell and tomorrow’s visit to Cochem.

At 5:30, we got off the ship in Bernkastell and walked around the town. Most of the stores were closed, but we found the pointed house (Wider on top than on the bottom). We also so the castle way up at the top of the mountain, but we didn’t go to it since it was dark. We got back to the ship around 6:30.

We had dinner at 7:15 and sat with Patty and John (Denver, CO), Judy and Mike, and Dell and Randy (Albany, NY)

Original photos by Pat Hensley

Reims Cathedral, Luxembourg Cemetery, and the Viking Herja

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We had to get our suitcases out in the hall before 6 am. I woke up at 5 am and fell back asleep. Thank goodness, I set my phone alarm and requested a wake-up call at 5:30. We put our suitcases out and went to breakfast at 6:00 a.m. At 7:40, we went to the lobby to identify our suitcases. Once we identified our suitcases on the sidewalk, we were allowed to board the bus.

We had a 2-hour bus ride to Reims, where we got a tour of the cathedral. It was a beautiful cathedral. The weather was very windy and very cold! After the tour, we had time for lunch, but when we tried the bakery, we would have had to sit outside. Instead, we decided to hit McDonald's. The food was served in reusable plastic containers. After that, we stopped by the bus to get our gloves and for Don to get his knit cap. We had 30 minutes to explore, but it started to rain and sleet. At 1 pm, we found Elliot, who told us that we could go to the bus. We had a 2 ½ hour bus ride to the Luxembourg American Cemetery, and we saw where General George Patton was buried. We had a 30-minute stop here and then headed to the ship.

 
We arrived the the Viking Herja in Trier at 5:30. We got on the ship and a crew member escorted us to our room (104). Our suitcases hadn’t arrived yet, so we went up to the Viking Lounge for a drink, and at 6:30, we had the Welcome Aboard speech. There are 54 crew members for the 176 passengers. We met the senior officers and told them what to expect for dinner and the safety talk. Then we had the port talk before we headed for dinner.

At dinner, we sat with Dell (attorney) and Randy (nurse practitioner) from Albany, NY, and Jack (geophysicist) and Wendy (opera singer) from California. I had a rib-eye steak, and Don had mahi mahi. For dessert, we had creme brulee.

When we got back to our room at 9 pm, we found our suitcases and we unpacked. It was a really long day!

Original photos by Pat Hensley

Paris Day 2

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We went to breakfast at 7 am, which was held on the 1st floor for all Viking guests. There were those getting off a cruise and those starting their journey. The food was excellent, and I had an omelet made to order.

At 8:15, we met in the lobby for our Panoramic Paris tour. Millie was our tour guide. One couple told me that their dad got a headset to use over his hearing aids, so I got one for Don, but he never used them. Instead, he took out one hearing aid and used the QuietVox earbud in that ear. He said it worked well. Millie was an excellent tour guide. 35 of us gon on the tour bus and we saw the highlights of Paris. We saw the Arc de Triomphe (but the Champs Élysées was closed due to a 10K running race), the Louvre, the Grand Palais, the Petite Palais, the Pont Neuf, and Place de Concorde. Then we stopped at Notre Dame and went into the cathedral. It was absolutely beautiful! We had gone to it about 20 years ago, and it is much cleaner and brighter now since they cleaned and renovated it after the fire. We also had a photo stop at the Eiffel Tower. We returned to our hotel at 12:30.

Then Don and I put on some warmer coats and went to a bakery for lunch, where we ate some quiche. Next, we went to the train station and bought a 1-day pass for the public transportation (12 euros for the pass + 2 euros for the card each)

We took the RER C train to Notre Dame. Then we walked to the Louvre and saw where the robbery actually took place. Then we walked all the way down the Gardens of the Tuileries to the Place de Concorde. We walked through the Christmas market, which was very crowded. Then we took Metro 1 back to the hotel since it was getting dark. We stopped and ate a sandwich charcuterie at the bakery where we had lunch. We walked about 7 miles.

At 8 pm, we watched the Eiffel Tower sparkle and it was beautifu1!

Original photos by Pat Hensley

Traveling to Paris

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11/14/25

I woke up at 3:30, and my husband woke up at 5. It could be because we both were excited about going on our trip. Our wonderful neighbor, Donna, took us to the Palm Beach International Airport at 8:30. Our flight wasn’t scheduled to leave until 12:19 pm, but they say if you are going on an international flight, you need to be there 3 hours early, so we were. No lines or hassles while we were getting through security.

I met a nice lady whose son is a teacher in Philly and works at the school where my online friend is the principal. It was really neat to find the connection!

We had a 4-hour layover in Philly, but by the time we got off the first plane, went to the restroom, ate a bagel, and got to our boarding gate (which was almost a mile (20 min.) from where we got off the first plane), we only had a 90-minute wait.

It was almost an 8 ½ hour flight to Paris, and we arrived at 8 am on 11/15. We went through customs and got our luggage. As soon as we walked out of the airport, we found the Viking representatives. 4 of us were brought to our hotel (Hyatt Regency Paris Etoile). 

We went to the Viking table and met our cruise director, Elliot, who was very welcoming. He gave us information and told us what to do next. We learned how to pronounce our ship's name, which is Herja, but pronounced Herrier.

Even though check-in wasn’t until 3 pm, they had a room available for us. We dropped off our stuff and then headed out to explore. We walked to the Arc de Triomphe and the Eiffel Tower. We stopped at McDonald's for a snack. We had to stop by our room so I could call our credit card company. I forgot to tell them that we would be out of the country, and our credit card was declined at McDonald's. Once we got that straightened out, we went exploring again. We also stopped at Epic (the supermarket) for some things to take back to the room. Thankfully, my credit card worked fine. By 5:30, we were exhausted since we had been up for 32 hours. We went to bed early!

Look forward to our Viking excursion tomorrow.