The annual Kulinarische Weinwanderung in Freinsheim didn’t happen this year (but you can relive its glory through our write-ups here, here, here, here, and here if you like).
Corona squashed the big event in the town, but that didn’t completely shut down everything, so we went anyways. Couple reasons for that:
- Before the cancellation announcement, we got a Ferienwohnung in Freinsheim behind the biggest church next to the Rathaus by some fluke (last year, right after last year’s event and well before Corona was a concern for anyone), and we wanted to go back to it next year (we have since learned that it’s already rented out for 2021, so we put in our request for 2022).
- We just like that town an awful lot. Shout out to our ex-Heidelberg pals once again!
So we drove to Freinsheim, met up with our pal Snooker, and snarfed up the Saumagen and Weinkraut and Brodworsch and Zwivvelkuchl without 10k of our fellow revelers competing for our attention. Also, the weather kinda sucked, so maybe that was a silver lining. Still, for tradition’s sake, I took a selfie or two at my favorite spots on the Wanderung route.
Since the Weinwanderung was not happening at all, that gave us time to go check out Bad Dürkheim, an easy train ride further south from Freinsheim. We ate a nice lunch in a huge old wine barrel and strolled through the Gradierbau (“graduation tower,” ever heard of that? We had not!). Hat tips to old WEBMU pal Christie Dietz for the suggestions. We must have benefitted from the salty atmosphere, right? I mean, they wouldn’t have built it and maintained it all these years if it were good for nothing.
After our time in Freinsheim was up, we parted ways, but took a hint from Snooker to check out the Felsenkirche (“Crag Church”, set into a rocky outcropping along the river Nahe) in Idar/Oberstein before driving north to Wiesbaden to meet up with a friend there for Kaffee und Kuchen on our way to our Ferienwohnung in Lorchhausen.
This looks like a lovely vacation. I am jealous of your still-viable travel.
Thanks Steven. You’ve only seen half of it so far; Part 3 (which is about 50% of the length of the trip) is coming soon.
Cool that you went to Idar-Oberstein!! I really enjoyed exploring the B roads through that area.
Sadly the church is closed to visitors thanks to the virus, so yet another year my plans were foiled.
Just beyond the Felsenkirche, on a higher hill, is a cool castle.