Day trip to Rudesheim - "We're CLOSED"

The cable car - closed.

The restaurants - closed.

Team-building curling - ends tomorrow!

We decided to take a quick day trip an hour west of Frankfurt to the quaint town of Rudesheim am Main, which I imagine is magical at Christmastime. On January 7, the flurry of tiny snowflakes was magical in its own way, but the closed town was missing something - a little life. There were a handful of wandering tourists like ourselves, baffled by the silent streets.  I'm sure a 5-minute search online would have told us about Rudesheim's status, but hey, we had the dusted alleys and cobblestones to ourselves.

Our plan to go to a particular restaurant was thwarted (it was closed) so we stopped at the Wirsthause Hannalore International.  If that doesn't sound like a tourist trap...

The food was pretty good, but the best part was the Rudesheum Kaffee at the end. You have to have the gorgeous cup.  We went in search of the cup, or a set (we saw one in a window  - 2 cups, 2 saucers, 2 spoons, and a bottle of Asbach), but everything was, remember, closed. Excuse to go back, including the Romantic Tour via cable car and boat.

Start with 3 cubes of sugar. Pour in a single serving bottle of Asbach rum.

Set on fire.

Stir and mix and stir and mix.

Pour in coffee, scoop on cream pile with chocolate shavings. Attempt to drink.

Realize that setting the cup on fire heated up the cup. Really really hot.  Coffee is also really hot. Then realize that the cup has no handle.

Drink anyway because it's awesome.

On our way out of Rudesheim we decided to check out the Mouse House, aka the Binger Mauseturm. Well, really I'd wanted to go to Bingen am Rhein originally with its Burg Klopp and the Hildegard von Bingen Museum, but we figured that Bingen can wait but the Mausetrum was easy. So we thought. Unfortunately, the roads were weird and partially blocked and we decided to head back home, and were rerouted up through Assmannhause. Totally not kidding. Assmannhause.

Rudesheim is wine country, so here are a couple photos of sleeping vineyards.

Looking down towards Rudesheim and the Rhein.

It was a sweet afternoon with Ian, and as always, we do this kind of thing and tell ourselves "we have to do this more often."

It's a good idea for the new year.