Best short Rhine Cruise
 

Two American senior citizens on our first trip to Germany, would like to take a short (few hours) cruise on the Rhine or Mosel River. Please advise us on which would be the most interesting (would like to see castles) and be the easiest to arrange and to negotiate. Our time is very limited but we would like to see things unique to the region. Thank you.

I would say the Rhein from Bonn to Koblentz is the most grand river scenery - including castles but the Mosel from Koblentz to Trier is peaceful and delightful.
No problem with boats for either.

Hi stpetereb,
Where will you be staying? This might help us recommend which cruise would be most convenient for you.

We stayed in Bacharach and took a round trip cruise on K-D from there to St. Goar. We packed a picnic lunch and ate on board. It was a couple hours. Nice and relaxing. Saw a lot of castles.

You can download the timetable here

http://www.k-d.de/english/home/

Happy planning,
Michele

Hi, we are staying in Oberwesel for one night and in Dusseldorf the next day. Thank you for the cruise guide.

Castles are more numerous along the Rhine than the Mosel.

From Oberwesel, you can hop on a boat along the most scenic part of the river to Braubach for a tour of the best castle on the Rhine, Marksburg, which unlike the others was never turned into rubble by the French: www.marksburg.de

If you do this on the way to D'dorf, there are morning boats at 10:35 and 11:35. You'll pull into Braubach at 12:20 or 1:20, then take a shuttle to the castle - a few Euros:

http://www.marksburg.de/english/anfahrt.htm

Braubach's Tourist Info office will typically hold bags for visitors if it's open - there are no lockers at the station. The TI office is just uphill from the train station.

From Braubach, you are 12 minutes by train from Koblenz, where you can connect for your trip to D'dorf.

Hope you have a nice trip.

Sounds like a good plan, thank you for the ideas.