Cruise Brochure
Known as the “Pearl of the Romantic Road”, Würzburg is at the heart of Franconian wine country, surrounded by sloping hills covered with vineyards. After breakfast, visit the Bishops’ Residenz, one of Germany’s largest and most ornate baroque palaces featuring the elaborate staircase, 18th century frescoes by Tiepolo, and the amazing 3–dimensional stuccowork. It is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Then join our guide for a walking tour of Würzburg.
The city has many wine bars, cellars and wineries where you can try the local wine in the characteristic Bocksbeutel bottles.
Close to Würzburg are other fantastic attractions such as Rothenburg, a perfectly preserved fortified town dating back to the middle ages, boasting unique gothic, renaissance and baroque architecture.
We had visited Rothenburg on our 2011 tour so we kept to the local sights.
An early morning arrival in Wurzburg had us off the boat and into the town about 9am for our tour. First stop was the Bishop’s Residenz – a huge 360 room Baroque style palace which was completed in 1744. It was extensively damaged in World War II and has been under restoration since 1945. Our tour took in only a small part of the building. We also had a quick look at the Chapel and part of the gardens before our tour set off into the town.
The Bishop’s Residenz – Wurzburg – A UNESCO World Heritage site
Gardens at the Bishop’s Residenz in Wurzburg
At the end of our tour, we were chatting with our tour guide and he was kind enough to take Adrienne and I into the Wurzberg Cathedral. He is passionate about the churches and when Adrienne asked which would be the best to go inside, he was quick to offer us a short impromptu tour. The Cathedral was also badly damaged in the war but some of the statues were able to be saved and date back to the 1100’s.
After this we walked down to the river, via the Unterer Markt where we also had a quick look at the Marienkapelle. We then crossed the river via the Saint’s Bridge – which has statues of a number of saints erected across the bridge.
Church in the Markt
Wurzberg Bridge – heading into the lock and on to Bamberg
We strolled along the river to where our boat was going to be moored. Although the morning was quite cold, we had a few glimpses of sun throughout the morning. We were back on board by 12.30 for lunch and at about 3pm – with the return of those who had gone to Rothenburg – we were on our way again.
At 4pm, Adrienne, Jo, Gae & Therese did a tour of the galley and the rest of the afternoon we caught up on some blogging and snoozed in the lovely sunshine coming in the window as we cruised along past lovely green fields and classic German towns.
After dinner, we excelled ourselves again at the trivia – “Evening with the Stars” – as we had famous voices to identify and movies to recognise from their music. The top 4 teams then had to literally “run off” for the grand prize – I got picked as our team runner and had to “tag” Csaba (the cruise director come game show host ?) running from the end of the bar area when we could identify the film from the classic quote. So more champagne to celebrate as winners and another fun night !
Tomorrow it’s on to Bamburg !
Today’s “Tour Trivia” – Occurring between 1626 and 1631, the Wurzburg Witch Trials are said to be one of the largest peace-time mass trials. During this time, between 600 and 900 alleges witches were burnt !