The wines of the district are far
better than its food.
Rudesheim, Geisenheim, Schloss Johannisberg, the Steinberg Abbey above
Hattenheim, are of course household words, and the man who said that
travelling along the Rhine was like reading a restaurant wine-list had
some justification for his Philistine speech. One does not expect to
discover the real Steinberg Cabinet in a village inn, and the
Johannisberg generally found in every hotel in Rhineland is a very
inferior wine to that of the Schloss, and is grown in the vineyards
round Dorf Johannisberg. I have memories of excellent bottles of wine at
the Ress at Hattenheim, and at the Engel at Erbach; but the fact that I
was making a walking tour may have added to the delight of the draughts.
The Marcobrunn vineyards lie between Hattenheim and Erbach. The Hotel
Victoria at Bingen has its own vineyards and makes a capital wine; and
in the valley of the river below Bingen almost every little town and
hill--Lorch, Boppard, Horcheim, and the Kreuzberg--has its own
particular brand, generally excellent. Assmanhausen, which gives such an
excellent red wine, is on the opposite bank to Bingen and a little below
it. The Rhine boats have a very good assortment of wines on board, but
it is wise to run the finger a little way down the list before ordering
your bottle, for the very cheapest wines on the Rhine are, as is usual
in all countries, of the thinnest description.
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