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Updated: May 11, 2025
You can imagine how, in a misty morning, as you leave Bonn, the Seven Mountains rise up in their veiled might, and how the Drachenfels stands in new and changing beauty as you pass it and sail away. You have been told that the Hudson is like the Rhine. Believe me, there is no resemblance; nor would there be if the Hudson were lined with castles, and Julius Caesar had crossed it every half mile.
The more he was troubled by his gloomy thoughts, the more he urged his workmen on. Four years had elapsed; it was now 1252. The tower on the north side rose already proudly into the air. The scaffolding reached higher and higher every day. One day Master Gerhard stood beside the big crane, watching how the gigantic blocks of stone taken from the quarries at the Drachenfels, were lifted up.
I was glad when we were really in motion on the swift Rhine, the next morning, and nearing the chain of mountains that rose up before us. We passed Godesberg on the right, while on our left was the group of the seven mountains which extend back from the Drachenfels to the Wolkenberg, or Castle of the Clouds. Here we begin to enter the enchanted land.
After determining this fact to his satisfaction, Brian went back to the seat that he had found for himself at the end of the boat, and began once more to watch the gliding panorama of "castled crag" and vine-clad slope, which was hardly as familiar to him as it is to most of us. But, after all, Drachenfels and Ehrenbreitstein had no great interest for him. He had no great interest in anything.
We made our first halt at Remagen, where we visited the handsome church, in which a young monk was preaching to an immense crowd, and we afterwards lunched in a garden on the bank of the Rhine. We remained that night in Rolandseck, and next morning we went up the Drachenfels. In connection with this ascent, an adventure happened which had a merry sequel.
These heaps of rocky ground which they had dug out were so great, that ever since they have been called the Seven Mountains, and will remain there until the Giants come again and sweep them away. The Nightingale Valley at Honnef Honnef is one of the most lovely little spots on the earth, nestling sweetly at the foot of the old Drachenfels.
Imagine the Siebengebirge with the Drachenfels placed by the sea; next to it Ehrenbreitstein, and between the two an arm of the sea, somewhat wider than the Rhine, forcing its way into the land, and forming a round bay behind the mountains.
But Drachenfels keeps another token of its legend in its dark-red wine, called "dragon's blood."
At Neustadt I made my home for half a week whence I took excursions into the country. One day I went to Drachenfels, walking about 16 miles in the woods, where I had nothing but paths and guide-boards to lead me; but the latter are found wherever two paths meet, so that I could easily find my way back again.
Hammerstein Castle and Rheineck they floated under; Salzig and the Ahr confluence; Rolandseck and Nonnenwerth; Drachenfels and Bonn; hills green with young vines; dells waving fresh foliage. Margarita sang as they floated. Ancient ballads she sang that made the Goshawk sigh for home, and affected the Club with delirious love for the grand old water that was speeding them onward.
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