Hello! We'd like to travel down the Moselle--from Trier to ultimately Kolbenz. We're eyeing the
GEBR Kolb river tours, one way from Trier to Bernkastel-Kues, would like to book other day tours up to Kolbenz. My question is: do the Kolb river tours provide luggage storage/lockers? If not, could you all suggest a luggage transport company? Any recommendations or recounting of your own adventures would be greatly appreciated.
Posted by
Paradise
7072 posts
I am not aware of luggage transport providers. IME these day cruises neither store nor prohibit hand luggage. You just keep it with you. It is not possible to travel very far in one day... the boats are slow and there are numerous locks that make it even slower than you'd think based on actual travel distances. These are sightseeing boats for day outings rather than vessels for transportation, with schedules that make what you're imagining kind of tricky.
How many nights were you planning to spend between Trier and Koblenz? Trier > Bernkastel (only Tu, Th, Sa, only one boat per day at 9 am) alone requires 4.5 hours. Bernkastel > Traben-Trarbach (a much busier and more popular route with ) would take 1.75 additional hours. So in theory, you could perhaps make it as far as T-T in one day, on the right day, but you would need to curtail your sightseeing to around 3 hours in Bernkastel in between those two cruises. OTOH, Bernkastel is a nice enough place that I'd want to stay overnight, I think.
I am not informed on options for leaving bags in Bernkastel during a short visit like this. You can contact the Bernkastel Tourist office (and other TI offices) in towns where you might want to drop bags for a few hours. Many TI offices around Germany are happy to provide this service, especially in towns where there is no train station or no lockers at the station.
Trains and buses cover the Mosel very well - schedules cover all days of the week and nearly all hours of the day. I would plan to use those instead for most journeys, then transport yourselves (and your bags) by cruise boat here and there (Bernkastel > Traben-Trarbach for example) on routes which have more generous and accommodating boat schedules. If you were to take the bus to Bernkastel (or perhaps cruise if the schedule allows) on Day #1, spent one night in Bernkastel, then cruised to T-T the following day and slept there on Night #2, then took the train to Cochem for a 3rd night... something like this would work OK.
Posted by
OP
2 posts
Thank you for your response, Russ! We were planning to travel from Koln to Trier, sightsee in Trier for the day, then either spend the night in Trier OR take a river cruise to Bernkastel-Keus (BK), then spend the night in BK. From what you are saying, this sounds doable, however, we'd need to keep our bags with us if we travel by river cruise--no storage on the boat. May not be a problem, I imagine it would depend on how tightly packed the seating is on the boats and how crowded they are in late September.