Original subtitles

Escape with us on a magicaljourney

down a river shaped by an extraordinary heritage.

We'll travel through a dramatic landscape of astonishing bends

and tranquil waters.

No other noise but just your paddle

and maybe the birds.

Discovering a river of trade and romance.

When you are on the river, you are not connected to the banks.

You feel free.

We'll explore underground worlds,

engineering marvels

and enchanted castles.

It's like a fairy tale.

We'll meet and travel with the people who live and work along this river...

The wine business has been in the family for 15 generations now.

...all the way to the mighty Rhine, where our journey spectacularly ends.

This is one of the most scenic river journeys in the world -

Germany's Moselle River.

Autumn on the Moselle...

...and the vines have been harvested.

We're in Trier, 100 miles west of Frankfurt.

The city claims to be the oldest in Germany,

with a proud Roman history.

The incredible 30 metre high Porta Nigra was built in 18OAD

from 7,000 stone blocks.

It's one of six gates which encircled the city.

Trier also marks the starting point

of the most beautiful section of the Moselle

as it travels 120 miles across southwest Germany

to the city of Koblenz.

While we could catch a tourist boat from Trier,

we're starting our adventure downriver,

just as Roman traders would have done 2,000 years ago...

HORN SOUNDS

...although we have a slightly bigger boat.

The 110m-long MS Sophie Dremen is making

just one of the more than 10,000 cargo trips

made on the river each year.

Today our barge is heading for Cologne

loaded with containers full of grain.

I think the River Moselle, it's like an old lady

because it's very elegant,

not so much trouble, easy-going.

Tony Hartwig, originally from eastern Germany,

has been working on river boats for more than 20 years.

At the end of school, I need a job!

And in the east of Germany in this time,

it was very hard to find a job for young people.

So I said to myself, OK, I'm leaving home.

The first year was very hard because I was 16

and far away from home.

But after one year, for me it was sure to stay on board.

From Trier, we'll call in at Neumagen-Dhron,

heart of the Moselle wine industry,

before travelling on to the medieval town of Bernkastel- Kues,

through the lock at Zeltingen towards the high Moselle Bridge.

Then the river carries us

to the forgotten cellars of Traben-Trarbach,

past Prinzenkopf Tower to the steep vineyards at The Calmont,

before we journey on to Cochem Castle

and finally to the city of Koblenz,

where the Moselle meets the Rhine and our journey ends.

The Moselle is famed for its wine,

unspoilt villages and remarkable meandering loops.

Eroded over millions of years,

these great bends are not the easiest thing to navigate around

when you've got a barge as long as a football pitch.

OK, now I go in starboard curve, yeah?

So I now I want to tell them ten degrees to starboard.

Twelve miles after leaving Trier, Tony has to navigate

the first of over a dozen sharp curves

between here and Koblenz.

The ship moves always to the port

because the power of the river push me there.

With boats coming in the other direction

there is no room for error.

Tony needs to anticipate the current

and judge exactly the right line as he moves through the bend.

And now I have to move more to starboard side

to control this to zero again.

And he's done it.

Only a dozen more to go.

But the most beautiful thing is to have this free feeling.

You see - you have the world in front of you.

Our barge is heading on towards the Rhine

but we're jumping off at the small village of Neumagen-Dhron

in the heart of Moselle wine country.

Today, the Moselle is one of 13 German wine-growing regions,

producing 65 to 100 million litres a year.

It's famed for what many consider

to be the finest Riesling wines in the world.

The roots of the Moselle's viniculture can be traced back

nearly 2,000 years

thanks to a remarkable discovery made here in 1878.

It's a sculpture of a 3rd century Roman wine ship.

A copy now adorns the centre of the village.

The statue provided the inspiration for a group of local wine lovers

to take on an incredible project.

The 18-metre-long Neumagen Star,

faithfully brought back to life using local larch and oak,

is the only working Roman wine ship of its kind in the world.

And we're hitching a ride downriver

with a group of multinational Moselle enthusiasts.

When you're on the river, you are not connected to the banks.

You feel free.

It's the best place on earth. Beautiful scenery, wonderful people

and the wine's not bad.

All your stress and all your sorrows,

they drop down from you.

Julius Caesar conquered the Moselle valley around 55BC

and Roman soldiers were garrisoned here.

They brought with them a belief that wine was a necessity

and should be drunk throughout the day.

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As more Roman garrisons were established here in the 2nd century,

demand for wine increased.

Originally it was shipped from Rome.

Someone had the bright idea, looked around, saw the hills

and thought, "We don't need to do that. We could grow our own wine."

Hence the German wine industry.

The deep valley provided shelter from cold winds,

while the river reflected sunlight,

keeping temperatures far warmer than the surrounding hills.

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Whatever its shortcomings, it was certainly popular at the time

and ships like the Neumagen Star would have transported Moselle wine

as far as Roman Britain.

Our ship still carries wine today

but not much of it reaches its destination.

It's an important part of the local economy,

so we have to support it.

So you're only drinking to support the economy? Absolutely, yes.

I'd prefer not to but I'm a patriot!

As we continue our journey,

we'll be exploring a critical piece of engineering on the river.

This is always magnificent to watch and it never gets boring.

I love my job. It's the best job in the world.

We're travelling 120 miles down Germany's majestic Moselle River.

Having been on board a cargo barge and a Roman wine ship,

we're now switching to a very different kind of boat

to continue our journey downstream.

The luxury cruise ship MS Casanova is two days into her eight-day trip

which started near the French border and ends in Stuttgart.

We're hitching a ride to the medieval wonder of Bernkastel- Kues,

then on to Zeltingen lock

before we reach the magnificent High Moselle Bridge.

100m long, with 48 cabins, three decks

and a leisurely cruising speed of 12mph,

the Casanova hosts a genteel crowd of 96 passengers...

...who have plenty of time to take in the sights

or just their cards.

HE SPEAKS GERMAN

Cristophe and Jan are in charge of keeping everything flowing smoothly

and rowdiness to a minimum.

My job is a lovely job.

Just keep travelling, enjoying the countryside.

It's nice because we are travelling all the time

and you are every day in a different place.

Every bend is different, every village is different -

very small, very tiny.

Yeah, it's like a second home for me here.

The Moselle is one of the most romantic rivers of Europe

because of its small villages.

It's the environment, it's the vineyards, it's the people,

it's the way of living.

What is really different on the Moselle is the colours.

This is my opinion. This is wonder - they are the colours.

You have the most beautiful colours on the Moselle.

And now we have October, for example.

You see all the colours - brown, yellow, red.

It's beautiful.

For my sake, it's the most beautiful river in Europe.

Around the next corner, 40 miles from Trier,

are the remains of the 13th-century Landshut Castle.

They stand guard above the medieval gem of Bernkastel-Kues.

The town's wealth dates back to the Middle Ages

when, for the first time, Riesling grapes were planted

in the vineyards around it.

The medieval market square is so pretty

it would make Christmas cards blush.

One of the most eye-catching buildings is Spitzhauschen

or "the pointed house".

No more than two metres wide at its base,

it was built in 1416

at a time when tax was charged on the amount of land built on,

not the size of the house above it.

This stretch of the Moselle is one of the most atmospheric

and we're going to meet a renowned artist who lives nearby.

Her unique glasswork captures the very spirit of the river.

The Moselle is like a lady, like a woman.

And she is also, perhaps, a princess.

At the same time she is really capricious

and this is what I call the Moselle feeling.

Mana Binz has exhibited across Europe

and has wealthy buyers from as far away as Korea

who covet her work.

Every material have his own elements

and glass had his own beauty.

Mana's creations build

on a long tradition of glass-making on the Moselle,

a tradition which historically relied on the coal industry in the region

to provide the high temperatures needed for glasswork.

Mana's latest piece is an ode to the Moselle.

I have here the river.

And I think it would be nice to put a flower here in it

with kind of cobalt blue.

Mana uses several layers of glass

and a paint made from ground up stained glass windows.

The finished piece has a unique aquatic texture,

with trapped bubbles of air and vibrant colours.

My imagination is here much better.

This is my guide, my idea behind every day here

at this Moselle.

It connect me, really, with the whole world.

Back on the Casanova and four miles downriver from Bernkastel- Kues,

we come to Zeltingen lock.

It's one of ten locks between Trier and Koblenz

that regulate the depth of the river

and it's crucial to keeping the Moselle working.

At 210 metres long with a double chamber,

Zeltingen is the busiest lock on the river.

We're hopping off to find out a bit more.

For more than ten years, Gerrit Klemm has been working on the Moselle

for Germany's waterways agency.

I studied civil engineering

and it was the specialisation that I wanted to do

and I finally I got a job where I can put these skills to work.

Gerrit is responsible for keeping the river navigable for larger boats.

Without the locks and the barrages,

we wouldn't have any commercial shipping on the Moselle

and the livelihood of many people along the river depends on the locks

and that they're working and this is what we're here for to do.

The Moselle drops 72 metres between Trier and Koblenz.

Without any artificial controls

the water would be less than one metre deep,

far too shallow for larger vessels.

But the locks ensure the water always has a depth of at least three metres,

meaning even the most heavily laden ships can safely navigate the river.

Ten million tonnes of cargo

and thousands of cruise trips now rely on the locks.

But something happens once a year that all boat captains dread.

Where we only have single-chamber locks

we have a maintenance period of ten days a year

where we have to shut down the locks

to make sure that the locks are working perfectly.

So we have to maintain it and where there's only one chamber,

we can't have any traffic in that period.

The plan is to gradually convert all the locks to have double chambers,

like Zeltingen,

so even if maintenance is going on in one chamber,

the Moselle can remain open for business.

Each lock manages a difference in water level

of between six to nine metres.

That's the height of two double-decker buses.

In preparation for the next customer,

the lower gates of the lock are closed.

The lower gates weigh 30 tonnes each

and they are adjusted to a tenth of a millimetre

in order to close tight

so that no water comes out when it shouldn't.

Boats heading downstream navigate themselves into the channel.

With just 25cm of space on each side

it's the maritime equivalent of threading a needle.

Once safely in, the upper gate is raised behind them.

We're looking at a small hydraulic cylinder

that shifts a 45-tonne gate with millimetre precision.

Then more than 15,000 cubic metres of water are drained

in just six minutes.

Sensors confirm when the water is the same level

and the lower gates open automatically,

allowing boats on their merry way.

This is always magnificent to watch and it never gets boring.

I love my job. It's the best job in the world.

As we leave the lock,

the Moselle valley stretches out before us.

A few miles around the next corner

an even more astonishing engineering wonder slides into view.

With a span of more than a mile and a height of more than 160 metres,

the High Moselle Bridge is the second tallest in Germany.

It was built to connect Frankfurt and Germany's industrial Rhineland

with the Benelux countries to the north.

The beam bridge, a culmination of 60 years of talking

and eight years of building,

was finally completed in 2019

at a cost of £158 million.

Almost everyone is impressed by the architecture of this bridge

and mighty it is.

The impression is that, "Wow!"

Sebastian Quint lives in the area

and took a keen interest in the bridge's construction.

I was here, following this project from the very beginning.

Some might say he was even slightly obsessed with it.

I saw every step when they pushed it.

I even came here sometimes at night

to see them pushing the bridge from one side to the other.

It was the country's biggest engineering project.

The superstructure was moved across in sections

in a process which took four years to complete.

Engineers strived to make the bridge as elegant as possible.

When it was finalised, there was a big party on the bridge

and there were up to 15,000 people come to see it to be opened.

In order to minimise its profile,

the finished bridge is supported by just ten towering pillars,

spaced up to 200 metres apart.

Stability is achieved with foundations bored 50 metres into the rock...

...and their thin design only possible thanks to 35,000 tonnes of steel

hidden within them.

The bridge is light, the design is clear,

so I think it's a nice architecture.

Ahead of us await new marvels.

A secret world hidden beneath a town.

I'm every time astonished.

Maybe there's a lighting system - "Oh, it's still existing! Great!"

And the steepest vineyards in Europe.

It is quite challenging.

We're back on board our river cruise

travelling through southwest Germany on the stunning Moselle River.

We're nearly halfway through our 120 mile trip from Trier

to where the Moselle flows into the Rhine.

We're heading to the town of Traben-Trarbach.

Then we'll continue downriver,

pausing to look out at Prinzenkopf hill

before we pass through the Moselle's great loops

to reach Europe's steepest vineyards at The Calmont.

Ahead, the river takes us through broad valleys

and patchworks of quilted vineyards.

And it's here that we find Traben-Trarbach,

a charming Moselle town made up of pretty streets and noble spires.

But Traben-Trarbach has a secret.

Because beneath this town there is another concealed world.

A honeycomb of abandoned wine cellars,

remnants of a time

when Traben-Trarbach was one of the global centres of wine trading.

Luckily for us, our guide is Achim Ochs,

and no-one knows these cellars better.

Under this town we have maybe around 20, 25km of cellars

and every cellar has a special history,

a special architecture

and we show it to our guests on guided tours.

It was during the 19th century

Traben-Trarbach's importance as a wine trading centre

grew dramatically.

Its position on the Moselle gave the town access

to lucrative but distant wine markets,

such as the Netherlands and Britain.

And by the end of the century,

there were more than 100 wine trading companies here.

Traben-Trarbach was the second-biggest wine trading city in Europe.

The biggest city was Bordeaux.

We traded in the year 1903 60 million litres of wine

from Traben-Trarbach.

The demand for storage led to a subterranean building boom.

More than 200 cellars were built.

Those closest to the river, with the shortest distance to roll barrels,

could charge the highest rents.

Cellars could stretch hundreds of metres under the city

and go down several floors.

This cellar was built in the 18905

and once held up to 400 barrels of wine,

that's 400,000 litres,

all kept at an ideal temperature of between ten to 15 degrees...

quite handy for those times it was cold enough

for a quick game of five-a-side on the river.

I'm every time again astonished

about special corners.

Maybe there's a lighting system - "Oh, it's still existing! Great!"

It is an adventure. I like these cellars.

There's stories of history.

I like it very much. It's the history of my hometown.

Mosel wine, probably shipped from here, was on board the Titanic.

But changing wine tastes, World War One and the 1920s' crash

brought an end to Traben-Trarbach's export boom.

Today the town has just two trading companies

but its brief moment in the spotlight has left an unusual heritage

and the intriguing possibility

that there are many more lost cellars still to discover.

There's a cellar entrance. There is a cellar entrance down there.

We find it everywhere.

Maybe we are standing on a cellar which I don't know.

Back on the river

and the Moselle passes through some of its most spectacular sections.

To really appreciate its majesty, you need to get up above it.

At more than 200 metres high,

the Prinzenkopf Hill dominates this part of the river.

The first time I came to the Mosel was in 2001.

My now husband courted me back then

but the Mosel courted me as well.

American Carrie Schwickhardt lives in the nearby village of Punderich.

I just always knew I will always come to the Mosel my entire life,

no matter what, and now I've made it my home.

One of Carrie's favourite spots is the Prinzenkopf Tower.

I really enjoy coming up on top of the mountain

because you just can clear your head completely

and it's a place to recharge

and just admire how beautiful it is.

This is at least the fourth tower to stand on this spot.

The first was built in the late 19th century.

This latest steel iteration was opened in 2009.

The view from the Prinzenkopf is absolutely stunning.

From here you can see how the river sets off on a great eight-mile arc...

...before coming back to within a few hundred metres

of where it started.

This dramatic landscape was formed in the same way as the Grand Canyon.

As the land started rising up half a million years ago,

the river cut down into it, keeping its existing shape

and making the meanders appear all the more impressive.

It made me weep at how beautiful it was.

It's the absolute best view on the Moselle that I've seen.

Given its commanding position,

it's perhaps not surprising that this hill has seen bloodshed

in times of war.

At the foot of the tower is a place with a special significance

for Carrie.

It's a World War Two graveyard for German soldiers

who fell during the war.

The cemetery holds the graves of 96 German soldiers

and 14 civilians.

A few of the graves are actually marked "unknown soldier".

The Moselle River became a key strategic objective

in the last months of World War Two.

Many of those buried here were killed by American forces

who launched an attack on this hill in March 1945.

I always get a chill walking through this graveyard

because some of the ages, when you see how young some of the people were.

I do feel a reverence here

and I am very aware of the fact of what happened right here.

Leaving behind the Prinzenkopf Hill,

we continue our journey downstream.

Three miles north we come to the village of Bremm

and another epic bend.

The BOO-metre high slopes which look down on this spectacular curve

were formed 400 million years ago.

With an angle of nearly 70 degrees in places,

these are the steepest vineyards in Europe.

And with everything having to be done by hand,

they're also some of the most labour intensive.

But rather than being shunned by wine-makers,

the slopes, known as The Calmont,

are some of the most sought after on the Moselle.

This time of the year we start trimming the grapes.

We take most away.

As you can see, we leave only two for next year.

That's more than enough to get that quality what we are looking for.

Michael Oster and his sister, Isabelle, are two intrepid vintners

who cultivate vines here.

They come from a very long tradition of wine-makers.

The wine business has been in the family for 15 generations now,

so I'm the 15th generation.

The family owns vineyards in other parts of the valley

but nothing compares to working The Calmont.

During the harvest, if you carry down the grapes,

let's say 40 kilos each,

you have to do it between 40 to 60 times a day.

So it is quite challenging, I can tell you.

It is... It is a lot of work.

ENGINE STARTS UP

To make things a little easier,

Michael has invested in what appears to be a lawn mower

attached to a rail,

a sort of primitive, precarious roller coaster...

although, quite a slow one.

200 metres long and journeying to a height of over 250 metres,

it's used to transport equipment, grapes

and the occasional dog.

Despite the challenges of working here, the rewards can be great.

The plants here at these steep vineyards,

they are at the perfect angle to the sun,

which means more sunlight comes directly to the grapes,

which gives them more possibility to absorb the sun,

reduce the acidity,

build up more flavours,

and that's something you don't have in the flat vineyards.

That's why we do it.

It's not just the extra sunshine that makes these vineyards special.

It's the soil.

We have a pure slate soil.

That means it's really rocky.

Only a few vines can survive. That's why we mainly grow Riesling.

This soil gives a special taste to the wine.

It gives the wine a lot of minerality,

a little bit of saltiness

and also a really fine structure in the taste.

It's Michael's job to harness that potential.

There's no sense in producing good grapes

if you're not able to produce something good out of these grapes.

So that's where the wine-makers can come in place as well

and they transform the amazing quality of the grapes -

they transform it into great wine.

Ahead of us lies an early morning canoe trip...

No other noise but just your paddle.

...a magical castle...

It's like a fairy tale.

...and a dramatic end to our journey

as the Moselle meets the Rhine.

At 80 miles into our adventure along Germany's Moselle River,

we're nearing the end of our trip.

Past the vineyards of The Calmont,

the river continues its stately progress,

carving a winding route between the Eifel and the Hunsruck hills.

Our river journey continues on a more traditional form of transport.

You are very connected with the water surface.

You don't feel this in a big boat.

In the canoe we feel the currents, we feel the move, we feel the wind.

Udo Marx was born on the Moselle

and for the last 15 years he's been running guided canoe tours.

For Udo, travelling by canoe is the only way

to truly experience the river.

The nicest thing is to be on the water

and move in a very silent way

through the water.

This is fantastic, you know?

You might hear no other noise

but just your paddle

and maybe the birds.

Before the locks were built in the 19505,

increasing the depth of the river,

only smaller boats could move along the Moselle.

It was the only possibility to travel this river

because there was no street that connected the villages.

And so when the British began journeying around Europe

in the early 19th century

canoes helped them to explore the river.

The British, on this Grand Tour, what they called,

they found the Moselle.

It was not easy travelling the River Moselle

and so they hired some guides in a canoe.

One of those pioneering visitors was

the famous British painter, William Turner.

Over the course of two trips here

he made dozens of sketches and paintings.

They became the Moselle's first tourist brochure,

showcasing this part of the world to the British public.

People saw them in London in the gallery

and they said, "Oh, wow, we have to go there.

"It looks very nice there."

And so it was a little bit like the starting point of tourism

200 years ago.

And for Udo, there's still no better way

to appreciate the charms of the river

than by canoe.

It's like a little holiday.

You are only a few metres away from the shoreline

but you're just a little bit out of the world.

A few miles further downriver we're hopping ashore at the town of Cochem.

Like many other towns on the river, it has a castle.

What makes Cochem Castle unusual is that it's not a ruin.

You can understand why they built this castle here

on this place.

Greet Cox, originally from Belgium,

has been working as a tour guide here

for 40 years.

I like it because you have such a beautiful view along the river

both sides.

They always say it's like a fairy tale.

"Sleeping Beauty is living here," I'm always telling.

"She will come around the corner."

The castle's origins can be traced back to the 11th century

when it formed part of a formidable wall

guarding the town.

It collected tolls from passing ships on the river.

In the centuries that followed it became an imperial castle,

home to a succession of kings and queens.

But it was almost completely destroyed in 1689

when Louis XIV's troops blew it up.

The building lay in ruins for nearly 200 years

until a wealthy Berlin industrialist called Louis Ravene bought it

for a pittance in 1868.

He invested a fortune reimagining the ruins

as a romantic gothic fantasy.

All the castles along the Moselle are still ruins.

Cochem, they had luck.

They found a rich man who rebuilt the ruin.

Louis Ravene died in 1879,

a decade before his dream was finally completed

but his vision lives on as the castle we see today.

This view - ah!

It's beautiful.

Each day I'm wondering, after 40 years,

I am so lucky to work where other people are having holidays.

This is my favourite place.

We leave behind Cochem Castle, continuing northeast on the river

toward Koblenz.

And we're ending ourjourney in style.

I spend about two or three times a week on the River Moselle.

I like to be separated from everything

and be included into the surrounding area.

ENGINES GET LOUDER

Like many around here, Timo Loesch, a local musician,

owns his own boat.

I need that space, I need that space for me.

That, er...

It's like a holiday, you know? Small holidays.

When I'm driving alone on the Moselle,

I have the best ideas for writing songs.

In the last few bends of the river,

the landscape gradually transitions from vineyards to houses

as we enter the city of Koblenz.

Caesar's troops established a garrison here in 55BC

and when the Romans founded a town here 50 years later,

they named it Confluentes.

Deutsches Eck or the German Corner is the iconic spot

where the gentle waters of the Moselle are swallowed up

by the mighty Rhine,

all watched over by Kaiser Wilhelm I.

The exact moment when we leave the Moselle is marked

by a change in the colour of the water.

It's a fitting place for us to end our journey.

When I get to the end from the Moselle,

it's a very special feeling

because I love this place a lot,

so I can't imagine to live somewhere else.

We've followed the tranquil waters of the Moselle River

all the way from Trier to its dramatic end

here at the Rhine.

We've hitched rides on cargo barges,

Roman wine ships...

...and canoes,

met the locals who call this river home

and learnt the Moselle is a river of contrasts,

mystical and romantic,

yet modern and hard-working.

It's been an amazing scenic journey.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media