It All Started with a Grape

Germany Day Seven

The concierge handed us champagne as we checked into Breuer's Rudesheimer Schloss. This hotel had an actual key to the door— not a key card— it's a key. There was an exclusive Honeymoon decoration on our bed. They must have worked with our flight attendants! Well, there was no time to waste— I needed to reverse engineer those swan towels. I mean, we needed to buy tickets to Wine Time. It's a pass that included two glasses of wine from four different wineries. The swans could wait— or so she told me. We got a map and plotted our trajectory. It's essential to have a battle plan. We picked the three wineries that happened to be in a row. The fourth was about a mile away, which would have cost us two glasses worth of drinking time. The math wasn't worth it.

Vinothek Georg Breuer screamed modern. Everything was either slate or stainless steel. The bartender was Swedish, so her English was better than my wife's—just ask our French friend. She slipped us a third glass of wine, which set the bar unfairly high for the rest of the day. A pupper greeted us at the door, and just like that, things were off to a solid start.

We toured the cellar and didn’t get murdered, though it had a definite horror-movie vibe.

The guide mentioned, “People hid down here during the war.”

I asked, “Which war?” like a total idiot. I loved the cellar but kept an eye out for ghosts just in case.

The bartender told us they hosted weddings there. Was it too late to fly everyone over for a do-over ceremony? Yes. Yes, it was.

After the tasting, I bought a bottle of that bonus third glass she gave us. It seemed fair since she was generous with the pour. Wait—was this a marketing ploy? Well played, wine. Well played.

Vinothek Allendorf and Berg’s Vinothek were way more laid-back. No slick saleswomanship, no dog. Just wine. They got that part right. We visited both spots and sat on the most uncomfortable chairs known to mankind. These torture devices were shaped like champagne corks and made of recycled corks. Who thought a convex chair was a good idea? Whoever it was, they definitely flunked geometry. Wine math had betrayed us—again.

I grabbed an extra glass for the road—or, spoiler alert, the cable car at our next stop.

The cable car took us to the top of a hill with a war monument so big it screamed, “Look at me!” Definitely 1800s. As we floated over the vineyards, all we saw was an endless sea of grapes. No way it was all Riesling... right?

Dinner at the hotel restaurant featured two to three bottles of wine. We debated whether that counted as dinner. Can you call it dinner if you forgot to order entrees? Asking for a friend. We did get a cheese plate that included mini-eggplants. My wife called them grapes. You decide.

Meanwhile, a Viking River Cruise unloaded what looked like the nursing home version of Rumspringa. These folks came to party. They danced and drank like it was their second youth. The restaurant even had a functioning Shotski. I hadn’t seen one of those since college. And these—let's call them seasoned—revelers got some serious mileage out of it.

The server decided his life's mission was to fill these shot glasses to the absolute brim. Guests started pleading, "That’s enough," or, "Just a half shot for me." He didn't care. Instead, he asked the band to play louder and pretended not to hear them. One woman stared him down and covered her glass with her hand. His response? He pulled out a squirt gun and sprayed her until she surrendered. While she was busy shielding herself, he filled her glass.

I have no idea where he got that squirt gun. No holster. No explanation. Just pure chaos.

Then we went out for after-dinner drinks. Again, not sure if you can call it that since we skipped dinner entirely. We kicked things off with yet another bottle of wine. Live music was playing, and the seasoned party squad was back, absolutely annihilating the dance floor. I think they were following us.

They played that "Alice" song you always hear at Hofbräu Hauses and Oktoberfests. You know the one. But I didn’t know if this was a callback crowd. In Pittsburgh's Hofbräu Haus? Callbacks are mandatory. At Asheville’s Sierra Nevada Oktoberfest? Also a go. My wife said no. The wine said yes. The band cued it up.

And without missing a beat, completely alone, I yelled, “Alice? Alice? Who the F— is Alice?” My wife looked like she might leave me there. The band, however, loved it. They pointed at me for each chorus after that. Congratulations, me. I had made it worse.

When the song finally ended, a German gentleman sauntered over, gave me a knowing nod, and said, “F—ing Alice.”

Did we make it home? Did we go to sleep? Did we ever find out who Alice is? Nope. We never do.