By Al Drinkle
Dedicated to the many colleagues, friends and family members who have accompanied me on this hike over the past 14 years.
It seems that I'm the first human to stir. Disoriented by jetlag and fuelled by excitement, I give up on sleep long before the day dawns. After the final nocturnal trains, there's a depth of silence when one can hear the vines exhaling as they, too, enjoy the stillness. Before long, gleeful birdsong begins to pierce the expiring darkness. I tie my shoes and leave the hotel by the side door.
Rüdesheim at dawn
The lush air has a welcoming chill to it, seasoned as it is by blossoms, moss, the mighty Rhein River and some ineffable aromatic signature of an old European village. Mine are the first footsteps on the cobblestones, echoing conspicuously off the church's proud, thick walls. There's no sign of life as I pass through the town square and walk up Marktsraße, although other early risers might be noting the stranger from their windows. Through bleary, provincial eyes, my appearance might be striking in the pre-dawn twilight — a tall man dressed entirely in black, walking briskly and with unmistakable conviction.
Turning left onto Oberstraße, one is afforded a rare view of this typically bustling street. Some hours later, the laneway will be packed with sunglass racks, hat stands, ice cream trolleys, postcard carousels, pretzel hangers, and the tables and chairs of countless restaurants and cafés — not to mention a throng of human bodies shuffling aimlessly through the ceaseless, endearing kitsch. For now, the street is eerily empty. I continue upon it past the postcard-perfect Drosselgasse, past the decaying splendour of Schloss Groenesteyn, and further still until the concise rows of the Hinterhaus vineyard are visible between the old buildings. Finally, after looking over the wall to the Rosengarten vineyard behind the Brömersburg Castle, I turn right and head up towards the Taunus Mountains.
The birds, now expressing themselves loudly and cheerfully, seem unphased by my intrusion as I gain altitude walking west through the Rottland vineyard. If I'm lucky I'll see a rabbit or a deer. Hours later once the springtime sun hits the stone walls, innumerable lizards will bask in the warmth, but for now they hide and I inhale the cool morning to its fullest. I contemplate Rottland's wine as I walk between the vine rows, and how its foghorn definition and grand, waxy richness has seduced Riesling lovers for centuries.
Leaving the village and heading towards Rottland
I'm never quite sure exactly where Rottland segues into the Roseneck vineyard, and my guesses are based as much on the subtle changes of dewy, terrestrial aromas as anything else while I nimbly sidestep the barely-perceptible snails in my pathway. Regardless, I know that I'm deep into the latter when the path curves tightly into an amphitheatre in the mountain. This is the Katerloch section of Roseneck, and legend has it that the devil resides here. Ominously, the air becomes cooler and more palpable, and while trying not to think about lurking evil, I step lightly as I pass by a dugout carved under the vines that usually shelters a sleeping hermit or two. Exiting the sinister undulation of the mountain, the path takes a steep incline as dawn begins to make itself known. As my heart pounds from the playful fear and the effort, I distract myself by thinking about great bottles of Roseneck Riesling, resplendent in their triumph of herb-laced, fruit euphoria.
Overlooking Roseneck with Rottland in the distance
The river now seems a long way below me and stopping for a moment to catch my breath, I watch the Nahe River emptying into the Rhein. On the banks straddling the terminating tributary, vine-carpeted hillsides hint towards the idyllic Nahe region on the right (to the west), and the sprawling Rheinhessen on the left. Continuing along the path into the Schlossberg vineyard, all of a sudden the remains of the Ehrenfels castle appear as if it sprouted out of the ground before my very eyes. The vista simultaneously pulls at my heartstrings and catalyses salivation. I try to picture what life in the castle might have been like when it was first built in the 13th Century, pondering how countless generations have persisted with the farming of an non-essential crop (depending on your viewpoint) on this perilous slope over the last thousand years. It makes more sense when one considers how numinously superlative the wine from this very hillside can be.
Overlooking Roseneck with Rottland in the distance
After the castle comes into view, it still takes some time and effort to arrive there! I keep walking as sunbeams break through clouds and glint upon the river. Reaching the castle, I sit upon a rock wall from which I can also see the Mäuseturm protruding from the river and pause to meditate for a short while. Despite wine-soaked attempts at climatisation the previous evening, it's only here that the realisation sets in — I'm back in Germany. Elated, I open my eyes. The trains have started up again and the sun is warming the forest of the Hunsrück Mountains to the west, which in turn usher the river back on a northward trajectory.
If my hunger hasn’t gotten the best of me, I take a detour on the way back to the village. Before exiting the Schlossberg, I scale straight up the mountain, soon finding myself in the dizzyingly aerial Kaisersteinfels vineyard. It's cooler up here and my shoes are now soaked with dew as I enjoy the bird's eye view of birds, immediately reminded why the wine from this site is so tensile and saturated in charming austerity. I'm awestruck by — and inexpressibly grateful for — my surroundings, but the gain in altitude has awoken my hunger, just as the dawning day has surely awoken the denizens of Rüdesheim. I begin my lengthy descent, first traversing through Drachenstein and eventually revisiting Rottland before I hear the church bells chime.
Hiking up Kaisersteinfels
Down the final slopes into the outskirts of the village, I regret my lack of forethought in neglecting to slip sunglasses into my pocket — but one doesn't think of such things leaving a hotel room in the dark. By now Rüdesheim is wide awake, and its Oberstraße is almost impassible as a garbage truck hurriedly and noisily makes its collections before the mobs form. There's also the banging of baristas, kids shuffling their way to school and the first of what will be countless bleary-eyed tourists taking in their surroundings. Feeling excruciatingly alive, I salivate at the thought of breakfast's imminence, and in anticipation of all the wonderful Rheingau Riesling that I'll be tasting throughout the day.
Weingut Leitz is a bifurcated producer of Rheingau Riesling. Led by the indefatigable Johannes Leitz, on the one hand they produce great quantities of delicious, utilitarian wines like Eins-Zwei-Dry and Dragonstone — not to mention the runaway success of their alcohol-free collection.
On a more serious level, they’re premier custodians of Rüdesheim’s greatest vineyards, making small amounts of old-school, cask-fermented single-site wines in a tiny cellar underneath Johannes’s home. The following Rieslings represent the apex of these terroirs, and are available in extremely limited quantities:
2021 Leitz Berg Roseneck Riesling GG $81
A triumph of cool, herb-laced fruit euphoria.
2021 Leitz Berg Schlossberg Riesling GG $85
Numinous, enchanting, stoic, foreboding.
2020 Leitz Berg Kaisersteinfels Riesling GG $85
Aerial, tensile, saturated in charming austerity.
Taking in the view (and waiting for the others to catch up)
