We made a brief pit stop in the tiny Austrian town of Dürnstein on the Danube. The town is the perfect little storybook village. I expected Hansel and Gretel to pop out of any doorway.
The thing that attracts me to this town is the experience of King Richard the Lionhearted of England. Returning from the first Crusade in 1192, he was kidnapped and held ransom by Count Leopold. The Count advised Richard’s mother, Eleanor of Aquitaine, that her boy would be released for 26.5 metric tons of silver, today worth about 60 million dollars.
His mother, the Queen of France, was beautiful, rich, smart, shrewd and related to every other royal family in Europe. So she called her kin and raised the money to free England’s king.
Some of our shipmates visited the ruins of the castle way up on the mountain above us. We chose, rather, to stay down in the storybook village and let visions of sugarplums dance in our heads. This is a Christmas tour, after all.Read more
December 10, 2025 in Austria ⋅ ⛅ 43 °F