Mosel is a delight of wine, food and wandering, but we chose our castles badly

Poor Germany. It may have the strongest economy in Europe, but it's the poor man of the continent when it comes to holiday appeal. People wax lyrical over the French countryside, Tuscan villas, Spanish beaches, English country houses. When was the last time someone captivated you with tales of his Teutonic holiday?

The Germans have a PR problem. As with their white wines, the sightseeing reality is far, far better than its reputation. I had a chance to put both wine and tourism to the test this week, with several meanders into the Mosel Valley from our base in Luxembourg. I can assure you that this was a very fine holiday indeed.

Of the delights of Trier I've already written (see 2.12.07, 27.7.08). We spent an enjoyable day there this trip, but new treats were to be found further up the Mosel Valley. We spent one long, lazy stretch wandering from Piesport to Cochem. The river's deep bends and wandering curves meant that a distance covered in less than one hour on the motorway took nearly six on the river road. But we didn't mind the pace. It was a sunny day, we had the top down on the convertible and the views were exceptional. One picturesque, half-timbered Hansel-and-Gretel village followed another, interspersed with limestone bluffs or steep slopes of vines, often crowned with quaint, open-sided chapels. And always beside us the placid river, flowing gently between its tree-lined banks.

The lovely, quiet village of Brauneberg is typical of the area, its main street lined with small wineries inviting your custom. Gut instinct steered us to Reuter-Dusemund, where we spent an enjoyable hour sampling their wide range. (Fortunately, my partner speaks German ... a must for real enjoyment of these family-run operations, which don't do mass marketing and don't do much English.) The rieslings were as fine as expected, but our real discovery was rivaner (also known as Müller-Thurgau). The second most-widely planted grape in Germany, though I'd never heard of it. Almost clear in colour, delicate, lightly floral, meant to be drunk now ... and cheap (about £2 a bottle). We happily filled the car with our discoveries.

On to Bernkastle for lunch, another half-timbered stage-set of a town clustered beneath castle ruins. We ate at the Ratskeller on the main square, a cozy, picturesque warren of groin vaults, painted ceilings and leaded glass windows. I'd had a comfort food heaven of schnitzel, spaetzle and weissbier here in February and was keen to give it another try. The menu was slightly less stodgy this visit as we were in the middle of white asparagus season. The Germans are mad about the stuff, and the whole menu had been rewritten around spargel. The fat, pale shafts doused in hollandaise were a delicious accompaniment to the veal, though as a rule I'll still cast my vote for the green English variety.

It took most of the afternoon to get from Bernkastle to Cochem, so there was no time to explore the latter town's fairy tale castle. It is, as with so many German examples, a medieval shell that was restored and kitted out to Wagnerian fantasy in the 19th century. Having seen a few examples of these, I decided to direct our attentions later in the week to Burg Eltz, a castle famous for its authenticity. The same family has lived here for more than 800 years and it's never been captured or conquered. I can tell you why. Because nobody else would be able to find the bloody place.

Eltz gives "off the beaten track" a new meaning. Despite maps, roadsigns, two people with good senses of direction and frequent stops to ask for guidance, we drove up hills, through forests and across valleys for more than an hour from spotting the first directional sign. Finally, we made it to the castle car park. By this point my anticipation was keen. Sadly, I was disappointed.

Burg Eltz is charming in its authenticity, striking from the outside, but hardly one of the finest castles in Europe (as travel writer Rick Steves opined) and certainly not worth the hours it took us to get there. Pleasant, yes, but not worthy of superlatives.

It is, without doubt, the view from the exterior that is the place's best feature, and on a sunny day a hike through the woods around it, to end as you clear the tree line and see the castle on a pinnacle in the valley below, would have been stunning. Our cold and rainy weather saw us arriving through the drizzle on the castle shuttle bus and pushed our attentions indoors, where the scenes were less exceptional.

Eltz is noteworthy for a series of interiors basically unaltered since the late middle ages. There are some interesting wall paintings and a few fine pieces of German renaissance furniture. The family treasury has some interesting bits, particularly gold and silver table ornaments. But, on the whole, there's a lot less here to explore than you'd expect. One of the things that differentiates Eltz is that three branches of the same family have lived here, each in a different wing to which they've added. You only get to explore rooms within one wing, however, so expectations of a vast stage on which to ramble are quickly dashed.

I left the Mosel with two regrets. I wished I'd gone to Cochem rather than Eltz. And we should have packed more rivaner into the car. Oh, well. There's always next trip.