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Artistry II arrived in Grevenmacher around 4 AM. It served as a base for our visit to Trier which was a 30 minute drive away. The town Grevenmacher is not too exciting.
Scenic Overlook
Our complimentary tour of Trier began with our bus departing the ship at 8:30 AM. We made a stop at a scenic overlook with a fabulous view of Trier. Along the way, we past several of the Roman ruins. We'd had a choice to tour Roman Trier, but since we've seen other Roman ruins, opted for the Trier City Tour instead.
Arriving in Trier
For the newly arrived guest, the Porta Nigra is the best place to begin a tour of Trier. The gate dates back to a time (about A.D. 180) when the Romans often erected public buildings of huge stone blocks (here, the biggest weigh up to six metric tons).
Trier is Germany’s oldest city. Some say Trier is even older than Rome and that it was populated over a thousand years before the Romans arrived. Many Roman remains have survived, including a 20,000-seat amphitheater; the Porta Nigra, the only surviving fortified gate from the original Roman settlement, which still gives access to the town’s center; imperial baths; and the Roman bridge, Germany’s oldest bridge with stone pilings dating from 144-152 AD—all evidence of this once grand Roman city. Trier also offers pleasant market squares, Germany’s oldest Christian church, and a cornucopia of architectural styles—Roman, baroque, neo-classicism, renaissance, and gothic.
The Porta Nigra is a large Roman city gate in Trier, Germany. It is today the largest Roman city gate north of the Alps. It is designated as part of the Roman Monuments, Cathedral of St. Peter and Church of Our Lady in Trier UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The original gate consisted of two four-storied towers, projecting as near semicircles on the outer side. A narrow courtyard separated the two gate openings on either side. For unknown reasons, however, the construction of the gate remained unfinished. We will continue our tour of Trier in additional posts.
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