Festivals of Western Europe

LINDENFEST (Linden Tree Festival), in Geisenheim, region of the Rhineland Three day festival, second weekend in July

Geisenheim boasts a six-hundred-year-old linden tree which is the center of the annual celebration for sampling new wine. Geisenheim is the oldest town in Rheingau County which, for over a thousand years, has been renowned for flourishing vineyards and precious wines.

During three days of festivities the ancient linden is illumined and folk dances in costume are held beneath its spreading branches. The town fairly bursts with laughter and merrymaking, since visitors from all over the world come to taste Geisenheim's wine and participate in her annual **** of feasting, visiting the vineyards and making pilgrimages to Marienthal, a picturesque Franciscan shrine, which is hidden in a nearby wooded valley.

High above the sounds of festivity and merrymaking the chimes of the old Rheingau Cathedral chime out melodiously:

What bells are those, that ring so slow,
So mellow, musical, and low?
They are the bells of Geisenheim,
That with their melancholy chime
Ring out the curfew of the sun.
--LONGFELLOW. Christus. Part Two. VI