Hermann offers view and vineyards

Our trip this week is the most unusual town in Missouri: Hermann.

Highway 94 provides a scenic journey through the Missouri River valley and through the heart of wine country. Cross the river at Hermann and sample some of the Show-Me state's award-winning wines.

The following information if from the town's official Web site.

Tucked away in the Missouri River Valley, Hermann is a picturebook 19th-century village where clock towers and church steeples rise above red-brick buildings.

The town was founded by German immigrants who dreamed of a New World utopia that would be "German in every particular." Finding the land unsuitable for farming, they covered the hillsides with vineyards and began making wine.

Prohibition, coupled with wartime anti-German sentiment, sent the town reeling into the Great Depression decades before the rest of this country. The one saving grace was that Hermann remained pristine, its 19th century buildings untouched by post-war modernization.

Today many of those historic homes are bed and breakfast inns that welcome thousands of guests annually. More than a few of visitors have decided to stay. It's an oft-told tale. "We drove through on a Sunday and fell in love." You are cordially invited to come see what they mean.

To get there: From Interstate 55 north, take Interstate 70 west. At the 175 mile marker, turn south on state Route 19 and go about 15 miles to Hermann. It is roughly 180 miles one-way from Cape Girardeau. You will not regret making the trip.

Send your suggestions or ideas to Bill Coomer at P.O. Box 699; Cape Girardeau, Mo. 63702-0699 or e-mail him at bcoomer@semissourian.com.