2nd to 3rd May 2005 - Germany - Old Bradley Gets His Castle
With the arrival of Monday morning came the demise of our parking space outside Phan and Phuong's unit, leaving us no option but to bugger off. So bugger off we did. South, south, south we go... Luckily for Bradley, our permanently designated driver, I selected a smooth sealed road for the day...
Hummmm... Here I'll take the liberty to interject momentarily on my own gripping tale. For those that are yet to hear the nasty rumours, old Bradley has been known to whisper diabolical indiscretions about my navigational tendencies. My most hideous crime in this regard is to select the most goat-like track available on any given map; and all the better if it's not on the map at all! To this I must retort that the sun reliably rises in the east and sets in the west, thereby providing his pretty little navigator with a guiding light that never falters! Sure.... I hear the skeptics out there snickering away about the times when my precious light has packed up it's bat and ball and gone home for the night. To that I say, GO TO BED! And how about those times when it gets even sneakier and parks up right on top of your head? Which way then, I hear you all ask. That's obvious. Go directly to lunch - do not pass go, nor collect $200. Just park your little bottoms in the first available cafe, and don't even think of leaving until such time as the sun has agreed to be more helpful. As you can all see - I was born to navigate!
Getting back to our tale. We headed south out of Nürnberg, changed our bearing to south west on passing München (Munich) and stopped for the night in the car park of a lovely stone cottage cafe in the village of Halblech, between Steingaden and Füssen. This left us about 10km short of the Austrian border. Not much to report from the day's driving, but the next morning I took a wander about Halblech while sleepy old Bradley was pushing out a few extra Zeds. I found a pretty little water trough that was continuously fed by a lovely clear stream behind it.
And what do we have here? A road. Not a goat track. There's not a goat to be seen!
I even found a few locals to talk with.
But they were having breakfast when I dropped in.
When old Bradley finally woke up (hummm... maybe it was when i finally jumped on him and dragged him out of bed by the ear lobes), we took off to visit Neuschwanstein Castle near Füssen. Bradley was all excited about this, because he'd never been in a fully fledged King's castle before. He seemed to know all about this one too, and he educated me as we approached.
Here's the castle when it first came into view. No, it's not the wooden shed, nor the next photo. The castle is just above and to the right of the wooden shed on the mountain behind. Perhaps you should get your glasses out for this pair...
This castle was built by King Ludwig II of Bavaria between 1869 and 1886. It sits above the Alpsee Lake with the Alps towering into the clouds directly behind it. According to Bradley this is the castle the Walt Disney used to model his fairy-tale castles off. For all the history and architect buffs out there I looked up a website to get more details and they said it was, "built in the neo-late romanesque style. With its turrets and mock-medievalism, its interior styles ranging from Byzantine through Romanesque to Gothic. Only about a third of the building was actually completed. The 15 rooms you see on the tour show astonishing craftsmanship and richness of detail. Woodcarving in Ludwig's bedroom took 14 carpenters 4 1/2 years to complete. Wagner's operas feature everywhere in the form of murals." It really was pretty special, and well worth a visit for any of you that happen to pass through Bavaria some time in the future.
Being a gentleman and a scholar, old Ludwig even built his parents a lovely yellow castle nearby. Theirs is called Hohenschwangau, and you can visit that one too. You can even do both in a horse and cart for a reasonable price if you're that way inclined. The horses are really beautiful too - lovely healthy clydesdales. Anyway, here's ma and pa's castle a little further down the hill.
That website I told you about also says that, "The best view of the castle and a 45m waterfall is from the nearby Mary's Bridge (Marienbruecke), which spans a deep gorge. On the path between this bridge and the castle is a wonderful view of Hohenschwangau and the Alpsee." Unfortunately we didn't know about this until today (when I found the website), but we did get a picture of the bridge and gorge in question.
This shot looks soooo much like I pasted Bradley in front of some cool scenery with my image-making software. But it's actually real! We took this photo in Ludwig's front driveway.
Here are some more pics of Neuschwanstein Castle (Ludwig's house). It really is full castle action!
You could only get inside the Castle on a guided tour. Right at the start there was a really big sign that said you were not allowed to take photos inside. What better way to make sure you take photos! Here's the view of ma and pa's castle from out the window of a big room full of murals showing Ludwig fighting off nasty beasts using his trusty sword.
Unfortunately we couldn't get a photo of the murals (or Ludwig's bedroom) though. The tour guide was on to us!
