4/16/05

Wow! We saw a whole lotta castles today. We are lucky because we are within hiking distance of both Hoenschwangaw(origonally called Schwanstein) Castle and Neuschwanstein castle. We ate breakfast and got on our way. It was a 5 km walk to where you get tickets for the 2 castles. We toured Hohenschwangau first. Hohenschwangau was the castle king LudwigII grew up in. It isnt as large or ornate as Neuschwanstein but it was a cheery castle(golden yellow outside). Caleb thought that the castle looked more like a Museum inside than a castle. Paintings everywhere. The tour was a recorded audio tour but there was still a girl there to take us from room to room and point to the things of intrest mentioned on the audio tour. The climb up to Neuschwanstein was a bit steeper then the other castle. We were assigned a time to enter the castle for our tour, so while we waited for our number to come up we climbed a bit more to stand on the Mareienbrüke. This is a bridge that spans between tow peaks and over a waterfall. You also get a fantaistic view of the Neuschwanstein. I had been here before in high school and was to afraid to go out on the brige at the time, but this time No problem. Ok it was a little scary, but overcome. The we went on the guided tour through the castle. The tour group was large. Not all of the rooms were finished in the castle because King LudwigII was suspiciouslz found dead in inches of water(and was an excellent swimmer) So we only really toured 10-12 rooms. The most impressive rooms were the kings bedroom and the chapel and the singing hall. The kings bedroom was cool because we have never seen such intricate, beautiful woodwork anywhere. The bed frame top was several models of famous cathedral steeples. Very cool and gothic. The chapel was cool because it was one of the most colorful and cheerful chaples I have seen anywhere in europe(besides madrid) And the singing hall because of all the wall paintings and stage backdrop. It was designed by a theater designer and not an architect and you can tell. We walked back to the campground by following the waterfall which turned into a river behind the castle. It was very peaceful and pretty. Today was a great day.