Germany (Day One; Part Two)

The second part of our day consisted of visiting the stunning Linderhof Palace.  

This beautiful palace was built and lived in by King Ludwig II.  We went on a tour inside, and were in awe at the fancy detail on every section of the walls, floors, etc.  I also learned that this guy was pretty cooky.  He enjoyed living alone, and he never even wanted to see the servants, and so there were secret passageways all over, so they could sneak around without him ever knowing they were there.  He also would sleep in the daytime and stay awake in the night.  The list goes on.

The most interesting part was where he would eat his meals.  The servants would set his table, and then reel it up through the floor, because once again, he didn't like to see anybody.  So he basically had a disappearing dumb-waiter dining table.  And...the servants would even have to set the table for four people because it is said that the king used to talk to imaginary people while he was eating...

The grounds were so-oo beautiful, and he even had a completely artificial cave built, called Venus Grotto, as an illustration of the first act of Wagner's "Tannhäuser".  He also liked to be rowed over the lake in his golden swan boat.  What a fella.

Now for pictures...

And that's it for day one, but don't worry there's still another day coming. :)

Germany (Day One; Part One)

What a treat it was for my little family and me to hop over to Germany and Austria for the weekend. Hazel loves everything about travels (buses, trains, airplanes, hotels, restaurants, and getting special treats). 

Our first stop was to see the Neuschwanstein Castle.  I've always dreamt of seeing this castle, and so our first day was especially magical.  It's also a pretty good uphill hike up to the castle (although if you're feeling lazy, you can take a bus, or a carriage) but we were wanting a good hike at the time, and so we faced the incline.  (But after waking up to super sore legs the next day, I was wishing I took the lazy route...)

Now, if you're super insane, you can take an additional hike up to this crazy-high bridge to get the perfect view of the castle.  We are officially insane because we took this hike, however I only touched the corner of the bridge before turning back (it was much too high for me).  Johnny, of course, loved going on the bridge, and while there he took some awesome pics for us all to enjoy.

Take a look at that bridge!

(photo courtesy of the internet)

After our sweaty hike back down, I actually bumped into a familiar face!  Her name is also Becky, and I met her while living in San Antonio.  So crazy!

 I still can't believe I was there...

More coming!

(p.s. If you don't know much history about this location, here's a really comedic, yet detailed description of everything we saw/did.  But warning:  There is some profanity.  Sorry.)

Aachen

Our final German market was in Auchan.  It was by far the biggest one that I've been to.  The good news is that there was so much to see and so much to eat; the bad news was that there were far too many people, and so I began feeling claustrophobic.  It didn't help that Hazel was a little grouchy.

But on the bright side, I yet again won the "piggiest" award for eating the most.  And it was all amazing!

Our adventures are still not over... :)