Tom and Linda’s 2008 Europe Trip

Munich Station

Salzburg to Munich was a nice, quiet train, but we missed our tight connection in Munich and had to wait an hour. We wandered out to the street and found an internet café to try again to find the gear. The train from Munich to Kempten was small, but not uncomfortable.

Slow Trains and the Biggest Experiment of All Time

Our information on trains was incomplete and we weren’t sure of our route. We wanted to go to Reutte in Austria, but thought we might have to settle for Füssen in Germany (they’re not far apart.)

But we told the conductor where we were going when he checked our pass. He found us a connection to Reutte.

Little did we know it was a sloooww one. In its 30-km run it had 5 or 6 scheduled stops, and would stop at any station along the way if anyone was waiting there or anyone on the train pushed a button when they announced the station. It took about an hour and a half.

Meanwhile, we found this article about the new Large Hadron Collider, about to start up not far from here. Unfortunately, you can't go see it, but we felt close anyway!

Arriving in Reutte

We got to Reutte near 20:00, long after the TI had closed. Walked down the street with our packs and found one of Rick’s hotel recommendations,

Das Beck, which was much farther away than it looked on Rick’s map. Not to scale, indeed! But they had a room and we checked in for one night, not knowing how long we’d stay.

Walked around the corner to The Golden Hirsch for dinner – good food and lousy service. We waited a good 15 minutes after we’d finished, and finally had to hunt down the waitress to pay the bill.

B&B breakfasts in Germany and Austria had reached a pattern – a boiled egg, served in the shell in an egg cup, coffee or tea, cold cuts and bread. It was getting a little old.

Breakfast at Das Beck was the best we’d had in a while. There were boil-your-own eggs, lots of interesting breads, cheeses, cereals, toast, homemade jams, fresh fruit and juices. That’s part of the reason we booked a second night.

Walk to the Ehrenberg

Our first real day here was quite an adventure. We walked out to the local group of castles, Ehrenberg, about an hour’s walk away on well-defined, paved walking paths and roads through the Tyrolean landscape.

There are three castles in the Ehrenberg

The Castle Ehrenberg was the home of the local king, built on the hill over the narrow pass.

The Klause was a fortress built to block the pass for the sake of exacting tariffs on the passing trade.

The Fortress Schlosskopf was built many years later, on the next mountain, overlooking the Castle. In fact, the castle was once successfully attacked from this position. More about that below.

See that little white dotted line up to the Schlosskopf? Been there!

Up to Ehrenberg Castle

It was an invigorating hike up a well-paved path. There were occasional informational signs along the way, in English as well as German, and they were a good excuse to pause for a breather.

A steep entry, up through multiple defendable gates.

There was a guy up there with buckets and ladders, a little cement mixer and a small lift, working on the paving and walls, but mostly it was just an open ruin overgrown with weeds.

And the other way as well.

I believe that round building stored gunpowder. Good to keep it away from the main castle.

Hike up to the Schlosskopf

After a bit of a rest we decided to take the challenge and climb on up to the third castle – the Schlosskopf – atop the next hill. It was a very steep, sometimes tricky climb to a point that overlooks the main castle, and from which its former owners lobbed the cannonballs that destroyed it. They later built the Schlosskopf on that spot.

I was quite exhausted when we got there. In the last several switchbacks on the narrow root-filled path, I’d had to stop every few yards, it seemed, to catch my breath – everywhere I could find a reasonable place to sit for a minute.

We met a couple hikers at the top who asked us for the way down to the Klause. There was a language barrier, but it seems they’d come up a different way. I think there’s a mountain-bike path on the other side.

Just as they were leaving we discovered the drinks machine, and that we had no change. They changed our 5 for us, and I was saved from the stupidity of not bringing water with me.

From the highest point of this hilltop, looking back over the ruins of the Schlosskopf and to the modern villages beyond.

Most of the bottom floor of that building on the right has been rebuilt and has new roof and doors. The orange spot outside is a picnic table, and the drinks machine is just inside the door next to it. These things became important to us.

Storm moving in, the wind picked up and the sky darkened.

We moved a bench from the lonely picnic table outside into the rebuilt rooms.

The thunderstorm moved in and we dove for cover. This picture was taken while the sun was still shining and the doors were open.

And there we were, all alone in a thunderstorm in two stone rooms with a new wooden ceiling and doors, water leaking in around the edges and under the doors onto the gravel floors.

We had our bench that we put near a wall so we could lean back.

We had our drinks machine and a little change, and a kitschy pirate’s chest. opening the chest started a recording of what sounded like a German-speaking, Scottish-accented pirate, accompanied by thunder and rain sounds. But after that was done, the chest gave some light.

Eventually the castle’s outside spotlights came on, as the sky darkened further. Thunder rolled across the mountains outside, the rain fell harder, and there was wind blowing in even after the doors were closed.

They’d put plexiglas panels over the windows, each with some sort of pirate-figure decal. They didn’t seal, but they overlapped on all sides by a little bit and didn't leak much.

We found a hole through the wall under one window where we could see the rain as it fell through the spotlight – good way to tell how hard it was actually raining.

So we sat and listened to the storm, mixed with the phony sound effects from the pirate’s chest, and watched the rain and the clock. We thought about the setting sun and talked about the possibility of being stuck overnight. The gravel was big and chunky and couldn’t be comfortable, but that path was not one to attempt in the dark, even if it were dry!

We had no rain gear with us, and it was getting colder. The storm was a noisy one – bolts of lightning and loud rolling thunder.

The light lasted long enough to get us back to the Klause.

By then the place was pretty much empty, although we had met a young man running up the hill a few switchbacks up, in the well-paved section below the main castle. There were people at the bottom looking for him, and were surprised when we told them he was headed up at that time!

The little creeks along the way were much more active than they'd been on our way up.

Got back to town around 20:30 and found an inviting restaurant open along the way. Cushioned seats!

Had pizza and salad and a rest. When we left, we found Al Capone’s Pizzeria right next door – they do like their pizza here. And their ice cream.

Finally back to the hotel, Tom checked email for news about the riding gear (no replies), I took a hot shower and we fell into bed.

Füssen

The next day dawned bright and pleasant, with many people talking about the storm. No one else had a story like ours, though!

One of our fellow hotel guests was Irene Trullinger, a journalist from NYC on a 3-month fellowship to Reuters TV in Berlin. She was taking a holiday just before her return to America.

Turned out that her plans for this day were the same as ours, and we got a chance to travel and talk together.

We were headed to Füssen and the famous castles of Schwangau.

It was a guided tour with tickets and start times and different groups for different languages. After the previous day at Ehrenberg, when we were free to climb around anywhere we wanted, the guided tours felt confining.

Here we are hanging out in the garden waiting for our tour to start.

It was a bit of a wait and we got to talk to Irene for a while.

The castles was full of murals and sculptures, on every surface available, and I would have liked to spend a little more time with them. In Höhenschwangau they are from Bavarian mythology and I would like to know the stories behind them.

No photography allowed inside, though. You'll have to go yourself sometime.

Ludwig's view of his castle under construction.

This telescope is in an office in the Höhenschwangau, and points to Prince Ludwig's pride and joy.

St. Mary's Bridge

Nueuschwanstein sits on a hill overlooking the older castle.

You can travel up on foot, by bus, or by horse-drawn carriage. On Rick’s advice, we took the bus up and the carriage down.

The bus drops off at St. Mary’s Bridge, a 10-minute hike above the castle, and one of the best places to see it from.

This is where Ludwig went to watch the building progress and micro-manage it. The view is pretty much perfect.

I think the scaffolding is up for cleaning the outside walls.

Ludwig died (mysteriously) at 40, before the castle was finished, and work on it stopped immediately, as it did on the two other castles he was building at the time. He’d spent less than 200 days in it. Within 6 weeks of his death it was a tourist attraction, and was never finished.

In Nueuschwanstein the murals that cover every wall are all from Wagner operas. Richard Wagner was a friend (maybe lover) to Ludwig, who patronized and publicized him.

This castle was built as a tribute to Wagner. There’s even an artificial cave, a set for a scene from one of the operas.

Ludwig wanted no depictions of himself in the castle, but there’s a bust of Wagner in the entry hall. Wagner was the only guest he ever had stay there. Ludwig cancelled his only wedding engagement.

OK, snuck a couple pictures of the inside. This is Ludwig's office, which included a crown-shaped chandelier and a telephone!

Just before his 40th birthday, a court declared Ludwig insane and unfit to rule. He was sent to Munich the next day, along with his tutor, and both mysteriously drowned along the way. In a 6"-deep puddle.

It wasn't long before Ludwig's younger brother was also declared insane. Sound like a power play?

But Ludwig was impoverishing his people for the sake of his elaborate building projects. You bring down the tyrant any way you can.

And the kitchens in the basement. Very modern compared to other's we'd seen on this trip.

After a bite in the touristy cafe in the castle, we headed back. The horse-drawn carriages pick up from the parking area just below the castle, so our transportation choices saved us both uphill climbs. Thanks again to Rick Steves!

One last night in Reutte and we were headed for Munich to hook up with our scheduled Motorcycle Tour.

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