Now that we have wifi – albeit, not great so I’m pretty sure we won’t be able to post any pictures :(, let’s talk about yesterday…
Our last full day in Germany consisted of driving on the Romantic Road (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romantic_Road) and stopping at the Neuschwanstein Castle. This is the castle that inspired Walt Disney’s Cinderella castle commissioned by King Ludwig II of Bavaria. Interesting fact about this castle is that it was never built for war, but rather built for the King to hide in when he didn’t want to be social. However he was never able to utilize it as he died before it was completed, so instead it has only been a tourist attraction. Because it’s not THAT old (1886) and it has no historical significance, we did not tour the castle. Rather we walked the grounds and hiked all around. It was quite an intense hike to get to the castle, and naturally, Kevin wanted to get to the bridge above the castle for the ‘perfect shot’. Totally exhausting hike, but definitely worth it. The views were spectacular.
Since we weren’t touring the castle, we moved on to the next half of the day… We added another country to our list — Austria! Hands down the most beautiful country we have ever visited in all of our trips. Nothing compares to the Austrian Alps and rolling hills. Seriously, I’ve been trying to convince Kevin since we saw it to move there. So beautiful.
We stopped to explore the Ehrenberg Castle which turned into quite a hiking adventure, especially after the hike from the previous castle — my calves were burnin’! It was quite a hike to get up to the Ehrenberg castle only to find out that Fort Claudia was an additional hike, as was the castle ruins at the top and the pedestrian suspension bridge. The lady we bought the tickets from said, and I quote “this hike is steep, but not dangerous” “you must go down the Magical Forest, very beautiful”. While she warned us about the steepness of the climb, neither of us were prepared for what we had to endure. However once we reached the top, miraculously there was a soda machine – I’ve never seen a more excited Kevin at that point. The top height we reached was 4125 feet high with a 46% maximum grade going up. It was intense. But oh my gosh were the views spectacular.
But once that wore off, we were starting to realize we had to go back down. The Magical Forest was definitely pretty, but at that point in the day, we were over it!
We made it off the mountain and back into the car. It was my turn to drive which was quite unfortunate since our feet were dying, but also because it was going to get dark before we made it all the way home. We originally thought that maybe the Autobahn would have speed limits at night since it’s more difficult to see, but that theory flew out the window right along side the Audi going 200 km/h past me. Quite an experience driving down the autobahn though… earlier in the day Kevin beat my fastest speed presumably because I called him out on it in the last entry, but before it was dark, I caught right back up to him =)
Pictures!
