Mountains, Castles and Grocery Stores

This morning, Chet and I woke up later than expected and had a slight change of plans for the day. We had previously expected to head to Salzburg this morning, but with a later start (due to me not setting the alarm clock correctly), we decided to head up to see some castles instead.

Though a gray and drizzly day (much like a normal day in Washington... we felt quite at home), we enjoyed the driver over Fern Pass through steep mountains. All along the way, there were deep blue green lakes at the bottoms of the peaks and, in more open valleys, small villages scattered in green fields. Once again, the driving was super windy on narrow 2-laned roads. Thank goodness Chet is a good driver!

This is the view from the car window as we headed down from the pass. Much more beautiful in person... we were in awe!

So, being the good tourists we are, we went to see the above castle... Neuschwanstein! The famous castle of King Ludwig II is quite impressive. I had been there once before, back in high school, but it certainly was much more fun and memorable to visit it today with Chet! We explored the adjacent family hunting lodge as well.

We enjoyed bratwursts at a beer garden type place for lunch. We are having fun taking pictures of our food to help us remember the trip!

This is a picture from up above the family's hunting lodge, Hohenschwangau... and one of the two lakes that surround it. We also did a tour of this castle which provided a great background to the family. Very interesting tour.

Some folks took a picture of us in front of Neuschwanstein from Mary's Bridge. Ludwig constructed a bridge up above a gorge with a waterfall to view his castle as it was being built. Great view, quite a distance down to the grown below... made me a bit nervous standing on a 150 year old bridge with a bunch of other tourists!

Chet and I decided to hike down the hill through the gorge under the bridge. There was a well established path and signs, but, amazingly, almost no one else on it! This is a picture from that path looking back up at the castle.

The fun part about the trail through the gorge was that you get to a point that there is no trail... just these metal grates with a handrail bolted to the rocks directly above the rushing river! It was a excellent surprise and definitely gave us a great view of the river.

On our way home, we finally had the chance to stop at an open grocery store (since they all were closed on Sunday). We wanted to pick up some breakfast supplies since we have a mini-kitchen want to minimize our eating out a bit. I must say that a grocery store in a foreign language is an experience. I'd say that we did fairly well except when it came to fruit. They had a system where you print a label for the fruit after weighing in on a scale (kind of like the bulk candy area at Haggen or Top Foods). The only thing was that we couldn't figure out what number to enter! So we just got a box of grapes with a bar code. I am also glad that I recalled from a prior visit that grocery stores don't provide bags unless you pay for them. Luckily, we had our own. Overall, it was a successful experience... but a bit funny as we were trying to figure out what things were!

Anyway, our goal is to go to bed and attempt to get up early tomorrow to head to Salzburg! This time the alarm clocks will be set correctly!

Much love, Brianne