Our European Holiday Day 9 - Bavaria

Today was an amazing day in Bavaria! We woke up today to rainstorms in Salzburg. We looked over the cities we were planning on visiting and discovered that they would be raining as well. We contemplated going to a different city but decided not to because it was out of the way of our final destination, Hohenschwangau where we were staying tonight.

Ultimately, we decided to stick with our original itinerary and visit Passau, and Regensburg, and end the day near Neuschwanstein castle, so we could wake up and tour it tomorrow morning. Our drive to Passau was very rainy. We couldn’t really see any of the Alps that surrounded us, which was a bummer. When we got to Passau, we got out of our car and walked across one of the iconic bridges and through town little ways before deciding to turn back. We didn’t factor in that today was Sunday and many businesses weren’t open, especially in the morning. It felt like Passau was a bit of a bust, albeit, a gorgeous bust.

We got back in our car and decided to see what the weather was like at Hohenschwangau. The weather was beautiful today, but it was going to be rainy tomorrow morning when we were going to visit the castle. It seemed like a major disappointment. We decided to redirect and head directly to the castle this afternoon and see it while the weather was good and then still do our tour tomorrow morning, but we would still have memories and pictures with good memories in case it was pouring rain while we visited tomorrow. This ended up being a great idea.

We drove a little over 3 hours to get to Hohenschwangau. Most of the drive was on the Autobahn. It was basically like a normal freeway, except some people do drive really fast because for portions there are no speed limits. Other portions do have speed limits. From our vantage point, it seemed like people drove with common sense and that traffic flowed very smoothly on the Autobahn. About 30 minutes out of Passau we encountered blue skies for the rest of our drive. It was an amazing drive. Bavaria is a gorgeous country. We passed beautiful, idyllic towns all with a church and giant steeple in the center. Eric and I commented how every city in Europe has a church because that was the center of every city. Most of the churches are older than in our country. America doesn’t really have that kind of tradition. Although most cities have several different churches, it doesn’t hold the central role in the city as it seems to here. I’m not sure if churches still play a central role here, but it’s clear that at one point they did.

One thing Eric and I have talked a lot about is WWII while we have been here. Eric and I both have grandfathers that fought in the war, so it hits very close to home for both of us. While we were driving today we passed Dachau. Dachau to me is a place of death, however, here it is the name of the city that housed the concentration camp. It was pretty strange driving passed street signs for Dachau. Additionally, last night we crossed one of the major bridges in Salzburg. When we got to the end there was a plaque that dedicated the bridge to the memory of the individuals who were compelled to build it between 1941 and 1945. It’s just so sad. It’s hard to believe so much hate existed in a place filled with so much beauty.

We were in a hurry to get to Hohenschwangau, so we didn’t stop for pictures, but we passed some of the most beautiful countrysides I have ever seen. There were cows and sheep in pastures, large beautiful churches, and cozy towns nestled into the mountains. I could live here.

We arrived in Hohenschwangau and checked into our hotel. From our room, we have a view of the Neuschwanstein Castle. It’s lovely. We quickly freshened up and then began the short hike up to the castle. The hike took us about 25 minutes – it wasn’t too steep, and the weather was lovely so we weren’t too sweaty when we got to the top. The castle is huge! We can’t wait to do the tour tomorrow. We walked around the castle and then continued to the Queen Mary Bridge where there are lovely views of the castle, a waterfall, and the Alps surrounding the castle. The bridge was very crowded, but we were able to enjoy seeing the castle from here.

View from our hotel room

View from our hotel room

On the other side of the bridge, we continued our hike, this time with much fewer tourists who turn around at the bridge. We hiked a little ways further and were rewarded with even greater views of the castle and surrounding regions. There are two Alpine lakes near the castle. Alpsee Lake is turquoise blue and looked gorgeous. We decided that would be our next stop after we hiked back down the mountain. We spent quite a bit of time around the castle and then headed back down to town.

We went and saw Alpsee Lake. It was so beautiful. We rented a paddleboat for a few Euros and went out on the lake. We decided to facetime my parents so they could see our surroundings. It was great to talk to them! We were on the lake for a little bit and then we headed to get some dinner. Eric had some schnitzel with noodles and I had turkey with rice and mushroom sauce. This was easily the best meal we’ve had so far in Germany. Food in Germany took us a little bit of time to figure out, and honestly, I’m still not 100% sure we have it figured out, but we are getting closer!

After dinner, we strolled around the town enjoying each other's company before calling it a night. It was so fun to be flexible and adapt our plans to better fit the weather. Staying in Hohenschwangau is also really nice because as the sun began to set most of the other tourists headed out of town. As we strolled through the town tonight it felt like we had the place to ourselves. We walked through the now very quiet town enjoying views of the castle. We ended the night sitting on our balcony admiring the beauty around us. Since we did most of the Hohenschwangau today, we have time tomorrow to visit another idyllic town, Rothenburg – we can’t wait!