Day 18: Royal intrigue, Bavarian style

The plan today was to see the two most important sites in this part of Bavaria; King Ludwig II's two castles near Füssen.  We were up early as the research we'd done indicates that these two castles are fairly popular.  By 8:30am we had driven to the town of Hohenschwangau and purchased tickets for touring both of the castles.  As was the case with some of the other castles we've been too, these two can only be entered as part of a tour.  There is no option of doing a self-guided tour.

We spent the earlier portion of the morning at the Hohenschwangau castle.  The castle is perched on a hillside overlooking the town and has quite a varied history.  the 14th century castle was destroyed in the Napoleonic wars.  Eventually, it was acquired and rebuilt by King Maximillian II (Ludwig II's father) between 1832 and 1837.  We were quite surprised at how small this castle was; it seems to only have about a dozen rooms.

Next up was the most famous castle in Bavaria; Neuschwanstein.  If you've seen Bavarian postcards with a castle nestled in the mountains, this is probably what you saw.  To get to Neuschwanstein you've got to undertake a 40 minute hike, or a bus/horse carriage ride up the mountain.  We opted for the hike.  Neuschwanstein is significantly larger (and newer) as it was being built by King Ludwig II between 1868 and 1892.  Most interesting of all is the fact that the castle was never completely finished as King Ludwig II died at the age of 41, under fairly mysterious circumstances in 1886.  Just prior to his death, he was deemed to be insane and unfit to rule.  Within days, he was found dead in a shallow body of water along with his personal physician.

After visiting the two castles we were going to visit some other castle ruins at the foot of Tegelberg mountain, and possibly also take a cable car up the mountain.  Unfortunately, while hiking to the base of the mountain things got pretty dark and thunder started rumbling in the distance.  We turned around and about halfway through our hike back to the car the skies opened up.  Luckily, we were passing a small chalet when this happened so we were able to find some shelter and waited out the worst of the storm.

Hohenschwangau from afar:

Hohenschwangau inner courtyard, as seen from within the castle:

Neuschwanstein up close:

Neuschwanstein as seen from Marienbrücke bridge:

Waiting out a storm with hail:

Cess, clearly unimpressed by the sudden onset of stormy weather: