Day 4: 15/04/06 Fussen
Around Fussen: from Schloss Neuschwanstein
The legendary New Swan's Castle
I will never in my life walk on this perilous path unless extremely necessary...
That's what we conquered that nightWe made a day trip out to Fussen on this day. Fussen is an insignificant town at the foot of the Bavarian Alps 2 hours away from Munich; however, on the mountains around the town, there housed one of the most famous sights in Europe: Bavarian King Ludwig II's Schloss Neuschwanstein, or the New Swan's Castle. It is said that the design of Disney's castle is actually inspired by this one.
We did the usual at the train station: bought breakfast and lunch from a sandwich stall (which explained why I did not gain weight after the trip). During the train ride we saw the Alps for the first time; we were really excited and kept taking pictures. That was the beginning: now we had developed immunity to the Alps already.
We had to take a bus to the place where the castle is. It was really crowded; we were almost not able to get on the bus. Luckily, a Philipino lady Tk met on the train gave us a hand and we all went through. Note that this was not the peak tourist season; you can imagine the madness during summer. Don't go during summer anyway; I doubt it looks beautiful without the snow.
And yes there was still snow! While we walk up the slope to the castle (it was shack; there were more relaxed alternatives like the bus and the horse carriage which left shit all over the road). Yj picked up some snow and made himself 3 snowballs to juggle. He sure had some talent about throwing things around :)
The castle certainly looked dream-like especially from the bridge on top of it. It was not grand or great or impressive or whatsoever, it just looked like as if it was from a fairy tale. The snow in the background added on to the feel. If you prefer, 'romantic' is also a good word to describe it. However the tourists destroyed all the mood. Don't think about getting engaged over there.
If you were only interested in the exterior the castle is free; if you were to enter it you got to pay for guided tours which you need to wait for at least an hour. The 19th century castle took 17 years to complete, however, the king was declared psychologically unfit and was exiled before the interior was completed. The interior was decorated with the scenes of plays by a certain play writer that the king liked a lot, and you can also find plenty of swans in one of the rooms. King Ludwig II of Bavaria also had a rather dramatic life story; the castle had a short slide-show like film which depicted his life using 1st person narrative.
We went onto the bridge behind the castle to get the best view. The bridge spanned across a deep gorge and it is realy high above the ground; not suitable for serious acrophobics. On the other side of the bridge there was a snowy, narrow and most importantly dangerous (the path was about 1/2 a meter wide and there was a steep drop on the right) which supposed to lead to an even better look-out point. Initially we decided not to risk our lives braving it, however, after being encouraged by a Chinese guy coming back from it Tk and Yj decided to give it a try. I refused even to walk one step onto it as the thought of slipping under this kind of circumstances was really scary. I stayed on the bridge and enjoyed the fairy-tale castle while waiting for the heroes to report their findings. After approximately 20 minutes they emerged from the path, claiming that they DID NOT complete it and saw NOTHING as the path got too scary. Tk claimed that his fear of heights was really at its extreme while walking back! Yj, as usual, was the HERO: he walked as if he was walking on flat ground, according to Tk. I was feeling really good after knowing that I made the right decision, but Tk insisted that it was FUN. Well, at least now I know he has acrophobia too :)
Tk and Yj bought really a lot of souvenirs from there; I just bought a porcelain plate with the castle on it. Buying souvenirs was never my travel aim, as I hate lugging things around and packing them. Anyway, my parents complain if I accumulate too much stuff. I shopped with them anyway, and we found this cool knight which we bought for Jeffrey. This was just the start of Tk/Yj's campaign; in the end, I think we spent at least 20% of our travel time shopping.
We had dinner at Hwee See's place. We had rice, stewed beancurdand stewed veal; the veal was good (Tk couldn't eat it, he could onlyate the sausages specially prepared for him) but the rice was, hmm,half cooked. Well, at least we had rice :)
The interesting thing was after dinner: after some beer we had duringdinner, Hwee See took out all sorts of alcohol she had: a kind of winewhich we tried and all sorts of schnaps which we all tried. I guess I hadnot drunk so much alcohol in my life before. We also had a botany and cheese lesson: native European vegetables which I forgot there names,and all kinds of cheese which we all tried too. We even had expresso duringthe fiesta; and Tk tried mixing Ameretto (Almond Liqour) with his expressoin an attempt to obtain the almond coffee he had in Berlin last time. Hefailed. :)
We did the usual at the train station: bought breakfast and lunch from a sandwich stall (which explained why I did not gain weight after the trip). During the train ride we saw the Alps for the first time; we were really excited and kept taking pictures. That was the beginning: now we had developed immunity to the Alps already.
We had to take a bus to the place where the castle is. It was really crowded; we were almost not able to get on the bus. Luckily, a Philipino lady Tk met on the train gave us a hand and we all went through. Note that this was not the peak tourist season; you can imagine the madness during summer. Don't go during summer anyway; I doubt it looks beautiful without the snow.
And yes there was still snow! While we walk up the slope to the castle (it was shack; there were more relaxed alternatives like the bus and the horse carriage which left shit all over the road). Yj picked up some snow and made himself 3 snowballs to juggle. He sure had some talent about throwing things around :)
The castle certainly looked dream-like especially from the bridge on top of it. It was not grand or great or impressive or whatsoever, it just looked like as if it was from a fairy tale. The snow in the background added on to the feel. If you prefer, 'romantic' is also a good word to describe it. However the tourists destroyed all the mood. Don't think about getting engaged over there.
If you were only interested in the exterior the castle is free; if you were to enter it you got to pay for guided tours which you need to wait for at least an hour. The 19th century castle took 17 years to complete, however, the king was declared psychologically unfit and was exiled before the interior was completed. The interior was decorated with the scenes of plays by a certain play writer that the king liked a lot, and you can also find plenty of swans in one of the rooms. King Ludwig II of Bavaria also had a rather dramatic life story; the castle had a short slide-show like film which depicted his life using 1st person narrative.
We went onto the bridge behind the castle to get the best view. The bridge spanned across a deep gorge and it is realy high above the ground; not suitable for serious acrophobics. On the other side of the bridge there was a snowy, narrow and most importantly dangerous (the path was about 1/2 a meter wide and there was a steep drop on the right) which supposed to lead to an even better look-out point. Initially we decided not to risk our lives braving it, however, after being encouraged by a Chinese guy coming back from it Tk and Yj decided to give it a try. I refused even to walk one step onto it as the thought of slipping under this kind of circumstances was really scary. I stayed on the bridge and enjoyed the fairy-tale castle while waiting for the heroes to report their findings. After approximately 20 minutes they emerged from the path, claiming that they DID NOT complete it and saw NOTHING as the path got too scary. Tk claimed that his fear of heights was really at its extreme while walking back! Yj, as usual, was the HERO: he walked as if he was walking on flat ground, according to Tk. I was feeling really good after knowing that I made the right decision, but Tk insisted that it was FUN. Well, at least now I know he has acrophobia too :)
Tk and Yj bought really a lot of souvenirs from there; I just bought a porcelain plate with the castle on it. Buying souvenirs was never my travel aim, as I hate lugging things around and packing them. Anyway, my parents complain if I accumulate too much stuff. I shopped with them anyway, and we found this cool knight which we bought for Jeffrey. This was just the start of Tk/Yj's campaign; in the end, I think we spent at least 20% of our travel time shopping.
We had dinner at Hwee See's place. We had rice, stewed beancurdand stewed veal; the veal was good (Tk couldn't eat it, he could onlyate the sausages specially prepared for him) but the rice was, hmm,half cooked. Well, at least we had rice :)
The interesting thing was after dinner: after some beer we had duringdinner, Hwee See took out all sorts of alcohol she had: a kind of winewhich we tried and all sorts of schnaps which we all tried. I guess I hadnot drunk so much alcohol in my life before. We also had a botany and cheese lesson: native European vegetables which I forgot there names,and all kinds of cheese which we all tried too. We even had expresso duringthe fiesta; and Tk tried mixing Ameretto (Almond Liqour) with his expressoin an attempt to obtain the almond coffee he had in Berlin last time. Hefailed. :)
posted by Hiu Yeung at 02:58
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