Munich Day 3: Neuschwanstein

Going to see the 'fairytale castles' just outside of Munich was pretty much the starting point for the entire trip - we didn't initially plan to get to them this early on, but when it turned out the cheapest/most convenient flights into any of the cities we were planning to visit was Munich, we started planning out when and how were were going to get up there from the city.

It looks like this:

I'm usually loath to go on day trips unless it's absolutely necessary, but all the research I did said that doing it yourself was either impractical or a lot of effort, and would pretty much necessitate hiring a car, since two of the castles (Linderhof and Neuschwanstein) were a ways apart. So with that in mind we found a Gray Line tour that would more or less get us where we wanted.

After some more wrangling with Google Maps over how to get the the Munich train station where the bus left from, we found ourselves in a long line of people boarding buses and waited our turn. It seemed there were maybe three or four coachloads worth; luckily for us we were on the last one and were also amongst the first dozen or so people to board it and got good seats in the upstairs section. And then we were off.

As soon as the tour guide started talking, I knew we were in for an interesting time - it's hard to describe exactly what she sounded like, but the closest I've come since is the sort of person who doesn't have English as a first language but who records the voice-overs for relaxation tapes; there were some very odd choices re: intonation and emphasis. All the information was there, with a whole lot of (almost certainly unintentional) hilarity.

There's some pretty nice scenery once you leave the Munich suburbs and head into the alps. The first stop, Linderhof, is a maybe an hour and a half away and after getting out there we were told we had just enough time to go on the 30-minute guided tour of the palace.

You can't take photos inside, so I can't share with you; take it from me that it's at the same level of opulent design you start to see in castles/houses all over Europe. It was very specifically modelled after Versailles, so if you've ever been there or seen pictures, you get the idea*.

Some pictures around Linderhof:

Next destination was the small town of Oberammergau, which is partway between Linderhof and Neuschwanstein. We stopped there and wandered around for a while - not entirely sure why; as you'll see it's nice, but not that exciting.

Then it was on to the town of Schwangau, where there's Hohenschwangau (the castle no-one really seems to talk that much about) and Neuschwanstein (which everyone talks about). After we parked the bus we got off and dashed up the road into the town to find something to eat; came away with a couple of excellent hot dogs, loaded with ketchup, mustard, sauerkraut and (what is fast becoming my favourite condiment) crispy dried onions. Then we went off to line up at the bus stop for the bus up the hill.

Hohenschwangau is the orange one.

To get these shots you take a bus up the mountain to a bridge built mostly so people can take these sorts of pics. It does also lead to some hiking trails, but we only saw a handful of people heading that way.

Even when the castle isn't in the shot it's some spectacular scenery.

Us.

After taking probably more photos than was absolutely necessary, we trekked down the hill about to get to the castle itself; the bus tour included a guided tour of the castle and ours was scheduled for 3.10.

It, too, is a photo-free place. But it's also very impressive; Ludwig (its designer) was very into his mythology and religious iconography. Check out the Wikipedia article, which has some older photos of it. It was a lot darker than it looks in these, and there was a heck of a lot of restoration work going on, so there was scaffolding all over the place.

At the bottom there is, of course, a gift shop. Note really worth noting except for the huge ceramic cockatoo.

Still around the castle. This bit is just a different colour.

We then had a twenty or so minute walk back down to the town.

Then it was time for a mostly uninteresting bus trip back to Munich. From the drop-off point we found the proper way to get back to our hotel. At some point we decided that, since we'd done local food a couple of times we wanted something a bit different and opted for Italian - or, more specifically, pizza. After find an Italian place that was just near our hotel (a very attractive option. we were both tired with sore feet) we realised that they didn't have pizza on the menu and so had to find an alternative.

We passed by a sign for a pizza place on the way so went and found that - only thing was, there was no restaurant in the space next to the sign. After a few more minutes of wandering around we found it; they appear to have spent all their advertising money on the big sign on the corner and had none left to put up anything - literally, anything at all, sign-wise - close to the restaurant.

But they had pizza and wine - a really nice Merlot - so we were happy.

And cake. It was soaked in alcohol, so with the cream and custard it was pretty close to being a trifle.

Then it was back to the hotel and time for bed.

*Regular readers will remember that on my 2016 trip I went to Versailles and it did not go very well.