Europe Trip, Part IV: German Castles

After spending an amazing 10 days tromping around Switzerland, it was time to say goodbye and enter Heather's birthland: Germany.  We first started out by visiting Linderhoff Palace.  The palace was actually much smaller than we were expecting, but the inside was very lavish.  King Ludwig the II of Bavaria, who was a king then in name only without any political power, built the palace.  He was infatuated with French nobles and King Louis the 14th in particular, and tried to style certain portions of his palace after Versailles.  Beautiful building, and incredible scenery.

Rochelle performing an artistic dance in honor of Ludwig's eccentricities

Just the girls :)

For some reason, it was popular to build a grotto on the grounds.  So Ludwig built a Venus grotto and themed the interior decoration after one of Wagner's works.  The lights in the grotto could change from deep red to bright blue.  Very strange.

One of the highlights of the trip was our tour of Neushwanstein castle, another work by King Ludwig.  This castle more than lived up to its hype.  The structure itself as well as its surroundings were breath-taking enough.  But the decorations throughout the castle was even more incredible.  Too bad we weren't able to take pics of the interior.  Well worth seeing if you are anywhere near the castle.

The complete designs for the castle were never fully realized due to the untimely and mysterious death of Ludwig.  In the picture above, for example, there were plans to build an enormous chapel directly where we were standing.  In addition, behind the abbey (which is the building behind us), there was going to be a series of patios and landings that would create space for a garden.  He was also going to add one or two more towers.

The interior was also unfinished.  Many of the rooms in the abbey, including Ludwig's personal room, throne chamber, jester's hall, servants quarters, dining areas, and other places, were finished, however.  And they were amazing!  The paintings and murals on the walls and the designs on the floors and ceilings were incredibly intricate.  Ludwig spared no expense for the highest quality of everything, and no space was considered too unimportant for decoration.  

On the way down from the castle, we enjoyed a pleasant little horse carriage ride.  Elli and Sienna loved it, and it was a fitting end to their experience touring a real princess's castle.