Europe - Day 9

This was the day that we got to see Neuschwanstein. Crazy King Ludwig started its construction in 1869 and it was opened to the public in 1886 after he died. This castle was the inspiration for Sleeping Beauty's Castle in Disneyland. Many of the rooms inside have themes based on operas that he liked, such as Tristan and Isolde.   

We were a bit disappointed to find much of the outside of the castle covered in scaffolding as there was some work being done, but it was still pretty cool.

Before going on a tour of Neuschwanstein, we walked around the outside of its older neighbor, Hohenschwangau, which was completed in 1837 by King Ludwig's father, King Maximilian II.

You could see a long way from the castle. It all looked so peaceful.

I tried to get artistic :P

The bridge built a bit further up the mountain which we hiked up to afterwards.

Courtyard shots...

It was quite a drop from the bridge...

The woods surrounding the castles were quite lovely and we enjoyed trekking through them. My photos do not do the area justice.

Europe - Day 8

We had spent the previous night at a small place over a bar up in the mountains. It was practically next door to both Slovenia and Austria.

In the morning, we drove just past the Slovenian border to say we'd been there and we got out and picked wildflowers and took a few pictures. It was very pretty.

 We then drove back into Italy and up into Austria. The drive through the Alps was lovely.

 We only had time for one city here so we made for Salzburg - home of Mozart and the Vonn Trapps.

 This was inside Mozart's house. I hadn't seen the no-pictures sign and the security guard got on me.

 From there we walked across town to the Abbey, and yes I mean the very Abbey from the sound of music.

There were a lot of bridges in Europe that were covered in these locks, many of which had couples names on them.

We weren't very photogenic that day...

 Along the way, we met our old friend Mozart....

 It was a bit of a climb

 ...but the view was great!

 We stepped inside the outer walls, but didn't go inside the abbey itself.

 I'm pretty sure this is the place where the car chase scene started in the Sound of Music.

After leaving the Abbey, we got a bit lost finding our way back to the car, but we found it eventually and then made our way on to Munich. It was getting late when we arrived, so almost everything was closed, but we walked around a bit. I think there was some kind of European football event going on there the next day, because there were several groups of guys who all seemed excited about something and were wearing jerseys. There were also advertisements that seemed to have something to do with a soccer game.

The place we stayed at that night was in Fussen which was closer to Neuschwanstein, our destination for the following day. They guesthouse was a bit difficult to find, especially since it was pitch black and the roads didn't seem to have the right names, but we got there in the end and it was quite nice. These pictures are from the following morning.