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Füssen, Germany

I used to say when I was hot that I was melting to accentuate the fact that I felt very hot and was perspiring a bit. Well having spent all week in the mid 30’s and humidity over 50% I can really relate to the word melting.

Imagine a free flow frozen strawberry, you take it out of the freezer and leave it out in the sun. As it defrosts it leaks out watery juice and goes all mushy. The poor strawberry must feel awful I imagine – all drained, as if the life is leaking out of it and being mushy its fibres and structure has collapsed and lost its sharpness, flavour and colour. Yep thats how we feel, defrosted berry fruit.

I do not mind a sunny day, but the humid and hot combination without a reprieve in the evening makes everything difficult including a good nights sleep. My fuse is shorter and my brain lacks clarity and motivation – thus a bit behind in the blogs. We also hate the feeling of being unclean with the constant sweating UGH. Just sitting, never mind exercise has one wiping ones brow, cleaning under your glasses and feeling trickles down your back and further …. why don’t Germans have much air-conditioning????

OK, rant over today we went on another stinking hot unconditioned train trip to Fussen, to see Neuschwanstein castle. This is one of the unfortunate King Ludwig’s castles for which he is most famous for, and the one they say Walt Disney’s Castle is modelled on. We did our own thing in getting there again using information from the internet to get us there for 1/4 of the price. A lot of the tours use the same train, so its a bit of a rip off charging so much for what is easily done, just to have a guide hold your hand and entertain you.

The train was packed, but arriving early we were lucky to have a seat by a half opening window. Even so we melted so I think the temperature must have been over 36 degrees on the train. We drunk all our water during the 2 hour trip and I had to go to the smelly toilet and use sink water to refresh myself at one stage or I thought I would go nuts. Everyone around us was feeling just as awful with pained looks on wet faces and wet clothes. Many people had jeans or trousers on with closed in shoes – as is common in Europe – don’t understand that at all. I had a light dress and jandles and those were two things too many!

The country side was pretty flat most of the way with a lot of agriculture, but as we got closer to the Bavarian mountains it got even prettier as described in previous blogs. At Fussen you transfer to a bus with the other hundreds of tourists and thankfully this was kind of air conditioned for the 10 minute trip to the town near Hohenschwangau. This is the town where the family castle where Ludwig was brought up is. The town also has a nice lake called Alpensee.

Neuschwanstein was built on top of another old castle up on a high hill with amazing views over the plains, a clear alpine waterfall, two lakes, rivers and the family homestead – Hohenschwangau. You can actually hike up from Fussen – only 5km away and travel along the waterfall and lakes area which would be great if it weren’t stinking hot. The water is probably freezing cold but would be refreshing as well as scenic. Once at Hoenschwangau you collect your tickets (booking on line recommended to avoid huge queues which we did) and then you can either do a 30 minute hike up a wooded hill, take a horse and carriage ride, or shuttle bus for a small fee. The shuttle is air conditioned, guess which one we chose?

A short walk through the forest where the shuttle drops you off takes you to the historic Marien bridge which spans the a gorge and a provides a great view of the castle. I got my shot – eventually – when there was room on the creaky wooden plank moving bridge – eek. I am getting brave. From there you walk 15 minutes down hill to the castle and await your tour.

The tour guide spoke very good english and was fresh and bubbly. The tour involved a fair few steps and whilst castles are pretty cool, it was still very warm up there and good exercise! Ludwig was close friends with Wagner and loved his operas so he modelled a lot of his castles’ interiors around the stories from these. Unfortunately due to his suspicious death only 16 rooms were finished out of the huge building! It was beautiful with very strong moorish influences such as stunning wood carving, tiles, ceramics, coloured glass, lavish fabrics – hard to describe but you can see pictures on uncle google of course.

We enjoyed the tour and castle and you can’t help but feel sad for a good looking creative man that clearly was done away with. I asked the guide on what basis did they say he was ‘insane’, she said that that is the curious thing – no evidence or information was given and if you are aware of the story, a day after he was ‘taken away’ – both he and the doctor were found dead floating in a lake!

I also asked if he was gay, as he was engaged for about 10 months but broke it off and never had any mistresses. When you see how artistic and musical he was and who his friends were it would not be surprising for a stereotypical profile. She said that there is a theory that he was – but no evidence. I think his disappearance and this theory could be linked? Would be nice to know an answer to the mystery anyhow. Surely someone must have known? BTW I also found it curious that many of his statues – like the mermaid one and many of the paintings in his castles featured very sensual females yet he had no women in his life? Ah, more mystery!

We took a lovely gentle stroll down hill through the tall trees from the castle to Hoenschwangau which was nice, but we were still sleek with sweat everywhere by the time we reached the bottom. We slipped our way in our sweaty jandles to the lake and waded in as far as we could. It got deep very quickly and was a bit slippery being a mud floor. The water was lovely and not as icy as we thought it may be, so we regretted that we did not have swim gear with us (no Munich behaviour here at the royal lake).

We dreaded the train trip back but had no option of course. It was a split trip this time, and the first leg actually had a bit of climate control but not cold air-conditioning so that was a little reprieve. The second leg was hot box time though. You just sat there with a very uncomfortable look on your face trying not to think about how awful you felt and how you wished for an escape. It was so warm even the seats were hotter than the air and didn’t cool down. Ugh.

We grabbed a doner pita at the station for our dinner, went back to the hotel via the lovely cool underground where the sweat actually dried for 10 minutes, and then ate in the “cool” 28 degree hotel room after freshening in the bathroom. Only two more days till the weather changes back to normal so they say:-)

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