Today we did what I've been waiting for the last 3 days to do: Day trip to Neuschwanstein Castle! Said to be the inspiration for Disneyland's Sleeping Beauty Castle, initially it was also the only reason I wanted to go to Munich, not having a particular affinity for beer or Bavarian food. But actually, Munich has really grown on me, and it was a little bit sad to check out of our hostel and know that we were leaving today...
Back to the summary... So yesterday's post I said we were planning on going to the Kocherlball at the Chinese Tower. The plan was to wake up at 4am, and get there by 5am, so that we could get a spot since it was supposed to get really crowded later on. That totally didn't happen, as we all overslept, and didn't end up getting up until after 6am.... And by the time we got to the Chinese Tower, it was almost 8am! It was still fun though, because everyone was dressed up in traditional Bavarian costumes, and drinking beer and eating pretzels/schmalznudels. But it was SUPER crowded! We ended up just looking around (and buying our beer/pretzel/schmalznudel combos) for about half an hour before heading back to our hostel to check out.
After checking out, we caught a train from Munich to Fussen, which took about 2 hours. And once in Fussen, there was a bus that took us to the small town the castle overlooks, called Hohenschwangau. (Omg all these German names are so long) The castle itself is situated on the side of the mountain, so requires a good 20min hike up (the shortest way) to get to the castle. You have to reserve tickets to tour the rooms, but just walking around the castle and courtyard is free! (Which is all we did) But the best views of the castle were from Mariennbruke, a bridge higher up in the mountain that overlooks a waterfall! I was actually a little disappointed though, because even at the bridge you couldn't get the beautiful front-facing view on most postcards/google images.... >.< We even hiked further up the trail to see if we could get a better view, but without much avail (Although Zach got a pretty sick instagram photo). And on the way down, we took a more scenic but longer route, that actually passed by the waterfall! Took us a lot longer to get back to town, but thank goodness it was all downhill at that point!
Overall I really enjoyed Neuschwanstein, although I really wish you could get front-facing views of the castle. (That was my main complaint) But it's still worth a day trip if you're in Munich or nearby! And don't go with a tour group; it's perfectly straightforward getting there on your own, and then you'll save a ton of money on transportation by buying a Bayern ticket (that can be combined for small groups). There's also another castle in town (the older of the two), but that wasn't as exciting looking and we didn't bother hiking up to visit it...
It was around 7pm by the time we got back to Munich, so we just went to grab dinner before our night train to Berlin. We opted for Italian because it was cheap and nearby, and then hung out at the hostel until 9:30, when we headed to the train station. That's when we said our goodbyes to Zach too, since he himself was headed out of Munich the next morning, and flying back to the States.
Back to the summary... So yesterday's post I said we were planning on going to the Kocherlball at the Chinese Tower. The plan was to wake up at 4am, and get there by 5am, so that we could get a spot since it was supposed to get really crowded later on. That totally didn't happen, as we all overslept, and didn't end up getting up until after 6am.... And by the time we got to the Chinese Tower, it was almost 8am! It was still fun though, because everyone was dressed up in traditional Bavarian costumes, and drinking beer and eating pretzels/schmalznudels. But it was SUPER crowded! We ended up just looking around (and buying our beer/pretzel/schmalznudel combos) for about half an hour before heading back to our hostel to check out.
Kocherlball! Chinese Tower in the background.
After checking out, we caught a train from Munich to Fussen, which took about 2 hours. And once in Fussen, there was a bus that took us to the small town the castle overlooks, called Hohenschwangau. (Omg all these German names are so long) The castle itself is situated on the side of the mountain, so requires a good 20min hike up (the shortest way) to get to the castle. You have to reserve tickets to tour the rooms, but just walking around the castle and courtyard is free! (Which is all we did) But the best views of the castle were from Mariennbruke, a bridge higher up in the mountain that overlooks a waterfall! I was actually a little disappointed though, because even at the bridge you couldn't get the beautiful front-facing view on most postcards/google images.... >.< We even hiked further up the trail to see if we could get a better view, but without much avail (Although Zach got a pretty sick instagram photo). And on the way down, we took a more scenic but longer route, that actually passed by the waterfall! Took us a lot longer to get back to town, but thank goodness it was all downhill at that point!
Courtyard of Neuschwanstein!
View from the trail! (You can see Hohenschwangau, the other castle, in yellow)
View of Neuschwanstein from the bridge!
Watefalllllll
Overall I really enjoyed Neuschwanstein, although I really wish you could get front-facing views of the castle. (That was my main complaint) But it's still worth a day trip if you're in Munich or nearby! And don't go with a tour group; it's perfectly straightforward getting there on your own, and then you'll save a ton of money on transportation by buying a Bayern ticket (that can be combined for small groups). There's also another castle in town (the older of the two), but that wasn't as exciting looking and we didn't bother hiking up to visit it...
It was around 7pm by the time we got back to Munich, so we just went to grab dinner before our night train to Berlin. We opted for Italian because it was cheap and nearby, and then hung out at the hostel until 9:30, when we headed to the train station. That's when we said our goodbyes to Zach too, since he himself was headed out of Munich the next morning, and flying back to the States.
Almost home!
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