Berwang (A) (July, 2008)
For a short summer vacation, we choose for Berwang, in the Austrian
province of Tirol, just over the German border. At about 1300 m above sea
level, it is a quite place in a valley (picture 1) but ideally located to
visit the famous castles of king Ludwig of Bavaria and Germany's highest
mountain, the Zugspitze, which was even visible from the hotel lobby. The
hotel "Kaiserhof" (next 2 fotos) offers tourists all they need in a typical
Tirol atmosphere.
On the next day the weather was fine to visit the highest German mountain:
the Zugspitz. You can either choose to take the cable lift from
Garmisch-Partenkirchen (D) or from the Austrian side in Ehrwald. After
having a detailed look at both websites we quickly came to the conclusion
that for a family with 2 children the Austrian cable lift is by far the
cheapest !
Have a look yourself:
http://www.zugspitzbahn.at/zugspitzbahn/en/
and
http://www.zugspitze.de/de/summer/berg/zugspitze/
So we took the Austrian cable (foto 1 below) and...arrived at the cable
end station you have to cross the German-Austrian border first and to our
surprise there the air was filled with smells of baked ognions and sausages
! We encountered the highest Biergarten of Germany (foto 2) :-(
As visible on the third picture below, when being in good shape you can
also skip the cable lift and get there on foot.
Despite the sausage smells, we had to admit that the 360° panorama is
marvellous up there (next 2 pictures). But you have to be lucky with the weather conditions:
often clouds are appearing from nowhere. To conclude this high level story
we can state that it is worth the trip, despite the high price.
One day later we headed for the famous Castle of Neuschwanstein. Today
Neuschwanstein is one of the most popular of all palaces and castles in
Europe. Every year more than 1.3 million people visit this castle that
Walt Disney used as inspiration for his logo (and for his castle in
Disneyland).
Take your time to get rid of your car, THEN first buy your tour ticket
(at the base of the hill) and do the climb to the castle either on foot or
in a horse carriage. The guided tour can be taken in many many
languages (even Japanese).
More details can be found on the
official website:
http://www.neuschwanstein.de/englisch/palace/index.htm
Next 2 pictures give a first impression from the outside, the inside you
have to go and look yourselves....
From the castle you can continue the road into Bavaria to the famous
baroque church in Wies: the Wieskirche. The church is located really in the
middle of a rural area. Although the outside does not indicate how the
decoration at the inside is looking like. Convince yourself by looking at
the few pictures below: even Heaven's gate gives a 3D impression (even
without the usual green-red goggles, I recently needed for Avatar....).
The remaining days we took some rest and enjoyed the nearby city of
Reutte where a metallic impression of an hairdresser draw our attention (next
picture) but above all the peacefull environment and .... the nice wheat
beer is also worth mentionning.....
Prosit !
