Day Eight

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On day 8 we awoke in beautiful vianden, Luxemburg with the intention of exploring its famous chateu de Vianden. After breakfast at the hotel (where mum and i ate a trayfull of mini crossionts and i made myself sum lunch and made mum sneak it out) we set off for the castle.

Mum and i were planning on catching the chairlift up to the mountain peak and then hiking over to the castle. After dropping us off at the chairlift opa and oma riet drove up to the castle. We were surprised that the chairlift wasn’t moving already as it was supposed to have opened a couple of minutes ago, but we sat down and waited. Fifteen minutes later an English couple came over and told us it was broken and they were waiting on people who could fix it, so we waited some more as without the chairlift we couldn’t easily get up to the castle - we didn’t know of any bus that went up or anything, and we couldn’t call opa cos he doesn’t have a mobile. Eventually the English couple decided they didn’t want to wait anymore, got in their car and drove off up to the castle - WITHOUT OFFERING US A LIFT!

So mum and I tried to ask the man if there was a bus, but we couldn’t understand his response. So we started walking to the tourist info centre nearby, and when we were almost there saw that the chairlift had started moving again, so we went back again, but no, it wasn’t fixed. So again we walked to the tourist info centre, asked the lady how to get up to the castle and she was soooooo rude, was like “just walk up this road, duhh” so we did and it was only about 2 kms, vertically up this hill, we were dead by the time we reached the top, and then found opa and oma riet had just finished some coffee and chocolate éclairs...and then we saw some people coming off the chairlift track... appaz it was now fixed...not happy.

So we proceeded on into the castle, which was amazing on the inside, having been rebuilt not so long ago, but absolutely none of the information was in English, it was all German and French which was disappointing. So we bought an English guide which had a little information in it and was very interesting. Today they use some of the larger rooms in the castle for charity dinners or performances and some rooms are decorated and furnished in a medieval style.

The view from the windows and balconies was spectacular....

Went back down via the chairlift, it was a bit of a hike to get there, but totally worth it, the view was soooo amazing! And opa went up and down on the chairlift as well. At the bottom there was a restaurant next door where we had lunch, served with chips of course (even the omelette Riet ordered was served with chips) then climbed into the car and headed for our next stop - Cochem, Germany.

The maps we had brought with us to navigate were terrible, it didn’t show half the roads, even major ones and would often show a road finishing at some point when it actually carried on for ages more so navigation was hard (especially because we could have had sat nav do it for us, but opa believes it doesn’t work, so he left it at home) and we got lost a couple more times, but we eventually made it, checked into a hotel and had a proper German dinner. Mum had sausages, mashed potato and sourcrote (spelling?) and I had pork schnitzel and chips (of course) and opa and oma riet had a beef goulash soup.

Cochem lies on the river Mosel and is in wine country, problem is its very hilly countryside so the grapes are grown on the slopes, some with angles of 65 degrees!! Anyway, we went to bed after finding that even though we were in an international hotel, specially designed to make it easier for non-Germans there was still nothing on the TV that wasn’t German.


Hope your all well, love Kels + Deb

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Photos

Caslte Vianden
the kitchen

Comments

[Lauren]

wow, this looks awesome! that whole chair lift saga would of sucked though! I cant believe those people didnt offer you a lift! also, i really am enjoyin these photos, i assume theyre with your new camera? the quality is excellent. sounds like youre having a blast

[anonymous]

Hi Kels, how did you get Mum on that chairlift? Look like you are having a good time, maybe Daenia should have gone with you. t least she likes chips! Pap