Eagle46

We awoke to another gray and dreary morning in Fuessen. Today was our scheduled trip to Neuschwanstein, Mad King Ludwig's famed castle. I was hoping to get "the picture" from the Maria Bridge which was one of the reasons for our trip. Unfortunately the bridge was completely enveloped in fog and the castle could not be seen. The walk traveling from the bridge to the castle in the rain was not enjoyable. As we made our way to the castle the mist became a heavy rain with no place to stand under cover. A kind worker at the castle allowed us in a covered courtyard area to await our entry time. We did complete the tour inside seeing the mostly empty rooms and climbing dozens of steps to do so. I knew that there was very ... read more

After leaving Rothenburg, we drove to Munich for the night. This morning we started out with a bus tour of the city. This was quite a disappointment as it was very difficult to see the landmarks that were pointed out and construction and traffic the drive was not a pleasant one. The one nice stop on the drive was at Nymphenburg Palace, the summer home of Max Emanuel. It was he, who in the late 1600's, increased the size to what it is today.From there we made our way to Marienplatz to enjoy the rest of the morning and have lunch. In this area is the New City Hall, home of a Glockenspiel, that we were lucky enough to enjoy as it only activates three times a day. To watch this easily, we snagged a table ... read more

Our tour continued on this morning into Bavaria to the city of Bayreuth. The city is know for its connection to Richard Wagner and his operas. The city holds a festival for Richard Wagner and he had a strong influence on the opera house. We started there with a tour walking thought the streets to the New Palace. Once there we were on our own to explore the city and grab some lunch. We took in some of the gardens and statuary of the palace and from there looked for lunch. Most eateries served sweets so we ended up with crapes filled with Nutella served with vanilla ice cream. It was quite good. After lunch we walked the pedestrian streets for a bit passing the Old Palace and oddly enough a large dinosaur. Leaving Bayreuth we ... read more

Today was a busy day for us as we included two excursions to our trip in and around Berlin. Our first trip was to Potsdam just on the other side of the line between West Berlin and East Germany during the Cold War. We crossed the Gleinicker Bridge near Potsdam where several spy exchanges were made and them made our way to Cecilienhof where the Potsdam Conference was held during which the decision was made by Churchill, Truman and Stalin to divide up Germany into four sectors as well as dividing Berlin the same way. This eventually led to the building of the Berlin Wall separating east from west. After leaving Cecilienhof, we continued on to Sanssouci (without worry) Palace home to Frederick the Great. This was his summer home where he retreated to relax. He ... read more

We had breakfast at the hotel and boarded our bus with Robert, our driver and Anna-Lena, our tour director to begin our journey around Germany. Our group of 44 included individuals of various nationalities, ages and ethnicities. Our first adventure was aboard a river boat to cruise along a portion of the Rhine River, dotted with castles and small river towns along the banks, for about 1 1/2 hours. The weather was chilly and windy so the best location was inside the boat making photography more difficult, but definitely more comfortable. Reaching the end of our cruise at St. Goar, we once again climbed aboard the bus to continue on to Cologne. After a brief introduction to the city, we were free to explore until the beer tasting mid-afternoon. We have been to Cologne in the ... read more