Germany 2016 – Part 2

On our 2nd morning in Southern Germany, my German sister & brother-in-law picked us up at 9am with a carafe of fresh coffee for Jim, a carafe of fresh tea for me, and a crinkly bag of things from the bakery – YUM!  They did this every morning which was fantastically amazing and SO nice!  On this specific day, one of the things in the bakery bag was a few munchkins, aka donut holes.  However, we learned that in Germany they’re called Nonnen furz, which literally translates to Nun Farts.  Apparently these are a thing in France, Germany, & England – LOL!  They were delicious.  We walked a block up the street from the hotel so we could ATM some euros.  On the way we saw THIS wonderful [NOT] exhibition was coming to Nürtingen:

Thankfully it was in town the week after we left, but there were signs for it everywhere!!!  *SHUDDER*

We got in the car and headed off to see 2 castles.  First up was Castle Hohenzollern:

Burg [Castle] Hohenzollern was originally built in the late 1000s [!].  It was completely demolished in 1423 following years of battle.  A larger and sturdier version was built between 1454 & 1461, which lasted until the late 1700s.  All that remains of that version is the Medieval chapel.  The current version was built between 1846 & 1867 by King Frederick William IV of Prussia.  In 1945 it briefly housed Crown Prince Wilhelm of Germany, son of the last Hohenzollern monarch, Kaiser Wilhelm II.  After that it became open to the public as a museum.  According to Wikipedia, a letter from US President George Washington is displayed in the castle [we did not see it] thanking Hohenzollern descendant Baron von Steuben for his service in the American Revolutionary War.  The castle sits in the Swabian Alps atop an isolated 2,800 foot hilltop, approximately 50 miles south of Stuttgart.  Here are my favorite pictures:

       

       

I love when orbs randomly show up, especially in creepy places like castle hallways:

       

       

       

I saw a whole bunch of little white specks in a field in the distance.  I zoomed in super far & realized they were sheeps!  I loved seeing fields of sheep everywhere:

       

       

This protected writing on the basement wall is from 1654 [!] which means it dates to the 2nd version of the castle:

After a quick lunch on the go [more goodies from the bakery bag], we were off to Castle Lichtenstein, which is about 40 minutes away, directly south of Stuttgart.  Schloss [Castle] Lichtenstein is also known as the “Fairy tale castle of Württemberg”.  The original castle was built on this site in the early 1100s but was destroyed in 1377.  A new castle was built over the ruins and was considered one of the most impressive structures of the Late Middle Ages.  In 1802 it had fallen into disrepair and was razed and replaced with a… hunting lodge.  WHAT???  Thankfully the site was purchased in 1840 by the Duke of Urach, torn down [again], and rebuilt to it’s former medieval splendor.  It was restored in 1980 and is still owned by the Dukes of Urach.  It’s open to the public for small guided tours.  The castle sits in the Swabian Alps atop an isolated 2,680 foot hilltop, approximately 30 miles south of Stuttgart.

Here are my favorite pictures:

      

The first pic is a closeup of a strange doorway underneath the drawbridge leading into the castle – you can see it in the lower left of the pic above:

       

       

        

       

        

       

This was the drawbridge leading us into the castle for our guided tour – very cool!

          

The following 6 pictures were taken inside the castle, and were taken on the down low… no photos allowed.  But there was only one guide, and we were allowed to freely wander, so me and 2 guys were sneaking around and taking pics when the guide was pre-occupied:

        

        

The hole/crack in the mirror in the 2nd pic is apparently from a piece of shrapnel that ripped through the castle during a battle many hundreds of years ago!  I love that they kept it like that:

        

We ended the day with a hearty dinner of Swabian noodles with cheese and grilled onions – yummmm:

We spent 2½ hours in the car & drove 82 miles on Day 2.  Here’s our route from Nürtingen to Castle Hohenzollern to Castle Lichtenstein & back to Nürtingen:

Stay tuned for Day 3!