FUSSEN

We left Rothenburg after lunch. The original plan had been to drive a combination of the Romantic Road and Autobahn. But, at this point, we were both anxious to be at the next destination, which is the heart of Bavaria and the 'fairytale' castles. Looking at that statement reminds me how difficult it becomes to 'stay in the moment' and enjoy it all. But we made our decision to save a few hours of time in the car. And even on the Autobahn, the views were beautiful. Up to this point, we hadn't seen mountains. As we drove south, I was just suddenly aware of the Alps. And I felt an odd sense of comfort in seeing the mountains. I have been surrounded by mountains for the last 7 1/2 years and didn't realize that I had been missing that type of land mark.

































































As we neared Fussen, we saw the construction on the Autobahn, extending it down to Fussen. It was notable that everything wasn't all torn up around the construction.













We stayed in Schwangau, just next to Fussen.

This is the balcony of our room.












































































Okay, so the stairwell to the rooms was, in a way, a little creepy :)











The yard from our balcony.

























The view of Neuschwanstein from our balcony.
















Two houses from our house was this lane that we walked to the castles, about 20 minutes at a more leisurely pace. Neuschwanstein on the left, Hohenschwangau on the right (the orange castle.)








Neuschwanstein

















At night












Hohenschwangau. You will learn more about Hohenschwangau in the post on the 'Fairytale Castles.'









The garden at the house on the corner of 'our' street and the lane.












A Bagel kitty sleeping on top of a covered wood pile in the lane. (Jason's sweet cat is named Bagel and is this kind of cat.)









A small castle across the lane. It is a residence for a prince or some such royalty.











Fussen in the evening.
















At the Franciscan Monastery you get this view of Fussen. That is Hohes Schloss in the background.












Another view.












The Franciscan Monastery.















This is at the Monastery. If you click on the picture, you will see that above this gate it says 'The End of the Romantic Road.' I thought it was kind of funny.....








The city museum. Concerts are held in this courtyard.











Another view of the museum courtyard. We were curious about the 'trees' - large branches - sitting in buckets of water at the doorways to most buildings. We find out about them tomorrow.








This is the ruined old ceiling in one of the covered areas of the museum courtyard.











Sights in Fussen. This was a really interesting fountain. The 'heads' on the tops of the pillars spin around.










The Church of the Holy Ghost, elaborately painted. We found a lot of this type of building art throughout Bavaria.















You can see the little door cut in this gate. Don really likes this kind of thing :)
















Hohes Schloss (High Castle) sitting above Fussen. It is a summer residence for the Bishop of Augsburg.









Hohes Schloss is notable for the painting on the buildings that produces tricks of perspective. While many buildings have the actual colored brick on the edges of the towers, these are just paint that look like the real thing until you get right up to it.







Notice the sundial on the right side. We saw a lot of sundials on buildings.















The windows all had the perspective altering painting around them.















The Lech River. Try as we might, we couldn't get a picture that showed the amazing color of this water. It was a mint green. I've never seen anything like it. The color comes from some mineral in the water.