Germany - 4th and final installment

After 3 days of travelling around Germany it was nice to have two night in the same hotel. We only had the one day to explore Berlin but ti was great to not have to jump back into the car and then journey to our next destination. We dropped the hire car off at the airport in the morning and then rode the train into the city centre. Richard and I are wanderers, whenever we visit a new city we always walk everywhere, jumping on and off the trains just doesn't seem worth while. So we started at one end of Berlin and walked.....



The Reichstag



Berliner Dom - Lustgarten




A section of the Berlin Wall that is still standing. It has been created in to an art exhibition called the East Side Gallery



Strolling along the Berlin Wall trying to get Benji to sleep.

 

Evie and Daddy being washed away by the sea.

 

Lots of the pictures stood out but i liked this one - it made me think about what life must have been like and the thoughts of trying to escape over the wall.




Next time we go on a trip we are going to try out one of these tours!!




Or perhaps rent a bike like this one.  One person does the steering while everyone else has to pedal facing the wrong direction.



We went to the TV Tower and rode the lift to the top. The views of the city were impressive.



Enjoying the sun even though it felt cold.




A view of the river from the top of the TV tower, you can just see the East Side Gallery Section of the wall in the distance past the 3rd bridge . We walked all the way to the tower from the Wall and then continued to walk even further during the rest of the day.  It would have been easy if I wasn't also carrying a sleeping Benji monster who seemed to weigh a ton!



The holocaust memorial - I loved the memorial,  the blocks of concrete were arranged so that they started of small and then got taller and taller the more you walked into the memorial.



Evie loved running around in the pathways but it was so easy to loose her.



My only half decent picture of the Bandenburg Gate,  there were men with a crane cleaning the sculpture on the top. How inconsiderate did they not know we were visiting!!

 

Our final stop was Legoland Berlin - I'm not sure who had the most fun, the adults or the kids!!



Lego Reichstag and Brandenburg Gate - no crane cleaning this one!

 

Queen Evie



King Benji





The entrance to Legoland - Evie was so excited when she saw the huge Giraffe.



So our journey finally came to an end. 6 nights in Germany - 5 different hotels - approx 700 miles driving and 18 hours spent in the car.  Its one of the longest driving trips we have been on with two little children but it hasn't put us off travelling and we would be ready to do it again......maybe next time we can choose somewhere where the roads signs are in English. It would certaining my make job as map reader a little easier!!

Germany - Part 3

Sorry for the number of posts just to cover one short holiday but ti was too hard to combine all of the photographs.  So after our lovely days at the castle we then headed north-east to Dresden. We had heard that Dresden was a beautiful city and worth visiting. I had calculated it to be about a 6 - 7 hour drive and was just right. We reached our Hotel in Dresden and went straight to bed ready to explore in the morning. After our all you can eat continental buffet breakfast which was extremely good we drove into the city and wandered around the sheets admiring the architecture.   



At one stage we were closer to Prague than we were Dresden. Being from an island it was strange to think about crossing into another country just by taking the wrong exit from the AutoBahn. Fortunately we never made that mistake.



A selection of Dresden's beautiful buildings.  We didn't have the best guide book on this trip so I can tell you what they all are.



Wish I knew how to Photoshop the sign out of this picture!





A mural painted along the length of one of the museums.



I found a small park near the edge of the river that had the most amazing coloured trees. I love Autumn and really appreciated having such beautiful trees to look at while we were in Germany.

 

After our morning in Dresden we then drove a little way out of the city to visit the Freiberg Temple. It was Monday and the temple was all closed so we didn't get to go into the visitors centre. The temple is so small it could easily have been mistaken for a chapel.  There really weren't any grounds to walk around either although you still get that same feeling of being in a sacred place.

Germany Part 2

So the reason for travelling all the way to the south of Germany was to visit the Hohenschwangau Castle and the Neuschwanstein Castle.  We arrived in the small village just as the sun was going down and were able to grab a brief glimpse of the castles in the daylight.  we decided the following day to take a guided tour around the Neuschwanstien Castle. It is said to be the castle that Walt Disney based there logo castle on (the one you see at the start of all the Disney Movies).  Evie was excited to be visiting Cinderellas castle although once we were inside she found it tiring. You can't take pushchairs on the 30min tour and encouraging her to walk while Benjamin was in the baby carrier was a little hard.  You also aren't permitted to take photographs inside the castle. so you will just have to believe us when we say it was impressive. It was built by King Ludwig II  although the castle was never fully completed inside as the king was believed to be mad and was committed to an asylum by his family before his castle was complete.  inside there is a room dedicated to swans, the door handles are swan the lamps are swans and all of the pictures on the walls contain swans. this then leads into his cave - a room completely covered in concrete and made to look like a cave, when you close the doors it looks like there is no way out. Crazy King???

After exploring the castle we took the short walk back to the village (we had rode the horse and carriage up to the castle). We then began the next leg of our journey from Fussen in the south of Germany on the Austrian Boarder through Munich and up to Dresden.




Our first views of the Bavarinan Alps.  Austria is just the other side of the mountains.



Our first views of the two castles.

Proof that we were there.

Neuschwanstien Castle, I love the fairytale turrets. It looks like Rapunzel should be living at the top waiting to be rescued by her prince.



This one is my photograph



And this is my photograph of the posters they sell in the shops!  We weren't able to hike this high with the children to get this amazing view. you can just see the other castle to the right of the picture. From this angle you can see the likeless to the Disney Castle.



Hohanschwangau Castle, also built by the Mad king, this one is set next to the lake where as the other is up on the mountain.



The view from the doorstep of our hotel. how lucky we are to be able to travel to such amazing places.  



Part 3 and 4 to follow  --- Dresden and Berlin

Germany Part 1

This post has been a long time coming and hopefully I will get the other highlights of our trip added soon. 

So wayyyyy back in October now we took a trip to Germany for Stuart and Rachael's wedding (Richards brother).  After spending forever making the decision to travel for a little while after the wedding I finally put together an itinerary for the short few days.  After starting in Frankfurt we made our first trip down to Hohenschwangau where there are some beautiful castles.  On the days drive we stopped off at Rothenburg od der Tauber which was a quaint little town surrounded by medieval walls and towers.  We wandered round the town for a while taking in the atmosphere and eating some traditional cinnamon dough balls.



A view of the town walls, you can just see them along with some towers close to the horizon.



One of my favourite little houses in Rothenburg, they all looked like this but this one stood out because of the flowers.



An abandoned well on the outskirts of the town.



One of the many turrets that surround the town, this one divided the town from a small park area that we walked around.



My favourite house appearing again!



Its was the middle of October when we visited and all of the shop windows and doorways were lined with carved pumpkins. I think I might try something simple like this next year.



Evie and Daddy trying to play hide and seek in the vines. It might have worked if the leaves were still there.

 

A quick break before jumping back in to the car for another few hours before we reached Hohenschwangau