tuesday, july 10

wake up
get ready
pack up
take luggage downstairs
quick breakfast
wait for stragglers
leave for germany at 10:00am
long time in the bus

we drove (or, rather, were driven) to the weiskirche, otherwise known as "the church in the meadow" for a tour and then a quick performance by the choir. this church is located on the crest of a hill, out in the middle of nowhere. we were lucky to visit right when there was a break in the rain and the clouds opened to provide me with the perfect opportunity to snap this idyllic shot:though you may not know it, the weiskirche is famous. it is really famous among art historians and nerds such as myself because it is the premier example of rococo art. and it is rococo. overwhelmingly rococo. for those of you who do not know what rococo is, it is a style, and it looks like this:lots of pinks and gold and swirls and embellishments and decoration. it is basically a one-up on baroque art, which employed a very dramatic style. rococo is dramatic in a lighter way. i always love when i get to see things in person that i learned about in art history. it is like meeting a celebrity whose life you follow in the tabloids, but art doesn't mind so much when you take pictures with it (unless the flash is on). i took a little break during the concert to stroll around outside, and found this:
look at that cute german couple taking a stroll in this beautiful scene. like i said, the church is in the middle of nowhere. i love europe.

after the concert and tour, we hopped back on the bus and headed to bavaria. i slept, but my cousin lauren took this picture from the bus. it is a great picture because that is what the landscape looked like the whole way there. the reason for heading to the bavarian region of germany was to visit the neuschwanstein castle. what castle, you ask? why, the one that the disneyland castle was modeled upon. the top picture is of neuschwanstein, and the bottom is the disneyland castle, just in case you haven't been there in a while.

neuschwanstein

disneyland

a picture i took of neuschwanstein from the pathway on the hike to the top.
it is on a mountain, afterall.

and another. notice the great weather we had. blegh.

the castle was beautiful and...interesting. it was built by ludwig ii as a quasi-tribute to wagner. the inside is totally decorated with scenes from wagner's operas, and the beautiful, fairy-tale embellishments and design of the castle was carefully created to reflect the fairy-tales in wagner's work. this guy must have loved wagner. but, poor ludwig, he only enjoyed his castle for 70-something days before he was found dead in the lake at the base of the mountain the castle sits on. with his doctor, oddly enough. there were rumours that ludwig was a bisexual, which explains the dead doctor as well, but no one knows how or why either of them died. sounds fishy to me. ergo, the castle was never finished. also, no pictures allowed in the castle, but here is one of lauren and me, along with two guys on the trip with us:

interesting side note: we almost didn't make it into the castle. the organization that runs the castle requires all groups to be at the ticket booth at least one-hour before your tour so that you can catch the bus and have enough time to walk the rest of the way to the top. however, we were running late due to traffic, construction, an enforced detour, and a late start in the morning. we were afraid that we were going to miss our tour, but fortunately our guide was a smooth talker (and he was ripped, i think he showed the girl at the ticket booth his guns and she couldn't say no to him, his baby blues, or his biceps) and we squeaked by. once again, no pictures allowed in the castle, but here is one they allowed me to take from inside the castle:

this is a view from one of the windows, overlooking the valley below.

after our tour, we hopped back on the bus and drove the rest of the way to munich. i slept (again) until we reached the restaurant they reserved for dinner. here is me, waiting for my food:

the dinner was...well...let's just say that i don't like german food, or at least the german food they served us. we had dry pork smothered in mushroom sauce (i hate mushrooms), and some sort of noodles that looked like capt'n crunch and tasted like mucus. eww.

after dinner, we went to our hotel (eurosuites) and when we got there, all hell broke loose. there was only one card key per room: complaining all around. elevators didn't work: double complaining all around. no hand towels: more complaining. room keys didn't work: triple complaining all around. no extra pillows--weird thing to complain about, but--more complaining. i felt so bad for the poor girl that was working. the rooms were not as nice as the ones in salzburg (we did stay at the crown plaza, afterall), so everyone is complaining about every little thing, and this girl--who doesn't speak english very well--has to bear the brunt of it. the elevator, and then our room key, did not work, so i went down to get a new one. the lady made a new key for us, grabbed a bag, then walked me back to our room to test the key, then left the bag and went downstairs. i thought the bag was hers, and she had thought the bag was mine, and some poor schmuck somewhere did not have his bag. whoops. i ran back downstairs with the bag, just as the girl was calling our room. she was very grateful, as was the owner of the bag.

finally, everything settled down and we got to sleep.