Saturday Morning, July 28th we got up early and said our good byes to Munich and headed south. We let "Nancy" direct us on our way and even though we got there we took some interesting roads on the way. We got in the "back" country and saw some beautiful Bavarian farms. We were heading to the Bavarian Alps to see the two castles Neu Schwanstein and Hohen Schwangau. Both castle's of "Mad" King Ludwig's era.
Our first tour was Hohen Schwangau which started at 11:00 am. Though not as spectacular as Neu Schwanstein it was beautiful and interesting just the same. King Ludwig grew up in this castle - so it was lived in. From the windows of the Castle you can see New Schwanstein perched up on the hill above.
After our tour we headed over to Neu Schwanstein. The tour there was to start at 1:00 pm. It was interesting to go through. This is my third time to tour the castles and Deborah's second. The castle was only about a third of the way completed when King Ludwig mysteriously died and the construction halted immediately. There were some interesting rooms in the castle. One was made up to look like a cave. King Ludwig was a great follower of Richard Wagner and much of what he had followed the opera's of Wagner. We unfortunately could not take any pictures inside the Castle because they want us to buy their books and pictures. You had to go through the gift store on the way out. It is interesting that Disney used this castle as a model for his Magic Kingdom and now this Castle is using Disneyland as a model for selling its wares.
After touring the Castles we hiked over to Mary's Bridge to see spectacular view of Neu Schwanstein from a short distance. The bridge crosses a very high gap. The views from the bridge were very beautiful. After the bridge we hiked back to our van and had dinner.
We then headed out to Salzburg, Austria via the southern Bavarian Alps. Our first stop was the Wiess Church. It is a Catholic pilgrimage church that was built in the middle of a meadow in the middle of no where because someone found a woodcarving statute of Christ and there were tears running down his face. It was deemed a miracle and the church was built in its honor. It is very beautiful and very baroque. The outside is plain with cows grazing in the pasture around it, but once you walk inside it is almost another world.
After visiting the church we headed through the back roads to Salzburg. There were some very beautiful sights to see and it took most of the rest of the day to get there. We arrived later in the evening and checked into our Pension. The rooms were beautiful and we had dinner at the restaurant, which was our best meal yet. After dinner we drove around Salzburg and got back after dark at about 11:00 pm. 
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