When I went on my first trip to Europe with the IUP Chorale in 1998, we
visited one of King Ludwig's castles, the
Castle Linderhof.
Linderhof had some crazy amenities, including the "Venus Grotto," which is a cave with a lake featuring scenes from Wagner's operas. Apparently, Ludwig was a great "lover" of Wagner, if you catch my drift.
On our Germany trip, Kevin and I visited what is probably King Ludwig's most famous castle,
Neuschwanstein. You've seen it, even if you haven't heard of it. Images of it proliferated those college poster sales, and it's the castle that Disney's Cinderella castle is based on.
The poster picture you've probably seen probably looked something like this:
Since we were going there in December, we had fantasies that the castle would look as beautiful and ethereal as it does in this photo, but, in reality, if there had been this much snow, we wouldn't have even gotten close to the castle. And I don't think we could have seen it from this angle, regardless.
But more about the castle in a minute.
