We left mid-morning on Monday to begin our three day drive to München. If we drove straight from Basel to München, it would only take about 6 hours, but we decided to stop along the way to see some castles and spend some time in Austria. At the beginning of our journey we were accompanied by rain and overcast skies which hampered our views of the countryside, but fortunately the sun began to shine it's lovely face on day two!

There were tons of tunnels on our drive. We're not sure why, but these were LONG tunnels! 

Our first destination of the day was Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany, the 19th century Romanesque Revival palace commissioned by King Ludwig II as a personal retreat and homage to Richard Wagner.   We had plans to take a tour of the inside of the Castle, but unfortunately due to bad weather and traffic arrived to late. Bummer. But we were able to take the bus up to the Castle and walk around it. 

The picture below is of Hohenschwangau Castle, the 19th century childhood home of King Ludwig II built by his father King Maximilian II of Bavaria. We didn't have time to drive and see this one, but I was able to get a nice shot from a distance. 

Neuschwanstein from the parking lot. 

Hohenschwangau

From the parking lot you take a bus up the the Castle. After alighting, it's only a short walk to the Castle entrance, but we had to stop along the way to capture the beautiful landscapes below. You can see Hohenschwangau in the distance to the left. 

Walking beside the Castle. To be honest, we were a little disappointed. I was hoping the Castle would look a lot older, but it really does look like it was built yesterday. Oh, well. The sheer size of it was impressive!

What a view!

The Castle Gatehouse. King Ludwig II had the Gatehouse built first so that he could live in it and be able to keep an eye on the rest of the construction. 

 Even though we could not take the tour inside, people were allowed into the inside courtyard. 

What an entrance!

Looking out from the courtyard you can see Marienbrücke. 

Leaving Neuschwanstein to head to Marienbrücke. 

Lots of people come to this spot because it has a perfect view of the Castle. 

 After leaving Neuschwanstein, we headed to our hotel in the Ski town of Innsbruck, Austria. We arrived late that evening and so only had a short time to wander around the town. Everything except the restaurants were closed and it was raining, but it was still fun to wander around!

Stay tuned for Day 2!