Hohenschwangau

We were awake at 6am this morning to the sound of the church bells but I didn’t bother getting out of bed until 7am. It was a chilly 9°c in Wanda and just 4°c outside so I lit the gas fire while waiting for the kettle to boil.
Today is our last proper day in Germany and I can’t wait for the road out but we had a dilemma ahead of us in the fact that Austria does not allow wild camping in most areas. In fact it’s a €220 fine for each person so we’re not going to be able to wild camp and camp sites are extortionate and we only have one thing to tick off our Austrian list and it would be ideal if we could just do that and drive straight through and into Italy. But in order to do that we are going to need to go through Austria with a full tank of fresh water and empty toilet and grey water because we don’t know when our next water station will be.
Just after 9am I started Wanda and programmed today’s destination into the sat nav. Whilst doing that the campervan Parker next to us through some liquid out of there side window and then a lady moved into the driving seat. She looked over and made eye contact so I smiled and waved and she promptly gave me the finger and shouted something through her closed window.
We couldn’t work out what her problem was, I did wonder if it was because I looked across at her van but she was staring straight at us so I thought the polite thing to do was acknowledge her. Obviously not. She was an angry little German.
We’ve also noticed that Germans like to stare and they will hold that stare and not even acknowledge you. More than once we thought we had grown second heads.
We left the park up and the angry German and went straight to Lidl to stock up on fresh food so we don’t have to shop in Austria and then we headed 20 miles down the road to the German/Austrian border and the lower car park of the Neuschwanstein Castle.
Parking here cost €1 per hour or €3 for 4 hours or €5 for the whole day. We chose the €3 option and here we did already have a splendid view of the castle but I had seen a panoramic viewpoint on google and that’s where I wanted to get to.
We left Wanda at 12pm, Ellie had the camelpack with the water and I had my small rucksack with my camera, 3 different lenses and some junk food to keep us going. I knew we had a heck of a hike ahead of us and mentioned it before we left England when I was planning the route. Mentioned it yesterday when showing Ellie the pictures of where we were going and I mentioned it as I brought the route up on my phone. Giving Ellie every opportunity to bail out.
We set off down the car park and onto a gravel track that led into some woods. It was just a 4.5km hike to get there this way that’s 2.7 miles in English. After the first 500 meters the track started to ramp up and then we came to a track that cut up a bank and the gradient was 15% and we had to pull ourselves up using the trees and even jump over a stream.
When we came out of the woods we were on a gravel road with lots of people walking up and down and Ellie said “ is this the way now?” I said “ no, we’re going up there “ and pointed to another track opposite and we started going up. It went up and up, steeper and steeper and we were pulling ourselves up all the way with Ellie swearing at me asking why we couldn’t take the road way. I pointed out that, that way is 2 miles longer and almost as steep. Then we passed a girl and boy coming down so that put Ellie’s theory of this isn’t a real trail to bed.
The gradient went up to 20%, Ellie kept stopping to catch her breath and I just pushed on trying to get out of earshot. Then we popped out on to another gravel road and there were loads of people milling around and on the road above us were buses shipping in the Chinese.
Once Ellie reached the road we stopped for a minute to let her catch her breath which was a silly mistake because as we started moving again we were now mixed in with the 2 coach loads of Chinese that had just got here, which meant that now there was around 300 people all heading to the same place as us to get the same shot.
We ran with the gaggle of people up a very thin mountain trail that was just wide enough for 1 person. Unfortunately the people coming back down didn’t care about that and just kept marching in through no matter what, even when we pulled ourselves onto the steep bank to let them pass nobody said thank you.
Finally we came to our first stop, a bridge that crosses the gorge and from that bridge is the panoramic view of the castle. Here there were railings up guiding us onto the bridge on the right and off on the left and there was also a digital counter counting how many people were on the bridge. We assumed that once it reached a certain number somebody would stop people but the bridge was now unmanned and the count was upto 101 and rising before we got on it.
Just as we were getting in a few of the Chinese pushed past us. It’s the same wherever we’ve been in the world they need to get there first and get there selfies like the thing we are all queuing up to see might move or disappear even though it’s been there for hundreds if not thousands of years. The worse thing was people were getting on the bridge and instantly getting their phones and cameras out and taking a picture there. The other end of the bridge was practically empty.
We pushed through to the other side and got the photos we wanted and then carried on walking. We picked up another trail and carried on up the 20% gradient much to Ellie’s disgust to a higher viewpoint where very few people ventured. Here we sat down perched right on the edge of the mountainside and opened my rucksack and got out the junk food and then we were joined by a German couple who sat right behind Ellie. They never spoke to us, never said hello or even acknowledged we were there and obviously had no idea what personal space is. We deliberately moved ourselves off the trail to be on our own. It was weird.
After eating we then made the trek back down and getting back to the bridge it was practically empty waiting for the next bus load to come in.
We grabbed some more shots as we had a bit more time and room and then we made our way back to the gravel roadway where the buses were coming back in.
For the return journey I said we’d go back down the road and yes it was longer but it was all downhill and Ellie didn’t moan once.
We finally got back to Wanda at 3:30pm and had hiked 6.5 miles and climbed 350 meters most of it at 20%.
Back in Wanda we made tea and now we had to deal with our dilemma I mentioned earlier and we decided to head back to the same park up as last night and hope that the angry German had gone and then go further back to the next village in the morning for fresh water and cleaning everything off before heading into Austria. That way we can both have showers tonight and use up what water we have without having to worry.
We arrived back at our park up at 4:30pm and there was no sign of the angry German lady who had given me the finger this morning thankfully and we pulled into the very end space and we’re later joined by another campervan.
At 6:30pm we had dinner of chicken and mushroom wraps which filled us up and then we both took showers using up the bulk of the water. Then we put the TV on and settled in for the night.
At 10pm just as we were about to turn the tv off and go to sleep a car pulled up next to us. The driver sat there for a while looking at his phone and then the car went black inside and he just sat there. I sat in Wandas driving seat in the dark keeping an eye on him but he didn’t move so I started setting the bed up. Then I heard a car door go and peaked behind the curtain to see the male driver wandering down the park up towards the footpath at the bottom. I just thought he’s leaving his car there and going to visit someone and finished setting the bed up.
We got in bed only to hear the car door go again and then the engine start.
Great, I thought, he’s going but instead he turned his car around and drove it in to the space next to us, turned the engine off and then sat there for another 5 minutes before getting out and going for another walk to the footpath.
Instantly Ellie was wondering if this was a dogging spot and why she thought I’d know what dogging behaviour looks like is beyond me. Then the guy came back, got in the back seats put a jacket in the window and laid down.
I said to Ellie “ I think he’s sleeping in the car”.
By now it was nearly 11pm and I did hear the car door go again a couple of times in the night and each time I got up to check what was happening. Sleeping here tonight was going to be a nightmare.Read more