Day 13

Today I got up around 8.30ish (a little reluctantly.. but hey..) and had a breakfast and antihystimine pill. After a quick shower me and Mrs Kirste headed off to go visit some places. On the drive to where we were headed we passed Tübingen, where I was considering going aswell as JIBS. I had no idea how close it was to Esslingen!! Anyway.. Our first destination was this FANTASTIC castle called Hohenzollern Burg (named after the Hohenzollern bloodline that founded and own it). Its a spectacular castle, perched on this lone 900-ish meter mountain, So it has an awesome view, and looks very impressive from a distance. Its the third time its been built on that site (been raised twice). And this time round its never actually been lived in ha ha. The family who owns it has visited n stayed a bit, but never officially taken up residance :)

We parked part way up the hill (had to... sneaky money hungry owners..) and caught a bus up to the castle (more money! Coulda walked but it woulda taken quite a while and also it was already like 30°). Anyway, soon we were there and we walked up the famous 'Eagle Gaetway' (not a super impressive looking thing, but an architectural masterpiece for its design) and were in the main courtyard. It was just as spectacular here as from afater, if not more so!

I took a few pics, then had a guided tour (unfortuinately in german, but i picked up some stuff and Mrs Kirste also got me a english borchure later so that was cool! In the first room we visited there was a massive family tree painted on the walls, stretching back to the first known records of the hohenzollern line around a thousand years ago (!!!). This was really impressive, and after a bit it split into two lines, a red - catholic - Swabian line, and a blue - evangalical - Franconian line (later to become Brandenburg-Prussian lines. There were a seriously huge amount of famous German kings, kaisers, and so forwarth.. not many of which id heard of but hey.. It stretched right up to WWII and now i think the current owner is a prince around 30ish years old.

We then walked through an amazing dining/ball room, with spectacular chandeliers and ornate decorations (and marble pillars), and then into a library, which was also pretty impressive. After this we came to the kings 'study' of sorts. It had a jaw-dropping view, and was so decked out!! :) It was so over the top and amazing. OH! when we entered the dining/ball room place we had to wear these old cloth slippers as not to damage the floorboards (often made of elaborate wooden tiles), we also had to slide our feet along the ground rather than walk normally :). Personally I woulda thought sliding along the floor would be worse for it that gently walking.. but oh well, its their castle! And they are probably right anyway..

Now we headed through some living quateres and into the queens bedroom. On the way were lots of photos of the most famous descendants (alot of Fredricks and Wilhelms).. Ok is it me or do people never look very good in olden days paintings! There will be this lady who is supposed to be stunningly beutiful, yet in the painting she looks decidedly average. One 'beautiful' princess seriously looked more like a man than a woman!! (Ill try get you a pic).. and seriously.. most of these famous guys and their daughters looked like these pump, rosy cheeked, beady-eyed piggy people, not galant rulers or beautiful princesses... But anyway.

The Queens room was amazing, there was gold-painted walls, amazing furnishings, some awesome paintings, a great view both over the countryside and into a courtyard.. :) totally sweet! Now we got to remove our peasant boots :) and headed back out the counrtyard, where we entered our final room where lots of artifacts etc were on display. There was a room full of weapons and armour, and then a big room with TONS of the silver and golden ornaments, cutlery (and pretty much anything the king or queen might use), swords, letters and seals and so forwarth all in display cases. They were amazing! and the craftmanship was equally amazing! I dunno why they spen quite so much on building these flashy as places with ridiculous furnishings and ornaments.. I mean who cares if ur neighbour doesnt think ur the man.. and anyway, u can just put all ur money into military and kick his ass and take his stuff ha ha! I mean u wouldnt have to live like a slave.. but it just all seemed a liiiitle over the top.

We then had some lunch (wurst, chips, bun and sauce mmmm) and watched some art students draw the castle for a bit then headed back to the oven.. i mean car. (34° today). We then drove on a bit further to a great little village called Haigerloch. Ok I have said it before, but its so cool and different having all these villages everywhere and not that far apart. They are all seriously old, and yet lots of people still live in them all. Nothing like NZ. It has litttle settlements scattered around too with a bar and postshop.. but most of them are seriously empty and stuff. There villages are still all go. Its cool as a! Theres always a big church or two which the village is kinda built around.

Anyway, Haigerloch was stunning, It had an 'over-city' and 'under-city' (although cits is overstating somewhat!). The lower part was surrounded by almost vertical cliffs, and the upper city climbed up on side way up above the lower city. also towering up out of the lower city was the Schloss, built on another piece of sharply rising terrain with basically vertical cliffs on each side. Really interesting landscape! and very dramatic and gorgeous to look at! Off to one side is a very high natural pillar or rock, and ontop of it it a wooden cross which is pretty cool too!

First off we went around the Upper city, and visited first an evangalical church with a huge copy of Da Vinci's Last Supper on the inside front wall.. was very cool!. We then walked past the big old Clocktower and came to an awesome Catholic church (where pilgrims would often travel apparently). So far id only really seen gothic style churches.. so this baroque style one was quite a change! So much going on everwhere with marble statues, and huge ornate statues and structures, and lovely painted ceilings. I didnt really know where to look.. But it was cool!

We then went back down to the lower city and visiten the big secret of Haigerloch.. Under the Schloss in the hillside (well in the cliff face) was a secret 'Atomkeller' (Atomic cellar) where the Nazis carried out some of their nuclear science in their race to develop a nuclear generator to boost the war effort. This was so sneakily kidden away it was amazing! In the middle of nowhere in a little village in southern germany.. Anyway, there were famous names like Einstein and the sort.. and it had a replica of the generator they had constructed and some ruined metal from the actual place (when it was finally discovered) (the french heard about it, but then the americans swooped in, raided the place, and took all the technology over to the states.. naturally the french werent too impressed! Later most the scientists would go to the states too, coy they couldnt really work in the ruined Germany). So yeah, had a hunt around here. It was really surreal (but really nice and cold compared to the heat outside!). We then climbed up the hill alongside the schloss. Halfway up we visited the schloss church which was another awesome ornate baroque style catholic one. and then up to the main schloss itself which wasnt a big deal.. it was now run as a hotel and conference center.. and it was cool.. but nothing to write home about. (altho ppl at home will read this.. arr anyway..).

Man this is getting really long and i dont even feel like im doing any of it justice! But after this we went to a cafe and I had a scrummy as black forest cake (never had a german one before.. delicious!! But seriously.. do they need that much cream! :) ) and Mrs Kirste had a apricot cheesecake which I also tried (tho not as good as her home made one i must say). We then drove home the same route we had came, and Ariane was back from work (after sarting 6.30, like she does again 2mrw) and arnulf was home from school. I took some time out, then played backyard soccer with arnulf until Björn was home. It was still a good 32-31°, so i was pretty hot and sweaty pretty soon, and seriously felt like a swim. But i sliced my hand on a gate getting a ball, so thought id just have a shower instead. Afterwards I had some toasted sandwiches for dinner, loaded photos onto flickr (totally up to date now!!! :D) and then it was soccer time.

The soccer wasnt bad, and france probably deserved to win it.. I thought it was kinda stink how the crowd boo-ed Christiano Ronaldo every time he got the ball tho! (tho they were probably english fans still annoyed at rooney's red card). I mean yeah, the guys a bit of an ass, and he prob needs to grow up a bit, but doesnt mean u have to boo everytime he touches the ball! Maybe just give him a hard time when he starts getting all whingy and stupid.. Anyway.. about halfway through the game i started watching less and less and watching the window more and more... There as a lightning storm going off. and man was it ever going! Thered be a flash every few seconds for hours! And the forks of lightning looked sooo awesome! Once I had seen enough I went to bed and heard more of the thunder.. Its the first time ive actually heard a 'crackling' thunder, rather than just a big boom.. its was totally awesome, like a cracking sizzling sound! (there would be booms too) I timed one thunder crash and all up there was constant crackling and booming for 1 min 49 sec. :) Boy was it ever impressive! Anyway.. I soon headed off to sleep.
Maybe tomorrow will actually not be a lovely warm, sunny day!
Time will tell :)