Cheese puffs yum!

Jo-Ann's weakness - cheese puffs.



 Stephen favourite was a little more liquid.








A welcome break while waiting to get into the castle.


The best way to get up the 40 min walk to the castle.  Jo-Ann's new friends.

So where is Romeo?

Verona was a day stop on our adventure north through Italy.  This was a mistake it was a charming City and we would have liked a few more days to explore.


Made famous by Shakespeare with Romeo and Juliette (a mythical tale), a lot of money is made from guessing which balcony Juliette stood on.  Mind you there are some very nice balconies.

Stephen's favourite part of Verona was the specialist gelati shop in the main square.  Bellisimo!

Gelati proved to be his Achilles heal.  In the end he had to limit himself to 1 a day he had only brought one belt.

Pork Knuckle and Wiener Schnitzel

Pork Knuckle and Wiener Schnitzel are the traditional meals in Germany and there is no getting away from them.  Don't be fooled by the vegetables in the picture we had to beg to get them normally they come with Pomme Frits (potato chips or dumplings) not a green in sight.  We tried to resist we really did - and failed!

King Ludwigs folly

The whole reason for being in this part of the world was to visit Neuschwanstein Castle.  
We had been to Europe twice before but always seemed to have missed it.  We had heard all of the stories and seen the travel shows that explained how it was the basis for Disney’s castle emblem.  We just had to see it.

It is really important to realize that without a pre-booked ticket it is unlikely that you are going to see it.  We arrived early like 2 hours early and it was still just enough time to get organized.

We saw the two castles Hohenschwangau (Ludwig's dad's castle) and Neuschwanstein.  Both were breathtaking - almost in mint condition having never been taken by force.  

Ludwig only had his castle for a couple of hundred days before they declared him mad and he died in mysterious circumstances.
His castle remains unfinished today but still the best thing you will ever see regarding the folly of men - apparently he had an even more difficult one planned.

Maybe he was crazy but Bavaria is making a lot of money from them today!

Fussen is lovely

Travelling north on the autobahns speed limits were a bit negotiable.  But we had decided to make Fussen our base for 4 nights and explore the surrounds from there.  

It was a good decision.  Fussen was lovely, the hotel was friendly and very homely – I’d say a folksy Heidi meets Bamby sort of style.  

We even found a local doctor to tend to us and she was great, having worked in Melbourne for a year – she understood us.

From Fussen we could easily do all the castles, travel into Munich and even visit some of the ski villages which all appeared to be packed with tourist even in the off season.

We had some great experiences just going to the neighboring town to do our washing and visiting the shopping center.  We drove to Linderhof (a castle) and enjoyed spectacular views in the mirrored lake as we drove along its edge.

A romantic night at the hospital in Bolzano - NOT

Soon after arriving in Venice Jo-Ann became sick with the flu my time was to come later.  By Bolzano (just below the Austrian boarder), Jo-Ann was not well so we went off to the regional hospital to see a doctor.  We figured they would listen to her chest, take her temp and send her off with antibiotics. 

We waited an hour to see the doctor – fair enough.  Then they wanted a chest x-ray as she was coughing heavily – fair enough another 2 hours.  Then they wanted to do a CAT scan as they just wanted to be sure it wasn’t a blood clot that spread to her lung – WHAT?

Italian doctors clearly aren’t used to being questioned by their patients.  They were most perplexed when I said that we were not having the CAT scan.  In the end they figured I was too much for them and sent us up stairs to see a lung specialist.  He was a nice fellow who decided in very quick time it was a flu and gave us some antibiotics and a puffer.

We left the hospital 4 and a half hours later but only 15 euro lighter.

The first cafe in the world

One of the 'must dos' on this trip was to have a coffee in the original Florian Cafe - attributed to be the first cafe in the world.
It is very old school with the original decor of the 18th century and silver service with waiters dressed in white with gloves.
Each afternoon and evening a band plays out the front (all in tuxedos) and the scene is set for possibly the most romantic cup of coffee you can ever have.
Of course this all comes at a cost and a coffee and biscuits can cost you up to $40.  But hey how many times do you drink coffee in Venice?