Vianden
Trip Start
Aug 27, 2005
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2
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Trip End
Aug 29, 2005
Vianden,
Luxembourg
Sunday, August 28, 2005
So we caught this bus to Vianden cos it was there, it had a beautiful castle and we had a Luxembourg card that needed using up. Now the one thing about Vianden, apart from the fact it is a pretty pretty town is that it has a chair lift (the only one in Luxembourg - funny that really isn't it, given that Luxembourg has a population smaller than my own home city - and I thought that was impossible).
So up the chair lift we go (free with the card). Saw the town from around 450m up. Caught the worst side of the castle (the side with the cranes and construction work) and then promptly returned to ground level. Why??? Because the price of a simple beverage (coke for example) was huge - over a couple of Euro for a can.
Another thing to note about Luxembourg (if you look at a map) is that is stuck between three countries and it is small. So hop on a bus in a French speaking part of town, travel for half an hour and what do you find - German speaking people. And I am now aware that when you find Germans you find Germans that ride motorcycles. So we had lunch in a cafe that was filled with motorcyclists. But wait there is more, they had self cleaning toilets at this gem of a cafe. haven't seen anything as wonderful as that for a while (not since Japan). If I could remember the name of the cafe I'd recommend going just for the toilets.
Anyway, after the lunch we thought "Victor Hugo", but Victor was out to lunch and his museum wasn't open. So next best thing was the castle. the castle was amazing. I've seen a few castles in my time in the UK but this was just as good as some of those, and better than most. Part Gothic, part Romanesque, it was an amazing little trip through, with freedom to do pretty much anything you could hope for. Of course I climbed the walls and almost fell to my death, but hey, if it was good enough for the Germans, Belgiums, French, Spanish, Austrians and who knows what other nationalities then it was all right for a simple boy from New Zealand.
Anyway, after that we decided to leave and find the next bus back to the railway lines ... ie the bus with our favorite driver from before. Once there we took a brief trip up to Troisvierges (see picture of dog) before heading back to the big L for dinner. A day well spent on the Luxembourg card.
