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Munich, Germany |
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The Third Day |
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Some of the outside views from the windows were both surprising and amazing all at once. The balcony window of the bedroom gives a beautiful view of the Poellat gorge with its waterfall of 149 feet. The gorge is named after a brook that originates from the mountains and feeds the Poellat Falls below the Marienbrucke.
The Marienbrucke, or Queen Mary's Bridge was built even earlier than Schloss Neuschwanstein and is considered a technological masterpiece of its time. It stands at a height of 304 feet in a bold curve. It was later named after Queen Mary, mother of Ludwig II. |
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This is the Singer's Hall. This impressive room is a combination of two predecessors; the Festive Hall and the renovated Singers' Hall of Wartburg Castle. |
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The paintings in the hall itself and around the listener's gallery show details of the Parzifal saga, the subject of Richard Wagner's most important opera.
The hall was never used during the reign of King Ludwig II. In 1933 festive concerts were organized on the occasion of Richard Wagner's death and continued through 1939. During these concerts, the hall was lit using more than 600 candles. The curved and angular pine-wood panelled ceiling gives the hall excellent acoustics. There were attempts in 1952 to organize further concerts and finally, since 1969, concerts now take place in September here, in the singer's hall. |
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The kitchen was considered quite modern for its time. It featured hot and cold running water, fully automatic turning spits for game and poultry, and a grill. The hot air rising in the chimney turned a turbine in a broad tube above the spit and this movement operated the spit over a gear. This was a Leonardo da Vinci invention.
The smoke of the big stove in the middle of the room was redirected under the floor. The heat escaping from the stove to the chimney warmed the dishes in the plate warmer which was installed in the wall beside the oven. |
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Our tour concluded in this area. Actually, this was a free roaming area along with another hall that offered pictures of the castle during the building stages and some concept work from the artists that never quite made it to fruition. The tour was quite nice and though a lot was explained to us by the guide, I learned more about the life and times of King Ludwig II and this beautiful castle that was his eventual dream through the research I did putting up these last few pages. |
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Unfortunately, King Ludwig II never saw his castle to completion. During his reign, he became estranged from his family. He led a solitary life, sleeping most of the day and spent his nights going for long, lonely rides through the countryside, often dressed in his full kingly regalia. He continued to withdraw into his dream world, running up the debts on his projects and still refusing all advice offered to him to curb this extravagance. His funds came from his personal purse, contrary to those who thought he ran the State Treasury to ruin. When those funds ran out and construction came to a halt, the King's life suddenly lost purpose. |
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In 1886 at the age of 41 years, the cabinet declared him insane. His Uncle Luitpold was made regent in his stead. On June 12, 1886, a Government Commission moved him from Neuschwanstein to Berg. Three days later, Ludwig II was found drowned in Lake Starnberg, on the outskirts of Munich. Speculation has it he committed suicide or was murdered, but in a letter addressed to Richard Wagner, Ludwig concluded he had to perish, because, in an "ideal, monarchical, poetical solitude" he had tried to create an art in harmony with his personal view of the universe. Upon his untimely and dramatic death, Paul Verlaine called him the "only true king of the century". |
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And in driving home, a final glance back at the sun setting over mountains in what used to be King Ludwig II's world, and the end of a beautiful day... |
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Return to The Travel Journals
< Page 4 |
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Updated April 2, 2002 |
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