3 castle adventure

We really enjoy visiting different castle and the kids enjoy it also. We decided to spend one Saturday visiting three different castles all within a couple hours of us. We aren't really into paying to go into the castles as the kids don't care and want to touch everything. We have been in one so far and we feel that is good enough for know. Mostly I'm going to post pictures as I don't know much about each castle.

The first castle we went to was Hohenzollern. We went there first because it was the farthest away There was a nice hike up to the castle but you couldn't really see much from the outside and there wasn't even a really good place to get a nice picture of the castle. It was a little disappointing.

The second castle we went to was the Lichtenstein Castle. Some people get confused thinking this castle should be in the country of Lichtenstein but it is in the middle of Germany.













I have seen the pictures of Lichtenstein castle on Pinterest and wanted to go for a while. You do have to pay a little fee to go to the castle and more if you want to go inside the castle. It is a short walk from the parking area that also has a restaurant to the castle. It also appeared the had a ropes course right there too. We decided to have lunch here before moving on the last castle of the day.




The last castle we went to was actually a castle ruin, our favorite type of castle. Burg Hohenneuffen is different then other castle ruins we have been too. This one hosts parties and has a restaurant. The other huge different between this castle and others is they had resident goats. The goats seemed friendly at first but then they seemed to turn on us. They were fun at first but after a while I wish they would of just gone away instead of falling us everywhere.

Ulm

We visited Ulm way back at the end of August. It quickly became one of our favorite cities in Germany. Being only an hour and half from Ansbach it is an easy day trip. I found the suggestion for Ulm on one of my travel Facebook groups and then did a lot of looking on Pinterest for ideas of where to go. There were several of these painted bird around the city and we had no idea why. They also seemed to sell a lot of bird items almost as a city mascot. I found out that the city sold them to raise money and then people painted or decorated them how they wanted. We thought it was very random but also a very cool activity while in Ulm, looking for the different birds.


One of the attraction to Ulm is the crooked house. The house is in the old fisherman's quarters and sits right along a little stream/ river. Since it is right next to the water it caused the foundation to sink. The house is still currently in use as a hotel and you can stay there. Maybe before we leave Germany, we will have a chance to stay in the crooked house.




The main draw to Ulm, in my opinion is the Ulm Minster. Many people call it a cathedral but it is technically not one. It is however, the tallest church in the world. The steeple is 530ft. For a small fee you can climb to the top of the speer for an amazing view of the city and on a rare clear day in Germany you can see all the way to the Alps but you have to know what you are looking for. We decided to make the climb to the top. We are very adventurous so are the kids so we will do things that other wouldn't because they don't seem kid friendly. Our kids are young enough that they were free. We set off on the roughly 768 steps to the top and the kids were troopers. Waylon, who was only 2 1/2, climb almost half the way up in the end. The climb wasn't too bad since there is a different way up and down so you didn't have to worry about passing people on the stairs. There were lots of spiral stair cases. When you get to what you think is the top you have a really nice view and then you realize there is another staircase up the final speer. This staircase is a very narrow spiral staircase and when you are carrying a child it makes it hard to pass people coming back down but we made it. It was windy and starting to rain when we made it up so the view wasn't of the Alps but still really nice. Going back down was almost more interesting to me then going up. The spiral stairs make going down a challenge when you have a child strapped to you as I was carrying Waylon in the Ergo at this point.

Once we were done with the steeple we went into the church and just admired the beauty that is the chapel. They had one of the most beautiful stain glass displays I have seen. After the adventure in the church, it was raining outside so we decided to head home. We spent a couple hours in Ulm and if the weather was a little better we would of stayed longer. They also have one of the most beautiful libraries in the world that we were unable to get to. Next time.