Burghausen

One of our lovely hosts, Christian, hails from the town of Burghausen.  We went to stay with his parents for a night and were treated to some spectacular sights as well as amazing traditional food.  The weather was gorgeous so we walked through the town to Burghausen castle.  It is the longest castle in all of Europe, at 1.051m, and it is truly enormous.  There are six "courts," or sections of the castle.  Each court was specific in purpose and historically housed very different types of people and affairs.  The sixth court is the outermost court, and has the clock tower, a guard tower, was a place for executions, and housed manual workers and couriers, among other things.  The fifth court holds the exterior chapel, an observation tower, a park (where we played on see-saws), and was the place for ducal administration with the granary and cashier's office.  The fourth court is the prison.  There is a hexenturm or witch's tower, that holds cells and a dungeon.  There's also a torture tower and a prison/labor house.  Additionally this is where the stables and stable hands were located, along with another defensive tower.  It is truly a multi-purpose court.  The third court contains the arsenal guard-tower, towers for artillery and lookouts, and a large arsenal.  The second court contains more battlements, more stables, and belongs to the inner castle.  Being there without permission used to mean your ears would be cut off.  The first court, and innermost area of the castle, held many more strategic battlements, prisons, and strongholds, but also is the location of the household cambers, dining rooms, and ducal quarters.

The castle truly is amazing, and a sight well worth seeing.  To the right is one of the famous gates between courts.  I think this one may be the entrance to the second court, but don't quote me on that.  Below is a stunning view of an external castle wall and the village, as seen through the observation tower in the fifth court.  One thing I found remarkable about this castle is the fact that people live here today.  It is full of apartments that are owned by area families and passed down through generations.  It is nearly impossible to get a place here unless you are left it by someone who passes away. 

Everyone enjoys a good see-saw, no matter his or her age!

We were really lucky on the day we visited.  We were able to sneak back into the main keep of the castle and look around some of the inner rooms.  Even Christian had never been able to see this part of the grounds before!  We walked around the entire inner court, outside and in.  Here you can see some of the best photos from the inside rooms we passed through.  Below is a picture into the center of the inner court, which we couldn't get into because of the iron gates.  The shape in the center hallway is a cannon.  The castle, as a whole, was a very impressive, open structure.  It was somewhat thrilling to wander about and get in the nooks and crannies of such an expansive, old, and historic place.

So you can appreciate just how gorgeous all the towns are in Bavaria, here's a shot of Burghausen from the castle:

Remember I said his parents treated us to amazing home cooking?  Well, that is no joke.  Christian's mom is a fantastic chef who enjoys preparing lots of food for her guests.  As is tradition in Germany, we usually ate a giant lunch in the mid-afternoon and a very small dinner later at night.  Our first afternoon with his parents is pictured on the left: we ate delicious mashed potatoes flavored with a local onion/garlic grass, garden fresh green beans, and a pork roast.  His parents are also wine connoisseurs, so we drank very high quality wine for the first time in our lives.  And of course, since there were engagements to celebrate (spoiler alert: Martina and Christian are getting married next year!) there was lots of champagne.  The next afternoon we ate white sausage with sweet mustard, and everyone but myself had huge Bavarian pretzels and beer.  This is  a very traditional meal in Bavaria.  To eat it, you skin the sausage and dip the meat into the sweet mustard.  Typically one eats it with the bread and beer, but I was given some delicious rice and potatoes instead.  It was a lovely trip to visit some great people.