Ascension Weekend Part 3

Welcome to part 3 in which I go to Herrenchiemsee. If you're not sure what's going on here, go back about two posts and catch up. Ready? Let's go.

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I got up early and hopped on a train at 7 am. Some people make fun of me for the way I travel, but frankly I'll sleep when I'm at home and have nothing better to do. I'm here to see stuff! So I get up early and run around all day until I fall over from exhaustion. After I got to Prien, I hopped on the "Chiemseebahn", an adorable little train that takes you from the train station to the boat dock. One short boat ride later I was on the Herreninsel ("Gentlemen's Island").

Herreninsel, from the boat

Ok a little more history. Ludwig II was really big into the absolute royalty of the past. He fell in love with stories of knights and princesses when he was a little boy and never really moved on from that. He was especially inspired by the Sun King, Louis XIV of France, and often called him his "ideal". He basically saw Versailles and like myself wished he could live there. Unlike myself he had the money and power to build himself his own Versailles, which is essentially what he set out to do with Herrenchiemsee (pron: Hair-en-kim-zay). Like Neuschwanstein, he didn't get to finish this one either. He only got the main building built (no wings) and didn't finish decorating that. He had also planned on having the grounds cover most of the island but never got around to it. In building Herrenchiemsee, he wasn't going for an exact replica. He wanted a "perfected" Versailles. "Historicizing" was a popular trend at the time. Basically the idea was to take a historic style and then perfect it. So Herrenchiemsee is supposed to be a monument to world of Louis XIV but at a higher level and with modern conveniences. Historical accuracy wasn't really a concern.

Once again, I got assigned to an English tour, but it wasn't for a little while so I did some meandering. Saw an old church, some farm buildings, an orchard (apparently growing citrus fruits was the thing to do to show how rich you were). Then I started down the walk towards the palace. The original landing point that Ludwig would have used doesn't leave any room for a ticket booth or souvenir shop, so they make the boats dock on the other end of the island. However, it's a pretty island and I passed by some German cows.

German cows

 The path runs sort of perpendicular to the way the palace and gardens are set up, so you're walking along and then all the sudden you turn your head and there it is. Gorgeous. The fountains and front lawn are just lovely and then you walk up to this huge imposing edifice.

Herrenchiemsee with front lawn and fountain

Gardens, fountains, and palaces, oh my!

The Fama fountain

Now I have seen Versailles. I have been through that palace, and all over it's grounds. I am here to tell you, Herrenchiemsee is more elaborate, more ornate, more over the top. Ludwig's King's Bedroom and Hall of Mirrors are better than the originals. When you come in, you're in this large foyer with a double staircase. He wanted it to resemble the room in Versailles with all the different types of marble (which it does), but instead of using marble, he used this stucco stuff that's actually more expensive than the real deal. Only the floors are actually marble. Then you go through the first and second antechambers which have these huge crystal chandeliers. Each one weighs over half a ton. No worries though, they're each being held up by a golden angel. The King's Bedroom is magnificent. The gold leaf alone took 7 years to finish. Everything is gold. It's just dazzling. Strange thing though: Ludwig never used it. He lived in the palace for like a week (remember it's still not finished) and he chose to live instead in a second apartment he had built for himself. I personally would not be able to resist sleeping in that bed. How you could build that room and not sleep in it is beyond me. Maybe he was crazy after all. Anyway, the Hall of Mirrors is unbelievable too. It's longer than the original, has more chandeliers than the original, and is just more sparkly than the original. All of the chandeliers are lit with candles, and it took a crew of servants about half an hour to light them all. Ludwig never bothered having a banquet in here; he only had the candles lit for himself. Unlike the original Ludwig also had the ceilings covered in paintings. The artist suggested painting Ludwig as Helios, but he refused and made him change it to Louis XIV. He was rather finicky about this being a french palace. He wanted very few references to Bavaria and there are no portraits of him in the entire building. His own apartments are nothing to sneeze at either. Gorgeous, but not quite on the scale of the official rooms.

After the tour, I went into a special exhibit on Ludwig II's life and castle building. They showed some stuff about his childhood which was kind of fun. For one Christmas, his grandfather Ludwig I gave him a block set of some famous castle so he could build it and commented in a letter that his grandson "already shows great skill and taste in construction". There's also a miniature bayonet that was made for him so he could start military training when he was seven. They also showed a typical weekly schedule he would have had as a kid. Literally every minute of every day was planned out for him, even when he was on vacation. They had a lot of stuff about the war with Prussia and then Bavaria losing its sovereignty. I have to admit, I lost interest in this part. I've just never been that interested wars and battles. The next room however was great. They had computer animations showing how Neuschwanstein was built and virtual tours of some of the rooms he had planned but been unable to finish. They also had a virtual tour showing another castle that he had planned but never started. It was really cool to see, especially after having just been there.

The back lawn, which was the original entrance

Taste the rainbow! My afternoon snack

This palace is known as the "new palace" because there's also an Augustinian monastery on the island which had served at one point as a royal home (the "old palace"). So I went over there and walked through it. Very boring, sorry to say. Only about three rooms were still as they were when Ludwig would have been there: his bedroom (very plain), his living room (also rather plain), and the dining hall. The dining hall was kind of cool in that the walls were painted with portraits of various Roman emperors. The rest of the building is a museum with some stuff about WWII that I did not understand, and a lot of paintings by a local artist who apparently enjoyed painting naked women.

I still had a few hours before the last boat left the island (to be followed by a two hour wait for my train) so I started walking around. There are paths all over the island taking you to different look out points and the like. My first destination was a really old church that is apparently one of the oldest in Germany. Who knew. It was tiny so I'm pretty sure only about 15 people could have attended at any given time. 20 if they were all very skinny and sat very close together. I then walked down to the other end of the island to a pretty little spot called Otto's Ruhe (Otto's resting spot) where I rested for a few minutes. Then it was time to head back to the dock, passing by Herrenchiemsee one last time.

The extremely old and extremely tiny church

Otto's Ruhe

Herrenchiemsee in the late afternoon sun

The original entrance as seen from the boat as we were leaving

Then it was a boat ride and several train rides home. What a weekend. I wish we had castles in the US. Democracy is great, but if you don't have a king, there's no one to build a castle. The white house just isn't the same. If the government is so intent on wasting money, the least they could do is waste it on something beautiful.