The Germans are great walkers, and they’re so into hiking gear that they often make me look like Ford Prefect from The Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, travelling the universe in slippers and a bathrobe.
They seem to have absolutely the latest in waterproof coats and pants, and boots so substantial you could probably use them to conquer Everest.
Given the Germans’ penchant for walking, one of their favourite activities in the Bavarian Alps seems to be mountain trekking. But before you imagine people with massive packs, and crampons and ice picks, slogging up mountainsides, remember this: the slopes are absolutely festooned with cable cars, since in winter the whole place is one massive ski resort.
So what everyone does in the summer (man, woman, child and dog) is take a lift to the top of a berg (mountain), and then walking poles in hand, stroll leisurely back down the hill.
However, there is at least one cable lift (actually a much larger and safer gondola), that takes people to the top of a mountain, but doesn’t really expect anyone to walk back down.
The mountain, the gondola, and a cog train that runs up inside the mountain (!) are all called the Zugspitze (Zug = train and spitze = peak). It’s a tourist attraction (and a major ski slope) that the Germans created in the 1920s. And given that it goes to the top of a 3000m peak that is the country’s highest, it’s quite a feat of engineering.
We made the Zugspitze trip in mid-August, taking all the means of transportation available, and it was an amazing ride. At the bottom, it was fairly nice and mostly sunny. At the top it was below freezing, and so socked in with fog that we could only get the odd glimpse of the surrounding mountain-scape.
It didn’t really matter, though. The infrastructure that surrounded us (including weather stations, telecommunication aerials, three restaurants, two bars, and the most tobacco smoke-filled observation enclosure I’ve experienced this side of Viet Nam) was so impressive that I spent most of my time at the top wondering how they managed to build everything and secure it in place.
The other thing that kept our attention while we waited for clearing breaks in the cloud was the track to the actual top of the peak.
We had wondered previously why people were getting on the train at the bottom of the mountain wearing climbing harnesses, carabiners and hard hats.
When we took the elevator (!) up to the third level of the summit building, it immediately became obvious what was going on.
There, out on a rock pinnacle, about 20m away from our safe position on the other side of the guard rail, was a whole line of “mountaineers”.
Starting on the same observation platform we were on, they had walked down onto on a steel platform just below us, clipped one of their carabiners onto a thoughtfully-provided and very secure wire strung along a set of posts, and then climbed upwards toward the top.
When they reached a post, they attached their second carabiner on the wire on the up-hill side, released their first on the down-hill one, and then carried on.
Really, it was like looking at people standing in line at the cinema, except that everyone was dressed as if they were ready to challenge the Hillary Step.
And of course when they reached the top, they had their mates standing safely on our viewing platform to take their picture – the “I conquered the Zugspitze” pose (“although I had just a wee bit of help from the Zug!”).
The youngest person we saw take on the might of the Alps that afternoon was no more than about 10 years old.
ooOOoo
We were able to enjoy a walk up a very much lower track ourselves the next day when we took the rock-strewn back route to Neuschwanstein, a famous schloss in the Bavarian mountains.
In fact, famous isn’t quite the right word, since Neuschwanstein is one of those things that sits in everyone’s subconscious, no matter where in the world they happen to live. The reason is simple – it matches better than any other building the image we all have of a fairy-tale castle.
You may never actually have seen Neuschwanstein, but when you first set eyes on it, it’s as familiar to you as if you’ve been looking at it every day for years.
Neuschwanstein is the work of Ludwig II of Bavaria. Subjected to a House of Windsor-like up-bringing of strict discipline and lack of parental affection (in later years he referred to his mother as “my predecessor’s consort”!), he found solace in Norse legends and mythology at about the same time that they became wildly popular amongst Germans as a result of the operas composed by Richard Wagner.
When Ludwig finally became king (and by this stage “king” in Bavaria meant a constitutional monarchy, like they have today in Britain), he used his position, and a very large fortune, to indulge his fantasies.
He built several castles in various parts of Bavaria, but Neuschwanstein is certainly his most famous, and it attracts 1.2 million visitors every year. They all come via tour buses along a road that ends at the front of the castle, not up the very steep gorge we happened upon.
While Neuschwanstein is a major tourist attraction, the castle itself, when you see it up close, is (oh, dear!) pretty mediocre. To begin with, it really doesn’t have much of a history, having been built in the 1870-80s.
It is, in fact, a pastiche, probably the first of the famous fairy tale castle replicas that carry on through to Disneyland and beyond.
It looks absolutely fantastic from afar, but when you make a close examination of the stonework you realise that it’s very basic, with almost no carving, and of at least six different textures and colours.
It also, for some reason, has several walls made from ordinary brick, the kind you see everywhere in Victorian era row-houses and factories.
The outside walls of the castle may look like a stone sample showroom, but that doesn’t stop the tour buses, because being only about 100km from Munich it’s definitely on the Europe Grand Tour route.
It has become a major source of revenue for Bavaria, and as they say in the tourist guides, King Ludwig is revered in the land he once reigned.
That wasn’t always so, however, and the story of Ludwig (or Mad Ludwig as he was known) is a strange one, with perhaps a few echoes in the present day.
King Ludwig wasn’t all that fond of carrying out his regal duties. He far more enjoyed building palaces (including grand plans for a palace bigger than Versailles), acting as a patron of the arts (especially Herr Wagner), and decorating his various lodgings in the most glorious and eccentric of styles.
He also didn’t think too much (or actually at all) about money. So while he was popular with the average Bavarian, the politicians and government bureaucrats were a lot less pleased.
When they told Ludwig he was running short of cash (he had run up a debt of 14 million Deutsche Marks), he ordered them to solicit loans from all the crowned heads of Europe.
After all, he reasoned, he was related to almost all of them, since inter-marriage had been a significant tool of diplomacy in regal Europe for hundreds of years.
Sadly, this didn’t sit well with the government, and secret plans were made to have Ludwig removed. A famous psychiatrist was engaged, and without even having met Ludwig declared him to be insane.
Armed with the good doctor’s declaration, government officials arrived the next day. After a brief battle with loyal supporters (including a Baroness who attacked soldiers with an umbrella), Ludwig was taken into custody and transported back to Munich.
Three days later he supposedly went on a late afternoon walk with the psychiatrist, but didn’t return. After a long search both men were found dead, floating in a nearby lake.
The story doesn’t finish there, however. While the cause of death was officially recorded as drowning, Ludwig was a famously good swimmer, and he was found in about half a metre of water. And for some reason the coroner’s report stated that there was no water in his lungs.
As for the psychiatrist, his body had what looked like finger marks around its neck, and other signs that suggested he had been in a struggle before his death.
Years later, when the king’s fishing master at the lake passed away, papers he had hidden were read out. The royal gillie wrote that he had been sworn to silence by government operatives, with his family provided for, so that he would not reveal what he had seen that night, namely that Ludwig had actually been shot in a failed attempt by supporters to free him from captivity.
Whatever the real cause of “Mad” Ludwig’s death, it was a fittingly romantic end for a man who once declared, “I wish to remain an eternal enigma to myself and everyone else.”
The whole story brought to mind for me, at least, the fleeting life and sad death of another famous romantic, from our own time; someone linked in a strange way to the creator of Neuschwanstein.
I’m talking, of course, about the immensely talented (and immensely tragic) figure of Michael Jackson. Jackson also finally lived in a dream world, and used all of his money to create an architectural fantasy called Neverland, based on the mythology of a Disney childhood.
In so doing he squared the circle of a modern tradition of monumental make-believe that started with Ludwig’s own castle of dreams.
Gazing that day at the bussed hoards at Neuschwanstein, I couldn’t help but wonder – lots of people also think Jackson was crazy; but some day his failed attempt at a fairy tale might just attract millions of tourists as well.
~originally composed in August, 2011~
