Luxembourg

You know, for such a small country, Luxembourg sure has a lot of castles.

Yesterday morning, we bid adieu to my parents and sister and got back in the car for the drive to Luxembourg. We had to cross almost the entire country so I definitely took advantage of the long drive to get a bit more sleep. Now, I say “long drive” and “across the country” like those are very big deals. They aren’t. Yes, a long drive for Belgium but nothing compared to some of the days of driving we had in Norway or Iceland. Partly, that’s because Belgium is small but also because we got to drive on proper highways that weren’t full of hairpin turns. Even with it being our longest drive of the trip, we were still in Luxembourg City in only a couple of hours.

And then we tried to park. Which was a disaster. After close to an hour of trying to get parked, EDP finally told me to just get out the car and go start seeing things and that he’d catch up (remind me again why we rent cars in Europe instead of just taking trains like civilised people do?) We weren’t heading into anything today, just checking out stuff outside so he wasn’t going to miss anything, he’d just see it all much faster than I did. So off I went to see Bock Casemates, the cliff that the fort that would eventually turn into Luxembourg City was built on. Over time, galleries and passageways were built into the cliffs and many of them still remain accessible. So I checked out the areas at street level before meandering over to Chemin de la Corniche, which claims to be Europe’s most beautiful balcony, winding along the old city’s ramparts, where EDP and I were going to try to join forces again. I took my time wandering along, expecting EDP to catch up to me and that we’d then wander back together. But I reached a construction blockade and so turned around to head back the way I came, expecting to run into EDP along the way. That didn’t happen either. Poor EDP got to the promenade but at the blocked end. So it took a little longer than expected to connect back up. By then, I was cold so we headed up into the old city to grab some hot chocolate and head back to the casemates.

There are a lot of tunnels and paths that make up the casemates (I think something like 17km?) so we knew we’d only see a little bit but we couldn’t figure out how to get down onto some of the pathways down in the valley by the river. Eventually, we decided you must have to approach from another side and headed into the Archeological Crypt to see some of the tunnels. That was really neat as they had been carved into the cliffs instead of being built up. It made for very uneven floors, low ceilings, and confusing passageways. It was interesting to wander through but I think I prefer my passageways a bit more logical. We ended our day with a quick dinner and short drive to the hotel.

This morning, we started our castle day. Today’s agenda called for three castles, just a tiny sampling of what’s here. After a quick walk over to the local bakery, we headed north, taking some back roads to avoid construction or morning rush hour or something like that. The back roads took us through some beautiful wooded areas where we admired the trails and streams, fully understanding why Luxembourg is a popular hiking destination.

Our first castle of the day was Beaufort Castle. Oh, right, this is why we rent cars in Europe - because we probably wouldn’t have been able to get to it, otherwise… Beaufort is made up of the ruins of a medieval castle and a Renaissance château. The château wasn’t open, it has very limited hours so we spent our time wandering through the ruins of the old castle, learning how it was expanded over time. There was some restoration work being done, so several areas weren’t accessible but what we could see was lovely. We also got to try some of the locally made liquors - they were VERY strong and not really either of our styles.

Then, it was on to Vianden, a huge castle that has been beautifully restored from complete ruins. Construction made it tricky to get down to the parking and has made most of the town around the castle inaccessible (seriously - all of the restaurants have just closed up!) We headed up the drive, collected an audio guide and set out to see the castle. They’ve done an incredible job with the restoration. One room of the castle is full of photographs and drawings, showing how things looked and the plans for the restoration. The castle was built up over time starting in Roman times and the area has gone through some boom and bust times, leading the castle to fall into disrepair but in the 70s, it was carefully restored and now is a beautiful site to visit.

Our final castle for the day was Bourscheid. This castle was incredibly unique as the town associated with it sits higher than the castle does. Normally, the castle is at the highest point but not so much in this case. It is still at the top of a big hill but the town sits on a higher one. This castle is almost entirely in ruins, much like Beaufort. Like the other castles, this one was built up over time. It’s been very interesting to see the progression of the builds, see how styles changed as time went by.

Then, it was back to the hotel for dinner and our last “real” night of the trip. Tomorrow, we head back to Brussels & the airport, stopping at two grottos and a castle on the way.