Castles and Chocolate

Yesterday was a long an exciting day! We left around 9 in the morning by train to head to the castle. It was around a two hour hike from the train station. Not my favorite thing! I hate hiking, and I am especially paranoid of ticks, but fortunately the majority of the hike was on paved roads (he he, my kind of hiking), although there were a few steep inclines through some pretty wooded areas. I did a thourough tick check though, and no ticks were found. So I’m feeling less paranoid!

This is one of the views we had. It was a gorgeous day and didn’t rain at all, like was predicted.

This isthe first view of the castle! It was really high up, and unfortanately neither my camera or iPhone could really capture the depth & height.

For instance, this picture doesn’t really make it look steep, but it was really steep. And high!

We took a glass lift from the bottom to the top of the castle.

Like I said, it was really steep!

Inside the castle, looking out. Obviously the glass part is modern.

This little kid was really cute!

Painted ceiling inside the castle.

Amazing wood door.

Fancy room.

Fancy ballroom room.

This is for my sister, Laura. Snow owl! We got to watch a bird show, which was actually pretty cool. One flew right over my head and it’s wing hit my head.

I loved how they had a Bald Eagle from America. And I love the expression it has. It just looks so American. And also like the one in the Muppets (forget its name).

“Hmph.”

Then we went to a chocolate factory! I haven’t figured out how to get my pictures from my iPhone onto my Nexus, so…for now the pics are just on facebook from the chocolate factory. Let me just say, there was so much chooclate to sample. Liquid chocolate, hard chocolate, and big samples! And even chocolate milk to sample. And there was chocolate on the stairs when you walked to the next room, and just when you thought that room was the last one, there was MORE CHOCOLATE. And so many flavors. it was crazy!

I wish that we had had more time to spend there. It was really quirky with fun colors, awesome illustrations, and of course, chocolate. We watched a fun (and very quirky!) video about the companies history. I appreciated the company’s emphasis on organic, high-quality, and fair-trade. They even had an organic resteraunt & petting zoo (you could see the animals they get their milk from and like the chickens…that they grass-raise and then uh, kill). We were supposed to eat there for dinner, but didn’t have time, so we didn’t get to pet any goats. 😦 But the company pays for all it’s employees’ meals there, which I thought was pretty cool.

They also had some pretty good 100% chocolate and 96% chocolate. Like I said there was so much chocolate to sample–it’s amazing how there can be several let’s say 60% chocolate from cocoa beans grown in different areas on the world and you can taste the difference. They also had some crazy flavors (fish, for instance, which I didn’t try), and chocolate and champagne (which I did try. It was gross!). Hehe, okay, so enough about the chocolate. It was really cool.

Then we took the train back on Saturday, and I went to bed and slept very soundly.