11 Friday Oct 2024
Posted in Austria, castles in Austria
On the evening of my arrival I was late to be admitted further into the castle but what I saw that evening was enough for me to want to come back the following day. Who wouldn’t? Although I wasn’t sure I could see anything better, here are a few of the photos I took the following day.
Hope your interest has not been raised.
By P.S.
22 Sunday Sep 2024
Posted in Austria, castles in Austria, Nieder-Österreich, River Thaya
This beautiful place was a great surprise on my way – I never imagined I would find such a great point to stop.
The town didn’t feel very interesting first but it was nice and it also has a couple of pretty churches to visit. But the castle, standing on a rock outcrop by the river and going back to the 11th century, was a unique experience.
At this point a solitary woman informed me that the castle was not open in spite of the flyer on the gate declaring otherwise, which I pointed out to her. And which also meant that I shouldn’t have entered but, with my curiosity, I did – without an entrance fee at that.
The castle proved to be near empty, save for a group of policemen, which I could have guessed from the presence of the two or three police cars parked outside. They seemed to be taken on a round tour – of what kind, for what reason, I neglected to find out: I just kept walking around, up, down, around again, to avoid them. What I found was a place without a semblance to a museum but with lots of signs of having been inhabited shortly before: by children. Lists of names could be found on most doors of what seemed to be dormitories. Good luck to me!
Other than this adventure, I found the whole complex quite interesting with a pleasant atmosphere outside as well.
The view was also great, with the river and the Thaya.
A bit further on the rocky outcrop, I found an old church that seemed to be worth looking. It turned out to be the Pfarrkirche “Zu Maria Himmelfahrt auf dem Berge”, meaning the Parish church ‘To Mary’s Assumption on the Mountain’.
It goes back to possibly the 11th century (the level of the German courses from three different languages I’ve finished on Duolingo didn’t give me enough German to understand this decisively) with some gothic elements and late-romantic elements and an altar picture donated by Queen Marie Therese.
Interestingly, it has the oldest clock in Austria with a numeral face dating back to 1343.
On the way back I stopped shortly at the triangular Hauptplatz – it would be misleading to call it the Main Square but, functionally, that’s what it is -, a nice place
but, looking back, the castle is the absolutely best reason to visit this little town.
By P.S.
20 Friday Sep 2024
Posted in Austria, Nieder-Österreich, River Thaya
Tags
castle ruins, castle ruins in Austria, castles, castles in Austria, Lower Austria, Niederösterreich, ruins, Thaya, Thaya river
As I promised a few days ago, I’ll be posting photos of nature and historic places on this site from now on. The first area I went to was the Thaya valley on the Austrian side, in Lower Austria (i.e. Niederösterreich in German), to which an earlier university co-student and friend of mine, Prof. Dr. Dénes Lóczy from Hungary, drew my attention. When we studied Geography together, we never ever heard of the river or the area but now I can assure everyone that it’s worth visiting for a wide range of reasons. See below some of what I’ve seen in the area on my first journey – I’m sure I won’t stop short at this stage, health permitting.
You could see the river in my previous post, now I’m starting out with a view of the sight of the castle of Kollmitz and will lead you inside.
A little view of the rocks of the surroundings as we look back from the bridge:
The Thaya in August, and below the dam, looked little more than a stream – I’m feeling deeply for the locals during the difficult times of the heavy rains in the middle of September, when I’m writing this post.
Now, on into the ruins.
Here we can have a good look-around towards the South-South-West:
Climbing the towers, though one feels really high, is worth the effort:
That was it. Great pleasure, so much so that I felt I had to let the guards know how much I appreciated my visit – so I told them in my brand-new German. Learning with Duolingo for hundreds of hours wasn’t a complete waste after all…
But not enough for me – I’d seen that the ruins can be seen from across the river after it has taken a sharp left turn. So I set out to find such a place. Again, I had to ask local help in German – no English, please.
Well, I couldn’t really get to a point where the ruins were visible together with the river but perhaps you can try it with a drone next time. Until then, hope you’ve enjoyed these photos. Other places are coming later.
By P.S.
Learning and teaching languages in the Netherlands - and taking photos in the process 