Some of you may have noticed that I have been mentioning King Ludwig II a lot lately in my blog. It's not because I have a crazy obsession with him but mostly because you can hardly sightsee in Bavaria without ending up in a location that King Ludwig II either built a castle, a palace or a summer retreat. The man was obsessed with his creature comforts and spent a lot of the citizen's money, and most of his own, on improving his lot in life (instead of theirs). When the attempts by his ministers to restrain his spending failed, they used his extravagances against him and had him declared legally insane by a doctor who had never even met him. He was transported to Berg Castle on the shores of Lake Starnberg on June 12, 1886. On June 13, the same Doctor that had declared him insane reportedly told the ministers that he was confident he could treat and cure Ludwig. Strangely, that evening both Dr. Gudden and Ludwig were found drowned in the shallow waters of Starnberg Lake after taking a walk together after dinner. Alone. With no bodyguards. And he was a King...
No one has ever solved the mystery of how both of them could drown in less than a foot of water or how their heads and shoulders were both above the water when they were found or even why Dr. Gudden had strangulation marks around his neck. And it seems they never will because even though they have exhumed his body and studied it carefully and there is evidence of a gunshot to the head in Ludwig's case, there is just no money in solving the mystery, and no one will declare a new cause of death.
Ironically, the frivolous spending of money and building of opulent castles is probably what let to Ludwig's demise, and yet those same buildings are some of the most profitable tourist destinations in Bavaria to this day.
But on this day trip didn't set out to see any of the castles - but rather the spot where Ludwig died and the chapel that was built in his honor. We left just after dropping the kids off at school and headed about 30 minutes south-west of Munich to Lake Starnberg. The lake is the largest in Bavaria and home to many of Germany's most famous (Heidi Klum has a house here). We parked and then hiked from one side of the lake to the other passing many a scene like this...
And houses like this.
We made it to the chapel about an hour later. It was quite the hike and all the way around the other side of the lake, but it was pretty, and the company was good, so the time went quickly.
Stopped for a quick selfie...
The inside of the chapel. It was difficult to take photos because there is a screen in front of the entire thing but I did my best. It really was pretty inside.
And out...
The cross marks the spot where Ludwig and the Dr. were found. Even in this photo, you can see how shallow the water truly is.
We were a bit hungry from our trek, and it was nearing lunchtime, so we backtracked to a little restaurant we had passed on the way in and had a genuinely Bavarian lunch of Flammekuchen, Obazda and steak salads with a side of bier or weinshorle before heading back to Munich to pick up the kids from school. I love adventure days like this.
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