When we first looked into going to Luxembourg, one of the main attractions was hyped as visiting the Valley of the Seven Castles, or more aptly named Chalets. We reserved a car through our hotel, and planned to spend a day driving around the countryside outside of the city of Luxembourg.
That morning before heading out, we went to visit the market in Place de Guillaume II. It is held every Saturday, and is a traditional German flower and food market. It is definitely not a tourist only event as we saw a lot of locals there buying vegetables and food.
It was a beautiful morning and the market was hopping. All kinds of beautiful cheeses and fruit (we bought 2 apples for the road), and sausages.
The flowers were beautiful too.
We hit the road, and headed out to the countryside. It felt a little strange to be driving back on the right side of the road after having driven on the left side for the past year.
One can drive the entire length of the country of Luxembourg in a couple hours so it wasn't long before we were at the valley of the seven castles, which is confusedly marked with a series of signs, and seems to actually be spread over a couple valleys.
Some of the castles are unoccupied and undergoing restoration, while others appeared to be private residences and not open to the public.
Some are only ruins of what they had once been.
One really nice, almost Italian looking villa, had become some sort of retreat center. It had some very nice grounds.
We took a break from the road and wandered around the gardens and enjoyed the very warm day that the day had turned into.
From the Valley of the Seven Castles, we drove up to Vianden Castle, which the TI office had highly recommended. It was by far the nicest castle we visited, and the town in which it is situated is very cute.
If we were to do the day again, we might skip the Valley of the Seven Castles, and just drive up to Vianden to enjoy the village for the day.
We rode the ski-like lift up to the summit above the castle, and walked down to it. We bought a return ticket, but elected not to do it, as it was a tricky walk down the hill, and ultimately, the walk from the castle back down to the town was a pleasant and picturesque way to return. I do recommend riding the ski-lift up as it affords some beautiful views of the castle and valley below.
The castle had been in a bad state of disrepair, but the town has restored it, and now it is a museum and cultural center. In many ways, it once again has become the heart of this community.
It was very pleasant walking around the castle, except for a couple annoying kids that were driving Tony crazy.
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