You don't build something that size for peanuts even in an age where the peasants were lucky to get sixpence a day. I quite liked the building but Baroque and Rococo are not styles that appeal to me so I found much of the interior decoration and furnishings somewhat OTT, all that heavily carved gilded wood and plush.
The place was badly knocked about towards the end of the war so there was a degree of reconstruction in the interior but I couldn't understand enough of what the guide said to know whether I was looking at an echt Tiepolo ceiling fresco or one done by a local house painter.
The town has a stone bridge over the river reminiscent of the Charles bridge in Prague with its array of statues.
On the hill behind the statue you can see the fortress that we also visited. It's beginnings are very ancient. The spot is clearly one you would pick for defence in the bad old days of marauding tribes. It has a well that goes a hundred metres down through solid rock to the river. Those peasants had to work their fingers to the bone for their sixpence a day.
Nowadays their descendants are busy fleecing tourists, servicing the university's 20,000 students or making wine. Amongst the university's clutch of Nobel laureates are Roentgen of the X-rays and Heisenberg of the uncertainty principle.
I felt obliged to try the wine and it eased my consumption of what my dictionary called meatloaf but I thought more like spam. I can't say I've been smitten by the food on offer but I did eat well in Nuremberg so it is around. The wine was tasty and I've bought a couple of bottles to accompany my upcoming Burns Supper.
Back in Schwabich Hall the snow fell heavily yesterday and the younger element tossed snowballs about beneath my window. When the fight was over I went for a stroll and after a coffee and a sachertorte came across this chum of Martin Luther.
He doesn't look the sort of chap who'd be terribly amused to find a snowball in his holy cup.
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