Chateau de Chillon

The visit to this magnificent castle was intended to be one of the highlights of our trip and it did not disappoint.

Devoted readers of this blog who may not have visited our home, aka Tanglewald im Fuchsberg, may not know that this castle is prominently displayed in a painting above our living room mantle. Others may know that this site was visited some years ago by our older son whilst he was engaged in physics research at nearby Cern. What matters most, however, is that we got to tour the castle and make several significant discoveries.

The first discovery was the meaning of Chillon, which visitors to our home frequently ask about. The tour explains that it is probably a reference to the rock island on which the castle is built. Apparently "chillond" or some such thing in French is a reference to rock, though I can not independently confirm this. But the tour said so! So there it is.

The second discovery is that the castle is even more cool from the inside than it looks from the outside. Like the dungeon, which has pillars and the amazing sight of light reflecting off the lake (lac), through the small battlement openings, onto the ceiling:

Other amazing discoveries are best shown in pictures. The view of Montreux:

Outer walls and inner walls and glacis and other castle stuff with Swiss symbols:

Upper courtyard with ornate window of the Lord of the Castle. He used this window to look out over his underlings. Barely visible on the right is his private stairway to the chapel and the keep. I told my Frau that we need something like this at Tanglewald. Frau, aka The Baroness, said No Way.

Happy Frau / Baroness standing in front of Chateau de Chillon:

As soon as we left there was, alas, one final discovery: a parking ticket. The Baroness, er, my Frau noticed that the ticket was a mistake. It said we had parked for more than three hours, but we had not. How un-Swiss. She spent two hours researching how to appeal a Swiss parking ticket on the internet and discovered--for all practical purposes--you can't! Vive la Suiss! So we'll add it to the cost of doing business or travel or vacances or somesing. C'est la guerre! C'est la vie! C'est stupide.