Journey to Switzerland Day 10

Kyburg Castle and Museum


Some of the knight's armor Katie sent crashing down

Day 10 : August 8th

Today we trekked out to Kyburg, about 30 minutes away by train in order to visit the famous museum and castle. The Kyburg Castle is the largest castle in Eastern Switzerland, and we're all glad we decided to make this trip. We ate cereal at the house, hopped on the train around 10 o'clock, and were there by the opening time of 10:30. The admission was a little steep at $8.00 per person, but it was totally worth it.

The first aspect we noticed was how humongous this place was. It wasn't as large as the Biltmore Estate in North Carolina, but it was still magnificent. It reminded us of the fairy tale castles deep within the forbidden forests as told to us in our childhood stories. Instead of taking the guided tours, which are more expensive, Katie Stanton suggested that we guide ourselves through the castle. Even though we didn't have a professional feeding us the information, we still learned a lot about the castle's history through its international award-winning museum. The Kyburg Castle was first mentioned in 1027, but the date of its original construction is unknown. Many events that took place in the castle date back to the Middle Ages and time of the feudal system. In order to get a feel of what it was like back then, many locations in the castle had exhibits. For instance, the kitchen was open, so we could smell the aroma of different spices. Also available to look at were the courtyard, chapel, and even a torture chamber! This experience really made us feel like we had taken a trip back in time. Our favorite part of the tour was the "Do Touch" exhibit. This part of the castle was where we could physically put on medieval outfits like a lady's dress or a knight's suit of armor, fill a bucket from a well, or try to sleep on a mattress filled with leaves. We each tried on different clothes, and Kaitlyn even tried on knight's armor!

Speaking of knights, we had another funny situation that happened involving Katie Burnet. While we were strolling around, enjoying the amazing scenery, we walked by a line of knight's armor. Of course, Katie just had to touch one. At her touch, the armor teetered. It finally just came crashing down, sending at least seven other knight's armor down with a loud clash. She was so embarrassed, Lindsay had to call a tour guide to help with the clean-up. Never in our lives have we seen Katie's face as beet red as it was today.

After this, we ate a late dinner at Restaurant zur Linde. It was just like eating a home-cooked meal, and all of the locals had happy dispositions. The decor was cute and cottage-like. Katie Burnet had vegetable soup. Katie Stanton had Meatloaf "Grossmutter kind." Lindsay had Spatzli, which is a flour based dumpling. Kaitlyn ate a plate of vegetables. For dessert, we all split a dish called Creme Caramel, and all of us agreed it was enticing to the taste buds. Our final bill came to $36.00. After this, we caught the train back to the house around eight at night.