The Eagle's Nest

The guide books call it the Eagle's nest, and the local name is Kehlsteinhaus but I call it abso-blooming-lutly beautiful. I am typing this while sitting on a bench perched precariously at the edge of a one thousand plus meter drop, overlooking the Konigsee and I have just rediscovered my innate sense of vertigo.

Actually, I lie slightly, because that feeling had already revealed itself on the bus journey up the mountain. Imagine, a bus chugging up a single lane road with only a foot of grass separating the tyres and a sheer drop. Keep focussing on the distant view, ignore what you see directly below you- ohmyfrickingodthatdoesn'tlooksafe.

But is it worth the view from the top? Absobloominlutely yes.

Getting there, though, is another matter. The closest town to the Eagle's nest is Brechtesgaden.

If you come by train from Munich, you'll have to change once. Before you change, just want to say, the scenery on the right-hand side is better. I had to scramble across and curse silently when beautiful alpine ranges were replaced by blurry trees.

From the train station, go out, and turn right to the main bus stop. You can drop by the office before hand and chat about what options there are to get to the Eagle's Nest, but they all boil down to the same thing: Take the 838 or the 849 to a place called Dokumentation (ours was labelled 838/849 - two in one if you like).

The bus will climb up a steep hill (nice views on the left hand side). If you get giddy easily, close your eyes and miss the scenery.

You will eventually reach Dokumentation. It's called that because there is a Nazi Documentation Centre there (which is also a museum), which is pretty good, by the way. If you're interested in that, EUR3 to enter, and if you sprechen kein Deutsch, get the audioguide because everything is in German.

But we're not here for that! We're here for the views. If the bus driver was kind (like ours), you are pointed towards the ticket office.

Now, you don't have to take the bus if you don't want to. It's a two-hour hike to the top (it seems). And lots of people do that. They're the ones with the climbing sticks and the red faces.

If you take the bus (wimp!), it's another fifteen minutes or so up some of the steepest, winding, narrow but ohmybloominggod beautiful roads. Don't be put off by the fact that it starts off with a lot of pine trees and not much else. Trust me, it gets better.

There is a helpful commentary on the bus on the way up. In four languages. I think. I lost count after German, English and French. It explains that it was a fiftieth birthday present from the Nazi party to Adolph Hitler (What _do_ you get a militirastic dictator who already has his eyes set on Europe?).

Because you have to have the return time printed on your bus ticket, the announcement will also suggest that you spend two hours at the Eagle's Nest. Now, all there is up there is a beautiful view, a restaurant and souvenir shops, so this to me is a rather crude attempt to make sure that a captive audience has time to get hungry and bored. Cynical me.

Anyway, I think an hour should be enough. The braver of you can spend the time teetering on rock edges, taking in the view, or just sitting on benches, a little bit off the edge, which is the way some of us like living our life.

Labels: germany, world cup