Little Country, Big Name

Mom and I woke up bright and early on Saturday morning to catch the train to Luxembourg!  We picked Luxembourg because it is one of the few countries that Mom has never visited, and why not?  It is only a 2 hour train ride from Paris, so it was the perfect day trip.

On the train and ready to go!

When we arrived in Luxembourg City, we decided to hop a national trains and head out to Vianden ( neighboring village) to visit a castle.  I read somewhere that Luxembourg has over 30 castles or something, which is a lot for a country that is less than 1,000 square miles.

Luxembourg Central Train Station

 We went from our sleek, modern TGV...

To something that resembled a Soviet era train...

Fortunately, the old train got us to Ettelbruck without any problems.  Unfortunately, the public bus we had to take from Ettelbruck to Vianden did cause a few problems.  Public bus stops are sometimes poorly labeled, and we really didn't know where we needed to get off in order to get to the castle.  Thirty minutes into our drive, I decided to follow one of the only other passengers when he got off because it corresponded with the amount of time that we were supposed to be on the bus.  Long story short, I got off while Mom run up to ask the driver where we were.  Before I knew it, the doors were closing and the bus drove away with Mom still on it!  Thanks to technology, we were able to message each other and meet up a little further on down on the road.  Crisis averted! 

The next problem?  We couldn't necessarily see the castle from the village through the ridiculously dense fog that blanketed all of Luxembourg that day.  

Can you pick it out?  It's the dark mass hovering over the trees

We hiked up the quaint (and very steep) streets to the top of the plateau...

And as we got closer, we could finally see the castle through the fog!

At the top!

We toured around, and then made our way back down.  The fog had cleared a bit, so we were actually able to see it from below.

It was gorgeous!  Straight out of a fairy tale

It was time to head back to the capital, and we spent the rest of the afternoon strolling around Luxembourg City.  I'll let the pictures do most of the talking.

This view is known as "the prettiest balcony in Europe!"

Mom was being artistic

Overall, Luxembourg was a very interesting place to visit because it is a mix of so many cultures.  They speak a crazy dialect that sounds like a mixture of both German and French.  Hmm, a combo of two of the most difficult languages?  No thanks, I definitely won't be trying to learn that any time soon.  I wish the weather would have cooperated a little bit better because that weird foggy haze seemed to follow us all day.  Also, there was a lot of foliage, so I can only imagine how gorgeous this city is when everything is in bloom!

Another HUGE plus were the sidewalks were very clean.  Anyone who has been to Paris knows that one eye is always kept on the ground watching out for doggie landmines.  Luxembourg has taken care of that issue with decals like this posted throughout the city.

Paris could benefit from such reminders.

- a tout à l’heure!