Darren: So far on our trip we’d stayed in hotels, apartments, cottages, a room at a seminary, guest room of a place with hide-a-bed, and others I’m sure I’m forgetting. We figured it was about time we added a castle to the list. We’d found this place online that advertised staying in an actual castle so we thought we’d give it a whirl. It’s called Schloss Ernegg and it was stuck out in the middle of the Austrian countryside. It was surrounded by woods and overlooked fields and a golf course below. The story of the place is that it’s over 1000 years old. It changed hands from certain noble men to others through the years and many changes and additions were done to the castle. The Auerspergs family came to live in the castle in 1656. It’s been in their family ever since. Another cool side note is that the original castle had four towers and a moat. Wish we could have seen the moat but even without it now, it was a pretty cool experience. After checking into our room we decided to go exploring. We were told by the woman who was overseeing the place that we should feel free to look around but I’m sure when went in at least 3 or 4 places we shouldn’t have been allowed.

We did some exploring outside too and went for a walk through the woods and down a path leading to a nearby town. We met some sheep along the way and found out that Kim speaks fluent “sheepese.” Never ceases to amaze.

The lady running the place that night was really kind and offered to take us into town to a restaurant she recommended. When we got there she walked us in and they sat us at a table out in the back patio. Really nice place and the food was amazing!! We got some of the famous Austrian soup that has pancake strips in it. We also tried the Kaiserschmarrn for dessert (it looked so good that we didn‘t remember to take a picture until it was already gone). We’d been wanting to try some since Hallstatt so we were excited. It’s a pancake broken into pieces, sprinkled with powdered sugar, and served hot with plum sauce. It was delicious!! The waiter and owner were really kind to us and brought out some “sweet wine” for us to go along with our dessert, “on the house.” So hard to tell them that we were sorry but we don’t drink. Felt bad,…but good for us. :)

Kim: The castle was fun. A little bit of a pain to get to without a car but our very own personal taxi driver didn’t seem to mind transporting us from place to place (due to it being a small town, every time we called for a cab, the same guy showed up. It was funny). We had a lot of fun exploring the old place. Old wooden doors opening to steep, spiral staircases. An attic with old furniture and other furnishings (I’m pretty sure this was one room we probably weren’t allowed to tour. Oops. Our bad. Would we do it again? Absolutely) :)

The Kaiserschmarrn was amazing! Who knew that something so simple could taste so good. I'm definitely going to make this when we get home. Yum!