Whilst the kids were in England, Jane and I took the opportunity to see a bit of Germany. So booked a few hotels, packed the car and headed off to our first stop Colditz, around a 6 hour drive from Düsseldorf. It took most of the day to get there, with stops for lunch etc, and a massive detour when only 5km away as the main route there was closed. But got there in the end.
Colditz is now part youth hostel, part music school and part museum. On entering the ‘castle’ there’s a sign showing how many people attempted to escape, did escape etc. Seems the percentage chance of the Brits escaping wasn’t too good. Thought we were good at things like that.
Couldn’t quite figure out if we were supposed to pay for a ticket to wander around the place. There was a ticket office and shop right at the back, not at the entrance, so we thought tickets must be for something else otherwise the ticket booth would be at the start. Who knows! So we just wandered around the place.
It was quite a hot day, but noticed it very cold inside the buildings. Can’t have been too pleasant in the winter in the small, concrete ‘cells’.
In all there wasn’t too much to see. There was a lot of literature to read as you walked around, but it was all in German. My German isn’t up to translating that; yet. I think there was an English speaking guide you could take, maybe that’s what the tickets were for. Consequently we didn’t stay long.
You can see all the photos below, just click one to see the slideshow.