Burg Hohnstein and the Bastei


Rob felt so badly about the car rental that he determined to fix it with hard work and a little bit of crazy. He left our castle above at 5:30am and caught the bus. Next the train back to Dresden. He was waiting at the rental agency when they opened at 8:00am and got the minivan and drove back out to our hostel. He showed up just as I had the whole family sitting down to breakfast at 9:00am! We were good to go!
This was our building in the castle -- it's the new part built around 1550 and these windows are Rob's favorite.
Clambering up and down the worn-down rocks was Joss' favorite.
We had a real, bonafide dungeon in our castle! I did actually walk down inside it, but it was a little too authentic for my tastes, dark and stony with chains on the walls.
We climbed to the top of the tower to look out at the town. It's a beautiful place, but you'd better enjoy terraces if you live here!
Ahem. He deserved a ball and chain on Friday night. And much of Saturday too, now that I think about it.
The whole clan looking back at the older part of the castle.
Maddie tried out the stocks and then we got into our much-anticipated car and drove off.
We came here to the national park. These rocks are all sandstone just like the buildings in Dresden.
And they were all carved by the river. Here is the Elbe, which doesn't look like it could carve much of anything.
Here is the Bastei. I thought that it was just a name for this rock formation, the way that we name rocks in southern Utah parks, but there was actually a bastion here.
The trees keep you from seeing what sheer cliffs these are. There was no soft landing for anything that fell!
There we are in the little balcony. I'm sure you can recognize us!
Sebastian inf ront of the view of the Elbe and two big towns south of us, Bad Schandau and Konigstein.
And here are the McFarlands on another outcropping on the way to the bastion.
Don't believe the smile! I was feeling like Will's face here. There were plenty of big holes here and spaces where Joss could slip through and fall down if he had half a mind. Then that made my hands sweat and I was getting all clammy trying to hold onto him! Why oh why didn't I bring his leash along?!
Maddie and Will were cool with it, though.
We still had to stop and change someone's pants. I couldn't blame him!
Hanging out over the abyss. I had never seen anything like it.

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