Today, Dad drove us up to an old
and beautiful fortress: the castle Hohenwerfen. This fortress is strategically placed by a
river, guarding the passage that runs through two long stretches of mountains. It’s
the first castle I’ve ever been to.
We arrived around 11:00am, right
as a demonstration was starting. We all sat down in a grassy area inside the
castle, and a woman in green entered the clearing with a falcon on her arm. We
leaned in, amazed to be so close to the bird.
After showing him off, the woman
threw the bird into the air. It flew away, unrestrained, over the castle wall
and into the mountains. She swung a feathered bundle around her head, slowly
and easily, and the falcon eventually circled around and dove for it. Right
before the bird’s talons closed around the target, the woman tugged it away,
and the bird pulled up, just inches above our heads.
We watched the scene play out
several more times. The demonstration ended when the woman threw the bundle up
gently, purposefully letting the bird catch it. She brought him back onto her
arm and took him away.
A smaller falcon was brought out
next: a female, who was much faster. After the smaller falcon, we saw two other
falcons, a pair of golden eagles, a bald eagle, and a vulture. Before you
recoil, it wasn’t a vulture from Tennessee with black feathers and a bare head.
This vulture was something a nobleman might keep. It had a soft white head, a
slender neck, and a thick grey collar of feathers. The vulture didn’t spend as
much time in the air as the falcons and eagles. It bounced around the grass and
pushed through the crowd, chasing treats the falconers threw.
This one's the vulture.
When the show had finished, we
saw the inside of the castle. Castle staff provided black audio devices which
explained, in English, the castle’s features and history. We held our audio
devices against our ears and followed a German-speaking tour guide through the
castle’s many rooms.
The first room, a small room, was
a chapel. The walls were lined with graphic sculptures and with paintings of
church leaders and saints. Here, we had our first introduction to the castle’s
purpose: defending Catholic noblemen from an onslaught of protestant
rebellions.
As we walked through the
different rooms and listened to the recorded narration of the castle’s uses, I
stopped thinking “awesome, I’m in a castle.” It was much more sobering than I
had expected. I was walking through an old protestant prison, looking down
holes created for arrows or boiling pitch, and lingering in the torture chamber
to finish listening to each contraption’s use.
Rob in the stocks
The best part about the castle
tour was the view we had from the windows. My family members kept bringing each
other over to the windows we each considered most advantageous and forcing the
other person to look out of them.
T. Rex, my littlest brother, pretended to fire every cannon he encountered.
I also took a picture of myself
with this large bludgeoning object before we left. It is definitely one of my
favorite selfies of the trip so far.
My selfie with Aunt Katherine, though, tops even that bludgeon.
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