Inari Shrine - Nano Paper Model

The factors that come into play when planning for a trip can range from the practical (must stop for food/gas at place X) to those that are attached to a story thread.

The only reason we flew into Munich was because it was the closest airport to Neuschwanstein Castle.  The castle is a major tourist attraction for sure, but we would have avoided it had it not been for the models that Will had built in the past.

After Lego started to get dull, we bought Will a number of nanoblock model sets.  Nanoblock is a line of construction toys manufactured by Kawada Co. Ltd, a toy company based in Tokyo, Japan. The bricks in these sets are extremely small (you need tweezers to put them together). His favourites sets were/are the world landmark models and for his birthday two years ago we bought him the Neuschwanstein Castle kit. This baby consisted of 5600 pieces and it took him months to complete it. So, when we were asking the boys about what they wanted to see in Europe, the castle was near the top of Will's list.

When I was in Japan in May, I came across the nano paper kits also made by Kawada and picked up a number of them for the boys try out.  Will's first attempt was of an Inari Shrine.  All that is in the kit is laser cut paper and detailed instructions.  Two solid hours were needed to put this together.

The end result is pretty cool.

The box

The finished model

Will and Ludwig II

Nippon

"Kind of like kinder egg chocolate mixed with rice crispies." Will and Sam rate this one an 8/10.

On the road to Denmark

We've seen everything from Frisian farms to intensive industrial landscapes and it is only noon here! We started with enormous Frisian house/barn buildings, had a lovely breakfast in the market area in Oldenburg, enjoyed the autobahn on our way through Munich and saw the huge cranes and shipping containers there.

Der rote Baron

I wasn't sure if I was going to buy a stein when I was in Germany.

Of course at had to buy this one brother.

Three castles, two countries, one day

We started off our day early with a 7:00am breakfast at the hotel. We drove 10 minutes in the rain up to Schloss Hohenschwangau and then walked to Schloss Neuschwanstein. From there we drove to Schloss Sigmarigen.

The drive from Germany to France was interesting - our first experience on the Autobahn, We made into Sélestat aound 7pm.

The Great Escape

Many of the scenes in The Great Escape were filmed in and around the town of Fussen.

One of my favourite scenes is where Australian Flying Officer Louis Sedgwick (James Coburn), "the manufacturer", is resting in a café when the local Resistance stages a drive-by assassination of three German generals sitting in a roadside cafe. James Coburn is spirited out of the way by a timely phone call. 

The boys watched the movie before we left on our trip. This is Sam "the Manufacturer" looking over the river.