CastleMemory: Kungliga Slottet (Stockholm)

Hello Sweden with a walk down memory lane 
to my visit to the Royal Palace of Stockholm, 
or Kungliga Slottet, anno 2005.

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Why You Shouldn't Bother Watching "Sisi", the New TV Series By RTL

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Hi there! I watched a series today that was so bad it made be write the first blog post in one and a half years. Will I write more again in the future? I don't know, I guess we'll see. In the meantime, follow all my latest castle adventures over on Instagram . See you there! Empress Elisabeth of Austria, the immortal Sisi, has inspired the imagination of the people for more than a century now. Her life, her love, her tragedies, her death. Adored, free spirited and one of the original royal IT girls. A face that could launch a thousands ships, well, bring peace to two feuding nations by simply being her charming self. A woman that, 120 years after her death, can still draw crowds and be the foundation stone of what seems like half the tourist industry of several regions. (Okay, that might have been slightly exaggerated but have you ever been to Vienna and seen the souvenir shops?) So it's not too surprising that time and time again, cinema and TV productions have tried to ca...
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CastleDrama: Three Wishes for Cinderella

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Today is the first Sunday of Advent and so from now on it is totally legitimate to start listening to Christmas music - and watch Christmas movies. Like Christmas markets and Glühwein part of each year's pre-Christmas season in Germany also is a period drama - or rather fairytale film. "Three Wishes for Cinderella" (known as " Drei Haselnüsse für Aschenbrödel " in German or " Tři oříšky pro Popelku " in Czech) is the Bohemian version of the classic Cinderella fairytale including three magic nuts and prince who must actively pursue his love and has to solve a riddle in order to find her: The cheeks are soiled with ashes but a chimney sweep it is not. A hat with feathers, the crossbow over the shoulder but the a hunter it is not. A silver dress with train at a ball but a princess it is not. Don't worry though, there is still a shoe involved. And the the Czech-German co-production has become such as Christmas classic in Germany that it is o...
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Kaiservilla (Bad Ischl)

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"Earthly heaven" - that's how Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria described his summer holidays in Bad Ischl. His own fate was inevitably connected the small spa town in the Austrian Salt Chamber region ( Salzkammergut ). After having suffered five miscarriages during the first few years of her marriage, his mother, Archduchess Sophie, went to Bad Ischl to drink the waters who were thought to increase fertility. She bore five sons who were thus sometimes nicknamed "the salt princes". It was also in Bad Ischl that the Emperor fell in love with his cousin and future wife Elisabeth, better known as Sisi. The couple spent almost every following summer at their home in the Salzkammergut : The Kaiservilla  in Bad Ischl. The large mansion was gifted to the couple as a wedding present by the Emperor's mother. In 1853 after their engagement, Archduchess Sophie had purchased it from physician Eduard Mastalier. He, in turn, had bought it from a notary called Jose...
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