August 15: Many years ago Melinda and I travelled through Interlaken after a rain storm. We were on a pass and I looked down through the fog and mist and saw a little village sitting in a meadow about 300 metres below. It felt unreal – as though we were flying.
Like many people, I tend to look at the countryside going by and accept it as scenery, and on this trip, I’ve been staggered by the beautiful places I’ve visited. In the past I have tended to rush past towns and villages because there would always be “a better one” just around the corner. This time, I’m trying to make time to be physically present and in the moment and take in some of the things I see in more detail and with more understanding.
Walt Disney famously drew inspiration for his “Fantasyland Castle” from 
Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany*. And I think many people see the towns and villages and churches here in that way: there’s an element of fantasy or unreality to them. But of course, they aren’t. That picturesque village clinging to the hill is there because several hundred years ago, the villagers were shepherds or woodcutters and they needed a place to live. They were merchants on a trade route or part of the country’s defenses. That church was the centre of their daily life.
And when you actually stop and look and listen, you discover that people are still there. Half-way up a mountain, at the end of the road, they still live in those houses and go to that church. Far from a fantasyland image, they are in fact, part of people’s daily reality.
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* This is as close as I got to Neuschwanstein Castle. I expected a lot of people but was amazed to find dozens of tour buses and hundreds of people waiting for the shuttles to take them up to the castles. I suspect it would have taken the better part of the day to see it all, so 3 or 4 quick shots and I headed out. I can always go to Florida …..