Arbon castle

This time, I did a research about Arbon, but I completely forgot that there was a castle too, so imagine my surprise when we drove through the old town and saw this beautiful castle waiting for our visit! We were lucky too as the castle is only open on Sunday from 2 PM to 5 PM. It was still before lunchtime, so we had enough time to walk around the old town and get lunch before our visit. Right at 2 PM we were standing in front of the castle with our renewed museum membership cards, so we could enjoy a free entry. These membership cards are life savers for people who visit many museums as you can save a lot of money over a year. But enough of a small talk... The origins of the **Arbon castle** date back to the Roman times. There was a Roman castle in this place *more than 2000 years ago*. A new castle was built within the Roman fortification in *the 7th century*, and this is when the history of the castle as we know it today started. Of course, it didn't look like this at that time. It was enlarged and renovated over centuries and it got its final touches in *the 19th century*. The castle changed its owners frequently, but don't worry, I'm not going to bore you with many details. After the World War II it was bought by the town and served as the school or gallery until it changed its purpose to a museum. However, the museum is only a small part of the castle. There is a residential part as well as a part dedicated to various events, such as concerts.  --- The castle is located in the middle of the town, only a few hundreds meters away from the lake Constance. It should not be a surprise to you that it's built right next to a church as most (or maybe all) castles are built either with a chapel on their grounds or a church next door.  ----- The tower was built in *the 14th century*, and I couldn't wait to climb it and enjoy the views. However, later we learned that it's under construction and close for one more year.  ----- This is one of the newer parts of the castle and it serves as the museum...  ---- The surroundings of the castle are renovated and there is path which leads you around it, so you can enjoy the castle from all angles.  ---- When we came in front of the entrance I knew already that we wouldn't be able to see the tower because of the scaffolding. We really are not very lucky this year with our trips. It is what it is, so let's go inside and see as much as we can! You can't miss the entrance as it's that large arched door in the back. It gets a little bit confusing inside because the ticket office is on the first floor, but we found it in the end. The entrance fee is *6 CHF per person* which was surprisingly cheap.  ---- We started our tour with **The Biedermeier period**. In Switzerland, this style was typical for the beginning of *the 18th century*. The common feature of Biedermeier is hand painted furniture. These paintings differed between regions and such pieces are popular even today. You can purchase them cheaply, renovate them and decorate your home. I found it strange that there was no rope, so that we could get close or even touch the furniture. Of course, we didn't do it, b […]