In the nineteenth century only ruins remained of the twin medieval castles, but those of Hinterhohenschwangau served as a lookout place known as Sylphenturm. Separated by only a moat, they jointly consisted of a hall, a keep, and a fortified tower house. Vorderhohenschwangau Castle and Hinterhohenschwangau Castle sat on a rugged hill overlooking Schwanstein Castle, two nearby lakes ( Alpsee and Schwansee), and the village. Finished in 1837, the palace became his family's summer residence, and his elder son Ludwig (born 1845) spent a large part of his childhood here. In 1832, Ludwig's father King Maximilian II of Bavaria bought its ruins to replace them with the comfortable neo-Gothic palace known as Hohenschwangau Castle. In the Middle Ages, three castles overlooked the villages. Its surroundings are characterised by the transition between the Alpine foothills in the south (toward the nearby Austrian border) and a hilly landscape in the north that appears flat by comparison. The municipality of Schwangau lies at an elevation of 800 m (2,620 ft) at the southwest border of the German state of Bavaria.

Ī northward view of Neuschwanstein Castle from Mount Säuling (2,047 m or 6,716 ft) on the border between Bavaria and Tyrol: Schwangau between large Forggensee reservoir (1952) and Hohenschwangau and Neuschwanstein palaces More than 1.3 million people visit annually, with as many as 6,000 per day in the summer. Since then more than 61 million people have visited Neuschwanstein Castle. It was open to the public shortly after his death. The castle was intended as a private residence for the King, until he died in 1886. Construction began in 1869, but was never fully completed. Ludwig chose to pay for the palace out of his personal fortune and by means of extensive borrowing, rather than Bavarian public funds.

The palace was commissioned by King Ludwig II of Bavaria as a retreat and in honour of Richard Wagner. Neuschwanstein Castle ( German: Schloss Neuschwanstein, pronounced, Southern Bavarian: Schloss Neischwanstoa) is a 19th-century historicist palace on a rugged hill above the village of Hohenschwangau near Füssen in southwest Bavaria, Germany.

Abandoned castle in snow