点评:Valkenburg was a beautiful, and very touristy, little town and I wish we'd spent longer there but poor research on the part of our travel planner meant we couldn't! The town was so touristy that the car park was full so we had to sit and wait at the barrier until someone came out. We visited the castle which looked like it was magnificent at one time and certainly covered a large area but was slighted in the 17th century and then steadily plundered for stone by house builders in the town. Now it was a hugely popular family destination and when we visited there was some living history displays as well as archery and some games.
After the castle we did struggle to find the caves for our tour but eventually found a sign and followed the route, a little way out of the town centre. We had missed our tour slot (my fault again!) but we were able to slot onto a Dutch language tour. The caves were excavated from? and as well as being a quarry were used as a chapel during the Revolutionary Wars when the French Republic tried to erode the influence of Catholicism.
The tour lasted about 45 minutes and we saw some beautiful artwork done in the caves. We had an English print out of what each stop of the tour was so that certainly helped and the guide gave us a quick run down in flawless English too. The tour exited at the castle so we had done them in the wrong order!
翻译:法尔肯堡是一个美丽的小镇,游客络绎不绝,真希望我们能在那里多待一会儿,可惜我们的旅行策划师做功课不充分,没能成行!小镇游客太多,停车场都停满了,我们不得不坐在路障旁等着,直到有人出来。我们参观了城堡,它曾经雄伟壮观,占地面积也很大,但在17世纪遭到破坏,后来逐渐被镇上的房屋建造者掠夺石材。现在,它成了一个非常受欢迎的家庭旅游目的地,我们去的时候,那里有一些鲜活的历史展览,还有射箭和游戏。
参观完城堡后,我们费了好大劲才找到要参观的洞穴,但最终还是找到了一个路标,沿着路线走了一段,离开了镇中心。我们错过了参观时间(又是我的错!),好在幸运地安排了荷兰语导览。这些洞穴是从哪里挖出来的?在法国大革命期间,法兰西共和国试图削弱天主教的影响,这些洞穴除了曾经是采石场外,还被用作教堂。
这次参观持续了大约45分钟,我们看到了一些洞穴里精美的艺术品。我们打印了一份英文版的行程单,上面列出了每站的行程安排,这当然很有帮助,导游也用流利的英语快速地给我们做了介绍。这次旅行的终点站是城堡,所以我们走错了顺序!