Today I'd like to show you the rest of the Bethlen-Haller castle, as well as invite you to see what amazing wine they are producing and selling at the souvenir shop they have at the venue.
I thought first I'm going to show you the rest of the castle, but if you've missed my previous posts, you should check them out here and here.
As I mentioned in my previous posts, this amazing castle has never served defense purposes, that's why entertainment was the main focus, when designing and building it. It has a nice music room, which served for entertainment and several rooms for other activities.
This room you see on the photo above has been furnished and decorated with furniture, folk costumes and artifacts from that era. Just like I said in my last post about the castle, I'd love to have a cabinet like that, in my imaginary extra room for old and very stylish furniture. It's old, but it's fabulous.
Please note, this is not the original furniture of the castle. Unfortunately the castle has changed owners a lot of time, has gone through a lot of transformation, not always in a good sense of the word, but the current owner has worked on restoring it and furnish it with furniture appropriate to the era.
While the chairs and the table on the previous photo are common ones you find in any home a few decades ago, this chair is a special one. It's visible with the naked eye that it must have belonged to someone financially powerful. Although it's a nice piece, I would not want one :)
The necessary objects of those times, the candle holders as electricity was possible to have only around 1960 or later. I'm not sure. That desk, even if it's easy to scratch, looks amazing.
Another amazing piece of furniture, which I love but it's too dark for my taste.
What you see here under the glass cover is a piece of the original floor of the castle. Restaurateurs decided to keep a portion of the old pavement intact, protected by this glass cover and rebuild the rest of the floor in the same style.
Under the glass top of that cabinet, there was an interesting pipe collection. Back in those days cigarettes were unknown, so smoking meant using a pipe.
I tried to take a decent photo but it was almost impossible.
Yes, you are right, I like this one too, quite a lot. However, I was thinking what would it feel like sitting in a room, full of these antique furniture for a couple of hours. After admiring them, I guess I would feel stressed as these are too serious for what we do today, how we are.
Some of these clocks look old, but there are some that may not be so old and may have come from China (my opinion obviously).
I would definitely not say no to a desk like that. There's room for a cool lamp, my laptop and all the gadgets that I use, but I would need a proper chair as my back was not designed to sit on that inquisition chair.
Even though this is not the original furniture of the castle, I can imagine the wealth and the life that has been going on there.
A glimpse into the dining room, which must have seen some very loud festive days.
There was a screen in there as the room is used for different occasions now, but that does not come from the past :)
This was one of my favorite sport from the castle. I know it's not really cool to show bathrooms, but I've never seen such a sink before. I find it very stylish.
On a more serious note, look at this masterpiece. It's the globe on handmade paper, surrounded by some cool drawings. Obviously it was under glass, which made my job even harder. Not to mention I had to wait for everyone to leave, to be able to take the photo.
The next room was the hunting room, which can't be missing from any castle. Hunting served for providing food, but was also a way of having fun for nobles. As any decent hunting room, there were some interesting species exhibited.
I'm not an expert, but this seemed to be a lynx. Having these furs was a way of showing off, like a trophy.
It is a custom to carve in the wood the name of the hunter, the date and the place where the trophy was shot. This is from 1990.
We were allowed to enter one of the bedrooms, which was round as it was set up in the front left bastion shaped part of the castle.
The room was simple, not quire minimalist, but much less decorated that one would expect.
For me, this was the main attraction of the room. A kidney shaped bath tub, pretty small actually and covered with this cloth or veil or I have no idea how to call it. Apart from the fact that not many would fit in that tiny bathtub, I was wondering how can you take a bath under that veil.
Have you ever seen a bear from such close? I have! Am I brave? 😂 Of course I am! I was the only one getting down on my knees to take this photo and I love it!
And my bravery did not stop there as I took this photo of the lynx and I wasn't afraid! 😂
This photo is not the best quality, but the staircase and the stairs is the most interesting part of the castle. These are the original stairs, but it was not open to visitors as it was under repair. Those logs have become unsafe as time has an effect on everything, so we were allowed to have a look and that was all.
There was a very nice wall clock collection on the wall.
Would have been a pleasure to walk these stairs while admiring these gorgeous wall clocks, but we were not allowed.
This is a photo of the stairs taken from below. This is all wood and made in an era where there were no power tools and everything had to be done manually.
I'm curious to see how they are going to strengthen the stairs but I would need to go back for that on day.
We had to use these stairs instead, not that I was complaining as these were beautiful as well, not to mention the view from the window.
A bell, most likely used to let people know dinner is served, or, this as the bell at the entrance, although, who would have heard this bell throughout those thick doors.
The last part of my journey will include the beautiful souvenir shop and the accommodation next to the castle, which is also amazing. So stay tuned.
If you're a newbie, you may want to check out these guides:
