Neuschwanstein Castle by Castorland 3000 pieces - 1/2 way done

 

This puzzle was a gift some years ago, and has been in our pile taunting us ever since.  

We started working on it on 14 August, after we finished the Cinque Terre 1500 piece puzzle.  Since we were able to do that one, we decided to tackle this one since it is divided into 2 bags of 1500 pieces.  We decided to work on each half separately because we're not quite up to the challenge of sorting through 3000 pieces (also we don't quite have the work space to make it easy to do).

The pieces of this puzzle are very small and thin, and they do not fit together well.  It is generally not possible to move even sections of two pieces without them coming apart.  There were also a number of false fits, and many dark sections and sections that look the same.  I really wondered along the way if we were ever going to get it done.  We started with the castle, and then did the leaves at the top and most of the foreground at the bottom, and then filled in the rest from the top down.

The size of the pieces and the difficulty of the image made this much harder than the Cinque Terre puzzle.

At the beginning we thought the pieces were really tiny.  By the time we got to the end, we were used to them and they didn't seem so small anymore.

I think this half is the more difficult and the right side will be easier.  We will see!