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Our salty adventure

October 2023
A short but fine adventure by Tim & Diane Read more
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  • Our salty adventure
    Day 1

    Things to do...

    October 26, 2023 in England ⋅ ☁️ 9 °C

    ...at 4am:
    1) be asleep
    2) be at Stansted Airport

    We chose 2).

  • Our salty adventure
    Day 1

    Austria, dirndl capital of Europe

    October 26, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ☁️ 14 °C

    And so we arrived at Salzburg airport at 9ish local time and bought bus tickets to Hallstatt for €15 each. Di had a bit of paper that said go to stop C and catch a #2. Stop C told us we had 21 minutes to wait so we did. I have learnt to obey paper and bus stops unquestioningly. #2 took us to Salzburg Station where paper said go to see Stop F and get a #120 which would arrive in 17 minutes and get us to Bad Ischl after 90 minutes. Which it did. Swiss Railways are sloppy compared to Austrian buses. After a 43 minute wait the #532 took us somewhere else that I had no need to remember as Paper knew. Then #533 took us to Hallstatt.

    Where it was raining.

    We went and had a definitely non-keto lunch in a restaurant in the pretty Town Square, and mocked the many Japanese tourists for their strange choices for photos. Austria is better than New England for leaf peeping.

    Then we trundled to our apartment and were pleasantly surprised by my excellent choice from Booking.com

    Of the 145 TV channels only Spongebob Squarepants was in English, so we watched some earnest Austrians discussing something. Then crashed early.

    Tomorrow is another day...    Read more

  • Our salty adventure
    Day 2

    Hallstatt in the rain and sun.

    October 27, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ⛅ 13 °C

    We had wondered if we had missed The Season yesterday as many places were shut. But then we found out that it was Austrian National Day. When places shut. So today, they were open!

    Into the Hallstatt Museum to see 7000 years of salty history. Very well presented, several hours were spent enjoying the displays. Especially the mirrors (see pics) But also the artefacts. We are suckers for a good artefact.

    When in Florence a few years back we had an Ugly Baby Jesus competition in the Uffizi (won by Botticelli, with a creditable mention for Titian) If only we had seen the Hallstatt altarpiece in the museum, a shoo in for first place.

    Then lunch in the same place as yesterday as I refuse to pay €50+ for fish caught in the lake in the posher eateries. So we had spicy veggie goulash mit brot röll. For €9.

    Then a stroll round the town taking pics, including in the charnel house. Because there is so little land, they exhume bodies from graves every now and then, paint the skulls and put them on shelves. And stack femurs underneath. I assume the other bones are ground up for fertiliser, the geez was very reticent on this...    Read more

  • Our salty adventure
    Day 3

    Gosh, I'm a decade older than I was yest

    October 28, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ☀️ 13 °C

    And so, after a vanilla cream filled pastry cone for breakfast, we ascended the funicular, all of 50 yards from our apartment, to the oldest salt mine in the world (see yesterday, museum...)

    You'd have thought if they were going to the trouble of building a funicular they'd have taken it to the mine entrance. But no, they made us walk the final 650m very uphill.

    We had to put on white over jackets and trousers, otherwise we wouldn't have looked stupid enough for the photos. Then we walked miles through tunnels. But we had fun on the miners' slides. On the longer 65m one, Di tapped into her inner miner by screaming the whole way down.

    It was nice to see the oldest wooden staircase in the world, perfectly preserved and only discovered/excavated a couple of years ago.

    Then we had a birthday lunch of spinach dumplings in very cheesy sauce followed by amazing strudel with great custard. Eaten overlooking the Hallstatt lake and valley, over 500m below. Di went out on the Skywalk to look down at the village. And I nearly did...

    The sun sets behind the mountains soon after 3pm so some of the later pics are in shade.

    Thanks to all who sent birthday commiserations on my ancientness.    Read more

  • Our salty adventure
    Day 4

    Yesterday was FLAT...

    October 29, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ☁️ 16 °C

    We caught the postbus to Dachstein Station and took a cablecar to level 1 for a visit to the ice cave. What we weren't told was that the cave entrance was a further 15 minutes away up a hairpinning footpath that was steeeeep. And then in the cave there were 500 steps, mostly upward, and between these flights were steep slopes. Still, quite worthwhile. We saw an animatronic cave bear because they'd found a skull of one (cave bears weighed up to 1000kg and we're told they were herbivores. Seriously, would you hang around to find out, after all you might look like a juicy berry to a short sighted ton of bear...) And we saw plenty of ice at around -2° but we were still sweating from all the climbing.

    And then after walking down the ridiculously steep footpath again, we had cheesy pasta with roasted onions, then sachertore with cream, which made things a bit better.

    Up the next cablecar up to nearly 3000m to look at REAL mountains, with snow. On seeing it was a half hour walk, uphill obviously, to the viewing platform suspended over 1500m of nothingness, we both used the "yes of COURSE we'd enjoy being scared shitless, but alas we can't climb on a full stomach" excuse so sat and drank hot chocolate instead, looking at the views. Di did a bit of a walk, brave girl!

    Then all the way back down, bus to Hallstatt, and a Syrian takeaway chicken burger with curry flavoured chips. Can't beat local cuisine.

    Absolutely knackered, but having that pleasant glow that comes after extreme exertion!    Read more

  • Our salty adventure
    Day 5

    Thank heavens for ibuprofen

    October 30, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ☁️ 16 °C

    Both Di and I leapt out of bed at the crack of dawn - and collapsed in a heap, our poor bodies stiff and worn from 2 solid days of vertical alpinism.

    So we had a leisurely stroll to the end of the lake, on the basis that lakes are generally not too uphill. Different viewpoint of town, not much else going for it apart from tranquility and FLATNESS.

    Then we walked into town, found a picturesque restaurant in the town square, ordered overpriced lake fish (which was yummy). Then had a blazing row with the surly bastard who owns the restaurant. (Just written a stinking review on TripAdvisor and found that "surly bastard" is one of the nicer things he's been called in dozens of shit reviews going back several years) Cafe Derbl if you want to check!

    And now back earlyish to try to get ourselves fit enough to get back to Salzburg tomorrow.    Read more

  • Our salty adventure
    Day 6

    Homeward bound

    October 31, 2023 in England ⋅ ☁️ 13 °C

    Pouring with rain this morning, but lovely hostess lent us an umbrella and said just leave it at the bus stop!

    Back to Salzburg on the buses, had good tomato soup and yumcake in restaurant then decided to walk to the Mirabel Gardens to see the statues that were in the Sound of Music.

    Thence to the airport, back to Stansted and a good dry drive back to MK. Fish and chips, TV we can understand and comfy armchair. Good to be back!!!    Read more

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