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Published: December 27th 2006
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Innsbruck not Innsbrook
The Day After Christmas and All is Still Closed After checking out of Fussen yesterday, we took the quick hour and a half trip to Innsbruck in the middle of western Austria. Innsbruck’s main claim to fame in winter is the skiing. Because it is high season for skiing, e. g. between Christmas and New Years, the town has a ton of tourists.
We arrived and checked in by 11am and set out about the town. From the hotel we have a short five minute walk to the old town of Innsbruck which is directly on the Inn River. As we arrived in the main part of old town we were surprised to find the Christmas Market still open. We had been told that Christmas Markets in the region close on the 23rd but this one was kicking strong. This makes 15 Christmas Markets we’ve seen in one holiday season.
Once in old town we immediately encountered the hordes of tour groups surrounding the major sight in the whole city called the Golden Roof. It’s basically an old building with a roof of gilded copper tile. While not really all
that interesting, it is a major site so we stopped and ogled for a minute.
Corn Starch…an odyssey I think most of you know that Kel takes corn starch as medicine for her GSD. We have had little problem finding corn starch throughout Europe, but have not really done any searching in the German speaking countries. Kel has had a corn starch cache which has carried her through since we left Madrid but it was starting to run a little low as we left Fussen.
We asked at the hotel about grocery stores in the area and were told that a store was open by the train station. With our German translation of “corn starch” we headed to the grocery store. The store was absolutely insane due to the fact that it was the only grocery store open in all of Innsbruck since it was the day after Christmas. We, and all of our closest Austrian friends, were attempting to find all of our grocery needs in a store the size of a Walgreens,
After trying to find the corn starch (google translation “maismehl”) on our own, we finally started asking store clerks for
help. It’s always difficult to communicate with people who don’t speak English but it can be really tough when you are trying to communicate the importance of a product which seems uncommon. We finally gave up after 30 minutes and 2 store clerks.
While dejectedly heading back to the hotel, we decided to see if someone working there might be able to help us. We approached the check in desk and hoped for the best. Immediately one of the ladies behind the counter said she knew what we wanted and was sure it was in the grocery store. She went so far as to find a picture of the box on Google to check with us which made us really excited. Even if this particular store didn’t have it we knew some store near by must have it. Iris, the lady behind the counter, told us to return at 3:15 and that she would go to the store with us to find the corn starch. Absolutely amazing!!
We left and got lunch and then came back to the hotel to wait for Iris to get off work so she could come help us. At 3:15 Iris came over
to where we were sitting with a box of corn starch in hand. During a break she had gone to the store on her own and bought it for us. She even drew us a map of where it was on the aisle so we could go back and buy more.
It’s moments like these that you realize that throughout the world there are nice people who will help when you can. We plan on sending an email to Hilton Hotels to commend Iris because of her kindness!
The rest of the day was pretty dull. It was already 4pm by time all was said and done and most things in the city were closed so we spent some lazy time in our room and then went to dinner.
Zoos are Fun We slept in a bit today, so we didn’t get out of breakfast until about 10:30. From breakfast we set out to go to the Alpenzoo. How many people do you know that have been to a zoo in the Alps? Well, now you know two people who have!!!
Once again the trip up to the zoo was neither short nor
flat. We both huffed and puffed out way up the hill and made it their by noon. The zoo is right on the mountain side and is quite steep. Instead of each exhibit being next to each other they are more like on top of each other due to the steepness of the hill.
Kel and I always enjoy zoos, as you can tell from some of the other places we’ve been. Here we enjoyed the baby pigs, which were smelly but cute and the moose. Who doesn’t like moose really?
The big surprise of the day were the mountain goats. Kel and I spent at least 20 minutes watching this one mountain goat climb out on a limb that was at least 40 feet off the ground. It looked like the goat was going to fall off at any minute. But just when the goat looked like it was going to go too far it would jump back onto firmer ground.
After the zoo we headed back down the mountain and got some lunch. We ate at a pizza place off the Christmas market which was recommended by Rick Steves.
Since lunch we have been
resting in the room waiting for dinner.
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