Austria to Switzerland

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Hi all,

Sunday 19th didn't turn out too bad after all, the thunder disappeared over the hills and the sun came out after lunch so we packed and tidied up ready to leave in the morning.

Monday 20th
Leaving lake Bled Harry said his goodbyes to the 2 German girls that had been following him around the camp site for 4 days, then we stopped off at a new supermarket for us, Eurospin (we've done that many!) to stock up then it was just a short drive to the border and the entrance to the Karawanken road tunnel that takes you through into Austria.
The drive was again very scenic and easy, straight up the A10 motorway until we turned off at St Micheal im Lungau and onto the small town of Mauterndorf. It was quite a chilly afternoon when we arrived so the boys put on a DVD and after I'd made plans for Tuesday I took advantage of the camp sites sauna and steam facilities for the rest of the evening.

Tuesday 21st
The camp site in Mauterndorf sits just below the Grosseck/Speiereck cable car station and luckily for us it runs on Tuesdays and Sundays and only when the weather is good, so it been a Tuesday and with the sun blazing down we took the cable car part way up the mountain. This area in winter is a ski resort but at this time of year it's busy with walkers and mountain bikers.
Now the boys had gone a bit Karl Pilkington on me, not bothered about seeing the great views from the top or maybe been too lazy to hike to the summit, so as I never got to walk much in Slovenia I left them at the top cable car station with a walkie talkie and went off up to the 2411m Speiereck summit myself.
It was a good walk up, I checked in with the boys on the 2 way every 30mins and they followed me as I walked the ridge above. Once on top the views across the central Austrian Alps were stunning, the snow capped peak of Grossglockner to the west being the highest. After having my lunch and chatting to a few Germans at the top I walked the ski slope route down, met up with the boys and we took the cable car back down to the camp site.
After tea the boys were again been lazy so I walked along the river path and into Mauterndorf village. It's a small alpine town with a nice market place that has fine hotels and restaurants around it but the towns dominating feature is it's castle. Mauterndorf castle was once home to the Archbishop Leonhard von Keutschach.....who? today it's open to the public with re-enactments from the middle ages held during the summer months.

Wednesday 22nd
After swapping some books with an English couple we'd met we were back on the road, still in Austria we headed north again up the A10, through more stunning mountain passes and into Salzburg the home of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
Arriving at the city camp site to blue skies we decided to take it easy and sit by the pool for the afternoon, this we did until 4pm until a bank of black cloud came rolling in off the mountains, by 4:30pm we were back in the van watching a hail storm cover the ground in bouncy ball size hail stones, what a contrast! After the storm cleared we took a walk down the road for tea at Mcdonalds, our first in 6 weeks.

Thursday 23rd
Catching the bus from outside the camp site we soon arrived in the centre of Salzburg. Not having done much research on the place we just wandered around town to see what we could find.
The most famous son of the city is Mozart, there are museums in his former homes and many concerts are held throughout the year playing his music, there are also many Mozart themed shops selling chocolate to instruments, preferring Morrissey to Mozart we declined the many offers of 'A night with Mozart'.
Also on the musical front The Sound of Music tour is very popular with the promise of travelling through the areas where the opening scenes were filmed, again not for us. We did wander around the architectural delights of the old town though and up to the castle area where we had a great view across the city skyline. After a rest and a Guinness in the Irish bar we wandered around the new town to find that all the shops were shut as it was a public holiday so it was back on the bus to site and a night in with a new book.

Friday 24th
Leaving Austria behind after our 4 day visit we soon crossed over the border into Germany. The camp site we were headed for was just outside a town called Berchtesgaden.
If you know your WWI and WWII history then you'll know that Berchtesgaden is where after being released from prison Adolf Hitler wrote Mein Kampf. Also after seizing power in 1933 he bought a house there and his party friends followed him to build their own homes around his Berghof.
There isn't much remaining of the houses today but one building saved from destruction after the French and Americans took the area is the Kehisteinhaus or Eagles Nest. Built by Bormann as a present to Hitler it is perched on top of Kehistein mountain (1843m). To access the house a road was constructed up to 1700m, the remaining journey is by an elevator built into the mountain. It really is an amazing engineering project that in all took just 13 months (no pressure on that project team I bet!) After the steep scenic bus ride and then the eerie elevator trip you can stand by the fireplace presented by Mussolini to Hitler where he probably once sat and chatted to his commanders.
After taking in the views across Bavaria from the mountain top we descended back down the lift and took the bus back to site. We did plan on a wander around the town of Berchtesgaden which looked really nice but the weather was poor so we called it a day and went home for tea.

Saturday 25th
On the move again and staying in Germany we headed west and for the city of Munich. Again the camp site was within the city limits so jumping on the bus and the subway soon took us right in to the centre. Similar to Salzburg I didn't know much about Munich so we spent the afternoon walking around the city taking in the Bavarian scenery and taking pictures of buildings that we had no idea of what it was. Another nice city to wander around, typical Bavarian buildings and loads of Beer houses, probably best during the Oktoberfest.

Sunday 26th
Heading west then south our destination was Fussen. Our camp site was on the edge of Hopfensee, a small lake 4km from Fussen and it was one of the best for facilities. The boys soon discovered the indoor sports facility, the indoor pool and the cycle tracks whilst I put a wash on and read a book.

Monday 27th
The reason for coming to Fussen was to visit the castles. The most famous castle in Germany is Neuschwanstein, never heard of it? well it's the castle from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
Using the excellent cycle tracks in the area we cycled down to Fussen, along the edge of Forggensee and up to Hohenschwangau, about 6 miles in all. Leaving the bikes we walked through the village and passed a smaller castle called Hohenschwangau, then it was up the hill for 30 mins to Neuschwanstein.
The castle was built by King Ludwig II and his idea was to build it as a fairytale castle in the style of the middle ages. Apparently the style is not what it should have been and his building ideas got out of hand costing the country millions so in short the government of the day eventually had him murdered and put his uncle on the throne.
Today millions visit the castles and with bus loads of Japanese and many many school and uni trips visiting today the wait for us would have been a few hours to get in so we just walked around the outside and chilled in the courtyards eavesdropping on the tour guides telling their flocks the history. (we've done that a lot over the year, just by chance, tagged onto a tour and found out some interesting stuff)
Back down the hill we picked up the bikes and cycled back in Fussen. As well as the castles the town also gets many visitors and I can see why. A very charming Bavarian town with it's own smaller castle, more typical Bavarian style buildings and a cobbled shopping and relaxing area not spoilt by high street shops. We ended up spending quite some time wandering around the town and shops and having an ice cream before we cycled back to the camp site for early evening.
After a rest then a shower we went out that night for tea to a lakeside restaurant in Hopfensee and as the sun went down so did the weissbier.

Tuesday 28th
A chill out day, the boys again using the sports hall and pool, I did a couple of jobs, beat the boys at football, nearly broke my neck on the trampoline and finished the day with another German lager.......nice.

Wednesday 29th
Driving west across Bavaria we were heading to Lake Bodensee (or Constance) and to a site on the edge of the lake near the town of Lindau. We didn't do much in the afternoon, the boys cycled along the bike track around the lake and found themselves crossing the border into Austria just a few hundred yards up the road. I took a walk down to the lake side and looked the short distance across towards Switzerlands mountains.

Thursday 30th
After another wet start to the day but by lunchtime it was clear to have a walk into Lindau. The town of Lindau is on an island in lake Bodensee connected by a couple of bridges, it's a popular tourist spot with boats coming across from Austria and Switzerland throughout the day. The buildings are again typical Bavarian style filling a long pedestrian high street with bars and shops and with a busy little port area it's a nice place for a day visit.

Friday 1st July
Still on route to Switzerland I decided to take a little detour so we could add another country to our list. From Lindau it's just 200 yards and you are back in to Austria, this little stretch of Austria was very busy with traffic, the main reason I guess is that the other 3 surrounding countries pop in to Austria to shop or get petrol as it was at least 10 to 15% cheaper. After about 30 miles we then came to our next country, the 4th smallest in the world Liechtenstein.
Liechtenstein has just a couple of small towns, even the capital Vaduz is no bigger than Beverley so there isn't a lot to see town wise, but it's position in the upper Rhine valley between towering peaks makes for a very scenic place and the camp site was situated on a hillside which looked right across the valley.
Having just planned to stay the one night we decided that we would just look around the immediate area and not bother venturing far, so a walk down to the stream and through the woods is all we managed the rest of the day was spent chilling on site. As we've travelled through the alpine countries the weather has been very patchy and the nights actually cold and here was no different, one minute sunny then a quick heavy rain shower than back to sun. It was a nice quiet site and we met a couple from London who had taken 4 months out with their 2 young kids to travel and found they were due on the same ferry to Hull on the same date as us so we may bump into them again.

Saturday 2nd July
Leaving Liechtenstein we crossed over the upper Rhine river that forms the border with Switzerland. Instead of taking the motorways we took the back roads north and drove through lots of typical Swiss villages with large timber chalets stepped on the hillsides. Having checked out prices in Liechtenstein we found Switzerland to be equally expensive so our plan was just a couple of nights stay.
Our first stop was back on Lake Bodensee, this time on the Swiss side and just outside of a small town called Romanshorn. As it was a hot day we sat by the lake and played in the sports field, chilled out with a book and even watched Sky news and the boxing which was on in the TV room. That evening we were also watched a massive fireworks display being held in the nearby town, I have no idea what was been celebrated.

Sunday 3rd
Off again and heading towards the famous waterfalls at Schaffhausen we pulled into the camp site after another very scenic drive and found the reception closed.
Finding a guy sat in the bar he said to us in broken English 'take a place' so thinking he meant a place on the camp site I just drove on and parked up. It was then I noticed him running up behind us whistling and shouting at us with his hands gesturing, he was saying something in German like he never told me to go onto the camp site, so I very politely said I think you did sir and he basically went off in a major rant and told us to get out, so I told him where to shove his Swiss camp site and drove off with an internationally recognisable gesture coming from my middle finger.
He was the first really rude person we've encountered on the trip (so far), a pity really as we decided to leave Switzerland behind and drive straight on into Germany.

You'll all be glad to know that the next blog will be the last as we now have just 24 days to go, so until then take care all.
Neil Dan & Harry
x

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