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Published: September 6th 2008
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Turracher Lake
On the Karnten/Styria border at 1800m In the morning we had a wander around the area before heading off again. We were travelling on minor roads which provide great scenery but can be very steep in places as you pass over the hills and through the valleys. Ferd worked at Hotel Hochschober at the ski resort area of Turracher Höhe on the border of Carinthia and Styria at 1800m. The last part of the road before we arrived had to be driven in first gear but Dobby, our faithful servant, kept his cool. We pulled up in front of this really flash hotel and, thanks to a previous text, Ferd came out to greet us and show us to his hotel-owned chalet where we had a couple of cold beers (Ferd had tea) before he left us to go back to work. We then freshened up, chilled out for a bit and wandered up the road to the Gasthof for another beer and some dinner. We got the beer ok but by 8 o’clock the kitchen was closed. The owner/cook was behind the bar and when we told him we were from NZ he brought out the Chevas Regal which was very nice. He also grabbed the
Turracher Hohe
One for Stewart leatherhous on display from the rafters and insisted we take them to Munich for the Beerfest! They were apparently 80 years old! We politely declined of course and as we were meeting Ferd after work we made our apologies and left. We headed down the hill to the hotel after picking up the computer - we were going to make use of the hotels internet while we were here - and we had bought a camera/microphone so we could talk to the kids at home. Skype is wonderful! We talked and saw both Simon and Jen for ages on the computer and it cost us absolutely nothing! (Ferd thought it was pretty cool too) When we had finished it was quite late so we all headed off to bed.
The next day Ferd had to work so we caught up on our washing and wandered around the lake. There were at least half a dozen hotels around Turracher Lake as well as a few restaurants. There was also a crystal museum and shop that Susan and Devlin would love! After a relaxing day we went back up to the local gasthof for dinner and a couple of cold ales and
Hotel Hochschober
View of the hotel from the lakeside after missing out the night before decided to go a bit earlier at around 6. Unfortunately the owner was already socializing with friends so we missed out again! (We actually think his wife sent him home early so he couldn’t drink with us!) We finished our beers and wandered back down to the lake to see what else there was and were shocked to find that at 7 pm all the eateries were closed! It was a cool and clear evening and nobody was outside enjoying it so we had to go back to the chalet and cook our own.
The next day was Ferd’s day off and we started by having breakfast at the hotel - and what a breakfast. It was buffet style but they had an incredible variety on offer with over 300 items. There was a cold meats section, a cheese section, a yoghurt section, fresh fruits, breads, cakes, teas, special coffees, fresh juice you could squeeze yourself and of course the hot line where you could get bacon and eggs cooked for you. So after a relatively light breakfast Ferd gave us the grand tour of the hotel and spa complex, despite the fact that
Crystal Museum
One for Devlin - you need to design a new bag! it was not ski season the hotel was, as per usual, fully booked with 250 odd guests. Unlike most of Europe it was actually a non-smoking hotel with only a couple of places that you could actually smoke inside, it was also cellphone free in almost all of the public areas. Apart from the rooms themselves there was a spa complex consisting of four different ‘themed’ spas - Nordic, Oriental (Turkish), Asian, and Mediteranian, complete with saunas, pools, gymnasium, meditation and massage areas. Then there was the four story teahouse which offers yoga, tai chi, oriental medicine, ceremonial tea drinking and just normal relaxing tea drinking. They also had areas for young kids with a caregiver and play area, older kids with computers and pool table, climbing wall complete with one on one instructor,… the list goes on. Worth a mention is the lake pool which is actually in the lake and kept at a constant 30 odd degrees summer and winter. Apparently it’s really nice to sit in when the lake all around is frozen. After our tour we went on a short hike up to the hotel’s hutt where they serve light meals, beer and of course schnapps.
Crystal Museum
Another one for Devlin - petrified wood All-in-all a really great place and for €150pp per night all inclusive (except alcohol) I thought quite reasonable also.
The next day we had to bid goodbye to Ferd and Tuarracher Höhe to catch up with Thomas at Zell am See. In complete contrast to Hotel Hochschober, Thomas ran a small family Gasthof in the hills above the lake where they served meals to hikers. There were no rooms but on a good day they can serve 30 to 40 diners - people do an awful lot of hiking in Austria! He made us an excellent mushroom goulash with knoodle (dumpling) made from these little egg mushrooms which are a specialty in Austria and very tasty. We spent the night in the bus and headed off in the morning after breakfast towards Salzburg. We took a little detour a little further on at Taxenbach to visit a place on the tourist map called Kitz Loch Klamm. It was a walkway through a river gorge with cool waterfalls and caves and made for a nice walk. Back on the road again towards Salzburg we stopped for the night at a camping ground at Auwirt near Hallein. It appeared to be
Hotel Hochschober
Cows at the alpine hutt - Jac's new friend just a stopover place for many and for some reason the owners were not as friendly as we have become accustomed to. I wanted to get rid of some change so used a lot of small coins to buy shower tokens (€2) and he kindly saved them for me and gave them back to me when we left as change! He thought himself real clever! Never mind, we had a short trip to Salzburg but it was raining when we got there so after finding an information centre and getting a map we drove into the city and found a carpark close to the old part of town. It was a catholic public holiday (not sure why) which meant parking was free so that was a bonus. We wandered into the old part of town which was fairly crowded despite the rain and had a look around before taking the funicular railway up to the Salzburg Fortress. Like everywhere else parts of it were under restoration but it was still impressive. It apparently is Central Europe’s only completely preserved fortress, dating back to the 11th century and was originally built to store salt which was more valuable than gold back
Hotel Hochschober
Ferd at it again on the accordian for the guests then - hence the name. We took the guided tour in which not only takes you places you wouldn’t otherwise see but also explains better what you are looking at. We walked back down to the city and wandered the streets for a while before heading back to the bus and trying to find our way to the autobahn to take us north. We had decided it was time to venture further afield. We had about 12 days until Ferd’s birthday party in Tober so we thought we could do a loop up to Czech Rep., across to Poland, down through Slovakia and into Hungary, then back across to Austria. It was the next step out of our comfort zone, going into countries where we not only didn’t speak the language but where we didn’t even know anyone who did! We spent the night at a town called Freistadt about 15km from the Czech border where we managed to find an info centre and a camping ground. It was still raining so we didn’t venture out of the camping ground but surprisingly we managed to hook into somebody’s wireless site so could check our emails and upload another travelblog. We
also read a brochure on Freistadt which sounded like an interesting old city inside a city wall with a big history as a frontier town. It would have been nice to visit it properly but we were now on a mission.
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