Innsbruck, Hall, and Linz

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We left Salzburg and took the scenic route to Innsbruck, about a 3 hour drive to the west. The drive was fun (the drives were some of our favorites parts of the Austria trip) and for lunch we ate at a salad bar at a mall along the way. Our hotel in Innsbruck was literally above the train and bus stations. Although it wasn’t the most scenic spot in town, the location turned out to be great because there was a supermarket nearby that we took advantage of for breakfast and a few lunches and we were only about a 10 minute walk from the city center.

There wasn’t a whole lot to do in Innsbruck, but we enjoyed the restaurant selection and we happened to be there on a Thursday night for the weekly Austrian traditional music performance. There was even slap dancing with guys with lederhosen and a song or two that included some yodeling.

One afternoon we tried to do some hiking in the mountains around Innsbruck but we ended up not really making it out of town and instead just walking along the roads near the edge of town. We ran into some other lost Americans who were driving around, so at least we weren’t the only ones who were confused.

From Innsbruck, we visited Neuschwanstein Castle in southern Germany. It was raining that morning and we had kind of a misty drive to get there, but it cleared up by time we got to the castle. The castle was the most touristy site we’ve been to on our trip so far (other than being a very famous place it’s also not too far from Munich and it’s now one of the contestants for the new 7 wonders of the world). The tour was only about 20 minutes long, but the castle was impressive inside and out and the surrounding countryside was very pretty. After the castle we visited Wies Kirche, a pristine 18th century church surrounded by mountains, fields, and a large tourist parking lot.

We spent one day in Innsbruck where we barely left the hotel. We’ve found that after sighting every day, it helps to have a break day every now and then to relax, read, and save some money. We left Innsbruck after three days and stopped off in nearby Hall for lunch. Hall had a castle, church, and Saturday market with live Austrian music (we kept timing things right this week.) We spent our last night in Austria in Linz, near the border with the Czech Republic, because we had scheduled a shuttle to pick us up from there to take us to our next stop, Cesky Krumlov in the Czech Republic. We didn’t do much there except walk around the downtown area, but we found a great beer garden for dinner.

We’re in Cesky Krumlov now, having a great time - we’ll upload some more pictures soon!

- Jason

*** We also posted a couple short videos of the Austrian band and slap dancers in Innsbruck on Youtube.

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Photos

Catching up on some reading
A bookstore in Linz