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Published: October 11th 2007
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Almost there
Nearing the summit of Kitzbüheler Horn. Well, I'm in Venice...
I still find it surreal, and rather hard to believe, but before I get into that I'll fill you in on what I've been up to.
A short bus ride from Munich took me right into the heart of the Austrian Alps to a region called Tirol. The sleepy mountain village I stayed in was called St. Johann (pronounced saint yo-haan). It was a flat town, but it was almost completely surrounded by mountains. The first day there I spent wandering around the town. I took a long walk down the river, and went for a stroll around the hills. I was staying in Bunnie's Pub - an Australian themed bar that had rooms up stairs. So that night I got my fix for some Aussie music I've been craving for so long. Everything from Khe Sahn to Are You Gunna Be My Girl - it was great!
In the morning I woke up pretty early and decided to hire out a mountain bike for the day. It was a good mountain bike (I've decided you can tell how good a bike is by the hardness of it's seat - the harder the seat, the better quality
Austrian Church
Pretty typical of the architecture around St. Johann - Bright colours, little round windows and very symmetrical. the bike), but the girl who i hired it off didn't quite have the grasp of the english language that many of the Bavarians i have met so far have had. So she wasn't much help when i was looking for ideas on where to take my bike for the day. In the end I just decided to ride up the nearest mountain. Kitzbüheler Horn rises up to an altitude of 2000m, 1318m above St. Johann's elevation of 682m. It certainly didn't seem that high up when i set out. The first track i found followed right underneath the cable car, so it was a straight route up the mountain. About 2 minutes later I was off the bike, and on the ground heaving in exasperation. Short-cuts don't work when you're going up a mountain. In the end I found the proper mountain bike trail, and a good 3 and a half hours after that I was only 300m below the summit, and once again barely able to breathe. I chained up my bike, had a lunch break - and set off for the summit on foot. But I soon discovered that navigating up the "trail" (which reminded me alot
Mountain Lake
I figured this would be good place to stop for a break on my way up the mountain. more of a cliff face) was just as hard work as it was pedalling up. I had a burst of inspired engergy when I saw some snow, but I nearly slid off the cliff face trying to get to it. It was a tiny patch, all that remained from the previous week's rain, and I wanted it. After the refreshing snow-break, I set off, and made the rest of the way up the summit. Upon reaching the top, and actually turning around to take a look at the view I'd worked so hard for, I realised it was all worth it. I attempted to give looks of pity as I walked past all the people stepping off the cable car (pity that they just wouldn't be able to appreciate the glorious views on the level that I was able to, having made my way up using nothing but Benj-power), but in reality the looks i gave were much more along the lines of grudging envy and resentment - stupid fat people. But the views were great, each mountain you looked beyond had another, bigger mountain sitting right behind it. The trip back down the mountain was reminiscent of my bike
The rental
Where i happened to ditch the bike to make the summit by foot. ride in Bosnia - death defying, scary as all hell, yet exhilerating beyond belief. Ok, maybe i like to exaggerate a little - but when you're travelling so fast down a gravel road that you can't hear a thing above the whooshing wind, a back tyre slipping and sliding IS scary as all hell. 3 and a half hours up the mountain, and a mere 10 minutes back down - gravity huh?
The next day, my ass sore as can be, I jumped on the bus to Venice.
The trip took all day, and we ended up staying in a camping ground, a few km's out of the city. Cheap accomodation inside the main city is hard to come by in Venice. I was there for 2 days (3 nights), and i enjoyed every bit of it. The camp site was good, it had it's own restaurant, two bars, a swimming pool and even some gym equiptment. But it wasn't the camping grounds I'd come to see, it was Venice. So I did.
I spent both days wandering the canals, allowing the inevitable - getting completely lost. It wasn't like I was going to get too lost - Venice is
SNOW!
A refreshing pit stop as i was nearing the summit... surrounded by ocean on every side - it's one big island, made up off 100 little ones. I had a great time just trotting along, not walking in any particular direction - just walking. A couple of times I found myself in the main (and Venice's only) piazza - San Marco's Piazza. It was there where i visited the San Marco Basilica (Saint Mark's Basilica). It was a beautiful church, inside and out. The outside was covered with with statues and archway mosaics, and the inside was one giant mosaic from the roof all the way down the walls. It must have cost a fortune to build back then, the mosaic was predominantly made with little gold pieces. An entire church full of gold makes for a great effect, and I spent a good half an hour just wandering around and staring. Behind the Basilica were the old jails that have become galleries. All the tourists were crowded around trying to get photos of the 'Bridge of Sighs' - named because it was the bridge that connected the prisons to the execution chamber, and as the innmates walked across it along death row they'd get one last glimpse of Venice...
Mountain Panorama
Mountain ranges everywhere you look. and sigh.
It did seem to have that effect on people - me included. I spent a lot of the time tripping over things while i was too busy looking around. This could also be due to the fact that the ground is not in the least bit level. It's warped, with mounds of ashpalt rising up here, and places where the roads have sunken there - the troubles Venetians deal with for haven chosen to live on a swamp! But they've got something right when the swamp of their's attracts 18 million visitors annually. And, after spending my two days there, I'm glad to have made it 18 million and 1.
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