25th Sept 2015
I get some
mountains at last !
Set off quite
early (for us) on a reasonably sunny but chilly morning, with a vague idea of
heading towards Innsbruck. As usual, we
stayed for a while on small minor roads, and were crossing some very scenic
rolling hills as we headed almost due south past Munich. In one area we saw railway lines that had
shiny tops, so they were obviously used – But there was quite a lot of grass
between and along the edges of the track, so it looked disused. The answer came a few minutes later when a
little single diesel engine coach came along the line, carrying local
passengers – What a perfect use for the little lines that would appear to be
inefficient, but do still serve an important purpose, especially out in the
countryside.
By now mountains
we starting to appear in the distance as we headed closer to the Alps – And I
love my mountains. It put a smile on my
face to see them after all the flat country we had seen recently. We passed though
lots of little towns and villages, with each one gradually becoming more and
more Tyrolean in their architecture as we headed south. We stopped for bread at a bakery in one
little hamlet, and then Janet found a place on the map that looked interesting.
We were seeing castles and churches high up on hillsides beside us as we drove,
and it looked like there was a castle on an island in a lake, and it wasn’t too
far out of our way.
So we headed on
down the minor roads, stopping at a McDonald’s for a coffee and to get some
wifi as we had some emails to send, and then continued on to Prien Am
Chiemsee. This was a delightful little
town, but we couldn’t see any castle on or near a lake, so we turned off
towards the lake down a little road, eventually coming to a big car park which
had old steam engines and open carriages in, and down by the edge of the lake,
passenger ferry boats. In the car park
were a LOT of cars, and almost as many big tour coaches – This was obviously a
popular outing ! However when we saw
postcards of the castle, (which was out on an island in the lake !), it looked
more like a low built stately home – Very nice I am sure, but not the kind of
castle we were looking for. So after a
quick wander round watching all the people (mostly local German people, we
think) getting on the boats on what was quite a chilly day, we shared a big
pretzel, and left.
We had decided
that there was one particular castle we did want to see – It is one of Mad King
Ludwig’s we think, and it over to the west of Innsbruck. A bit out of our way, but we thought it might
be worth the effort, seeing that we are not in a hurry. So we decided to get a move on by using the
autobahn down to Innsbruck, and headed off down there, being passed at great
speed by 2 black Lamborghini’s going almost flat out, nose to tail, that made a
magnificent noise as they passed, and later on by a Ferrari that wasn;t hanging
about either. Then of course there were
some incredibly quick Audis and Porsches – It is quite stressful on these kind
of roads when you are in an old Troopie that still has a long way to go, and so
you are sitting on about 100 kmh !!
Then we came to
the German / Austrian border – Once again, minimal signage, although there was
one, but I was so surprised I didn’t have my camera ready and missed it ! But shortly after the border the freeway on
the other side was blocked by the Police, and the traffic was backed up for
MILES. Probably 10 or 15. And once again, this was Germany trying to
prevent the flow of refugees across their borders, because it is becoming a
massive problem over here at the moment.
I hope we do not encounter too many problems when we start heading north
in a couple of week’s time.
We got to
Innsbruck at about 3 pm, and instead of going into Innsbruck at 3 pm on a
Friday evening, we decided to head on towards the castle. It just happened that the winter sport resort
Seefeld was just up the road, and Janet knew it some 40 (?) years ago, so we
decided to pay a visit. We climbed
steeply out of Innsbruck up to Seefeld, and went through the town (unrecognizable
!) to a lovely campsite in the valley.
So we will stay here tonight then explore round here and up to the
castle
A cold evening,
but looking forward to tomorrow. Being
able to just wander here and there at will is one of the great things about
travelling like this - You can just explore at will. The weather is supposed to be warm(ish) and
sunny for the next few days, so fingers crossed.
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