Another early start today and off to Austria we went. Another gorgeous, sunny, warm day. Fantastic!!
We drove through wonderful green hills with the gorgeous Swiss Alps as a backdrop as we said goodbye to Switzerland. I’m going to miss Lucerne.
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| Lichtenstein fortress |
Our first stop was the town of Vaduz, the capital of the principality of Lichtenstein. Called a principality because they have a Prince of Lichtenstein but it is part of Switzerland. All I can say is that I’ve been to Lichtenstein. That’s it. There is nothing there. We couldn’t even find something good to photograph. There weren’t even people in the street. In order to try to get rid of my Swiss Francs, I paid 3 Francs to get my passport stamped as a souvenir that I’ve been to Lichtenstein.
There was a small grocery store where we all stocked up on water, fruit, snacks, and of course chocolate.
There was also a gorgeous fortress overlooking the bus stop but that was about it. I’m thinking this stop was mainly for our bus driver who needed a break after a two hour haul. There had to be more to this place than what we saw....surely.
After our 45 minutes stop (where we were all ready to leave in about 10 minutes!), it was back on the bus, rolling through the green hills, woods and mountains to Austria.
We stopped at a place called Trofana Tyrol for lunch. I’m guessing that the name of the restaurant was Trofana because we were in the county/region of Tyrol.
We then crossed the border to the Bavarian part of Germany in order to get to Austria. That’s what the movie The Sound Of Music got wrong. The family couldn’t possibly cross from Austria to Switzerland without passing through Germany first. They actually did just that – crossed the border of Austria into Germany, then continued onto Switzerland.
On our drive through this part of Germany, we passed the mountain where Hitler had his retreat called Eagle’s Nest. Apparently, Hitler was afraid of heights and he hated going up to Eagle’s Nest. Eva Braun loved it, though. It is now a tourist attraction.
After another hour’s drive, we crossed the border of Germany into Austria. No passport security, we just drove from one sign saying that we were exiting Germany, through a small part of the road called No Man’s Land, to another sign saying that we had entered Austria.
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| Emperor Maximilian's Golden Roof |
The green hills, mountains, forests, gorgeous churches and houses continued all the way to our next stop – Innsbruck, which is the home of Swarovski.
It is also home to Emperor Maximilian’s Golden Roof. And golden it is. As it was a rather sunny day (and quite warm – 26-27 degrees!) the gold was almost blinding to look at. Innsbruck, like many old European towns, has many ornate buildings and small cobblestone streets leading onto small squares and plazas. Modern red trams run down the main street. People were out enjoying a meal in the great weather. They had even tried to create a “beach” on the rocky river bank by putting out beach chairs for people to sit on – the river is a glacier river which means that it is freezing cold. Not surprising, there were people sunning themselves but no one was swimming.
After an hour of free time to look around, it was off to “The Sound Of Music” country – Salzburg, Austria. On the road, we passed by the largest monastery in Europe.
As we arrived at 5pm and dinner was not until 7:30pm, I decided to sit at my desk and write this blog. We are doing a walking tour of the old town tomorrow which will be approximately two hours long so I decided not to walk around tonight.
It’s now 6:30pm and it is still warm with the sun still high in the sky.
Had a lovely dinner and sat with Jo, Paul, Kathryn and Peter. Definitely not boring!!
Tomorrow, it’s a walking tour of some of The Sound Of Music sights and the birthplace of Mozart.
Then, it’s off to Vienna.
