Off to Zell am See

Today was a day of surprises, once again pointing out the need for flexibility when traveling.

Our original plan was to catch a bus over the pass and down into Zell am See, the most direct route and one that would allow us to see a part of the park we've not been to yet. Unfortunately, the official tourist season ended a week ago and with it the bus. Instead, we're going to backtrack the way we came in (i.e., Postbus to Spittal) and then grab a train to Zell am See. Not a big deal -- just a little more time in transit.

The Spittal bus leaves Heiligenblut at 8:18 and it takes 25 minutes to walk the trail into town, so we left the pension shortly after dawn. We enjoyed seeing the valley in a different light (literally) than before.



As we approached the village there was a break in the clouds and we could see the morning sun shining on Grossglockner.



We had enough time to quickly check email at the hotel before jumping on the bus and found that our Zell am See lodging had fallen through. The pension said they had a room in response to our initial inquiry, but our response was slow enough that they'd rented it out by the time they heard back from us. The folly of having intermittent Internet connectivity. We didn't have time to work on new lodging before the bus came, so we decided to punt -- show up in town and see what we could find. This late in the season there's sure to be some rooms available; so it is really a question of how much it will cost rather than whether or not we'll find a place.

The bus arrived on time and we had a pleasant ride down the valley. I should probably point out that riding the bus in Austria isn't like the gray dog back home -- the buses are clean, quiet, and comfortable. It isn't necessarily the fastest way to travel and you have to adjust your plans to fit their schedule (as we found out), but it is completely viable.




While riding the train to Zell am See we found a German language newspaper with an entire section on Project Management. Beth was delighted -- clearly an enlightened newspaper.

When we arrived at the train station we dropped our backpacks in a storage locker and walked through town looking for likely places to stay. We found a hotel with very nice rooms at 108 Euros/night and used that as our baseline. No one answered the door at a pension we stopped at, and the next one had a room for 35 Euros/night per person. That was still a little more than we were used to paying, but it was close enough. We picked up a key to the room and then retrieved our packs from the bahnhof.

We dropped our packs in the room and then walked around town to take in the sights. We passed the Haus der Begegnung -- a pension that looks suspiciously like a poorly disguised CIA listening post.



We also passed an entire store devoted to feminine beauty products. It was large, well stocked, and thankfully, closed. Per the photo below, I really don't think their marketing is aimed at the men.



Below is a location map showing where we were today. Heiligenblut is in the middle and Zell am See at the top, so clearly the shortest path was due north. Unfortunately, that wasn't an option at this time of year, so we took the bus southeast to Spittal and then the train in a counter clockwise arc to Zell am See. Not the most direct path, but we're not in a hurry.


View 2009.09.26.location in a larger map

Up, up, and up

I started out the day by dropping a Nalgene water bottle on the middle toe of my (bare) left foot. Under normal circumstances anyone who is even half as manly as me would have waved this off as a mere trifle, but with the Austrian gravity the water bottle must have weighed at least ten pounds and it nailed the little guy square on. It was not a pleasant experience. I did a bit of hopping and strutting and after a quick massage (with no crepitus) I decided that I could probably make it through the day.

Our plan was to go to Bricciuskappelle -- a small chapel east of Heiligenblut that we didn't make it to on Thursday. Our route took us all the way down to the valley floor below town where we crossed the river and then started up the other side. The first thing we came to was Gossnitz Falls -- one of the largest water falls in the area. We hiked up a slippery trail to an overlook near the top of the falls.



We dropped back down to the river and then started up the side of the valley again, but this time on a road that was every bit as steep as the trail to the water fall viewpoint.



The road clawed its way up through several switchbacks, quickly leaving the top of the waterfall far below. We came to an open point in the trees that allowed us to look across the valley and see the chapel (not Bricciuskappelle) that we'd found on Thursday.



The road continued up the "Gentle Incline" and eventually reached an open meadow that was "Fairly Flat". The meadow contained several small cabins and looked like it was used as pasture for cattle some of the time. While Beth was bending over to look at some thistles (smaller than the ones we'd seen yesterday) a wild animal charged out at her from the brush. Fortunately it didn't press the attack, but it gave her quite a start.



When we reached the top of the meadow we looked back and saw a family walking their toddler up the road we'd just struggled to climb.



After climbing seemingly forever on the road we switched over to a trail that continued on in the same vein. Up, up, up. The map promised that at some point we'd fork off onto a trail on the right while the main trail continued on to the stars. When the air started getting thin I began to fear that we'd missed the trail junction, so we spent a lot of time looking at the map debating our location.



We did eventually find the trail junction and then started sliding down the hill. As rugged as the terrain is, it is still being used as pasture land for cattle. We'd often see cow manure along the trail and there were regular fences with gates or stiles for us to get through.



There was lots of water coming down the valley at this point, so we passed many waterfalls (large and small) and crossed several bridges. We also passed a snow cave over one of the creeks.



Finally, we came to a meadow containing Bricciuskapelle.



We stopped at the chapel and ate a snack while sitting on the benches out front. It was wonderful to be able to rest in the warm sun while munching on nuts with the meadow and waterfalls to look at.



For a while the trial out of Bricciuskapelle was "Fairly Flat" as it wound down through the meadows. There were many small creeks trickling through the meadows and they reminded Beth of hiking in California's Marble Mountains with her Aunt Binny as a teen. She also saw flowers similar to Blue Bells that reminded her of her Grandma Carpenter.

There's a bit of a cliff before the trail drops into the valley and it has an overlook cantilevered out over nothing. While I generally have a high regard for Austrian engineering and construction, I wasn't too keen to walk all the way out to the very end.



We'd enjoyed yesterday's lunch so much that we were hoping for a repeat performance today, but as we approached the trail-side restaurant at 15:02 we saw the proprietor scurrying down the path toward home (and the restaurant was locked up tight). Poor timing on our part -- maybe we shouldn't have spent quite so long eating nuts in front of the chapel.

On the way down to Heiligenblut we passed several barns with cables for gathering hay. The barn is situated at the top of the field and has one or more cables running from the hay mow down to the bottom of the field. They presumably run a hay hook on the cable and use it to pull the hay up into the mow. I wasn't able to see anyone actually using the cables, but it was a very common feature on the barns.



We stopped for an early dinner in Heiligenblut and then hobbled back to the pension when we were finished. It was a great hike, but we covered a little more distance (and elevation) then we'd planned. We spent the balance of the evening resting and reading in our room.

Below is a track of today's hike.


View 2009.09.26.track in a larger map

Hike to Goldgraberdorf

Today we hiked east of the pension to an old gold mining community. Much of the hike was along a small road (which is typical), but portions were actual trails. It was cloudy and cooler, so we were glad we had our warmth layers -- you didn't need them so much going up hill, but when you stopped you cooled down very quickly.

We noticed lots of thistles along the road. Some were still in bloom, but most were brown and dried. A few had started to break down into the fluff that spreads the seeds on the wind.



The gold mining town was called Goldgraberdorf and there wasn't really anything left but a small tourist facility.



It has a gift shop and a bunch of displays showing how gold was processed in the area. Apparently the raw ore was mined further up in the mountains and brought here for processing. They had displays showing how the ore was cooked, stamped, mixed with mercury, and then the gold extracted. The stamp mill was my favorite -- it was powered by a waterwheel and had a series of five stamps that would be lifted and then dropped one after the other.



All of the displays had signs in Deutsch, English, and Italian. We found the English ones to be the most informative.



We had an early lunch at Alter Pocher -- the restaurant behind Goldgraberdorf. It was a small place with just a couple tables and a rustic atmosphere; antlers on the wall, a stuffed marmot hanging from the ceiling, a fireplace in the corner, and wool blankets on the benches. I can't say how nice it was to pop into a warm place for a hot meal in the middle of a hike. The Europeans may be on to something here.





We went into town in the evening to rent some WiFi time from the local hotel. I had to scramble to get four days worth of journal uploaded and edited within the 60 minutes I purchased. In the end I had just under two minutes to spare.

We had a leisurely dinner at the hotel and then walked home in the dark. Fortunately we'd brought a headlamp along as the trail is dark and lined with a barbwire fence. I'm pretty sure we wouldn't have gotten lost, but it could have been a painful trip without the headlamp.

The map below is a track of today's hike. The miners were working in the areas up-valley from the end of our track. If you look at the satellite view you'll see the lake that they had to cross before ferrying the ore down the (very steep) hill to Alter Pocher. Hard work.


View 2009.09.25.track in a larger map

Bus to Heiligenblut

We'd intended to catch the 10:45 Postbus from Spittal to Heiligenblut, but we finished breakfast quickly enough that we thought we might be able to catch the 8:45. We hustled out of the pension and in toward town, and after running the final two blocks got to the bus just as the doors were closing. We were able to buy tickets on the bus itself.

The bus from Spittal only went as far as Winklern, so we had to cool our heels there for 45 minutes before catching a second one that took us to Heiligenblut.



Heiligenblut is a small tourist town glued to the steep sides of the alps. The bus dropped us off in town and we had to hoof it to our pension in the suburbs (i.e., cow pastures). Unfortunately, the road out of town was *not* pedestrian friendly -- a retaining wall on one side, guard rail and drop off on the other, and no shoulder or sidewalk. The photo below looks back down into town before the sidewalk evaporated.



We made it to the pension and found that there was a footpath into town, so after dropping our packs we headed out on a hike. The photo below looks back at the pension from the footpath.



On the way through town I noticed that Heiligenblut, too, has custom manhole covers. Not nearly as nice as Cesky Krumlov, but still better than a blank piece of steel. I'd never really noticed before, but maybe all cities have custom covers -- sort of like vanity plates for city utilities. Something to watch for in the future.



We headed up the valley behind town with a goal of having lunch at a trailside restaurant. Our host had described the trail as being "fairly flat", but the Austrians clearly don't use the phrase the same way you and I would. We managed the trail OK, but there were definitely some steep sections. At one point a shuttle bus dropped off four school kids in front of us, and they (and their large backpacks) were soon out of sight on the road above us. Could gravity be selective in Austria?

We had a late lunch at the restaurant, and while waiting for the food were able to watch some farmers collecting loose hay in the field next door. They used a power rake to pile up the hay at the bottom of the field, and then tossed it into a basket on the back of a tractor. Once the basket was full they closed it up and headed down the road. I didn't see how they loaded it into the barn, but it had to be fairly efficient as the tractor returned empty within a few minutes.







Our route back to the pension took us high up the valley wall (as if we weren't high enough already), through some woods, and then back into pasture lands. Near the peak of our wanderings we came across a small chapel overlooking the valley. The chapel was at the far edge of nowhere, but it was outfitted just like a tiny church -- replete with pews, stained glass windows, an alter, and burning candles. People clearly don't come here for services (do they?), so maybe it is just a place for the occasional hiker to stop and meditate or pray.





Not surprisingly, our route back was all downhill. We were following a narrow paved single lane road that steeply dropped through a series of switchbacks. The hiking trail followed the road through the straight sections, but took a shortcut from turn to turn through the switchbacks. You didn't quite need ropes through the shortcuts, but it was close. Per the Austrian trail rating system this was probably a "Gentle Incline".

At an open point we had a view down into Heiligenblut with our pension on the left side of the valley beyond (i.e., underneath the wispy clouds).



In the map below, Spittal is in the lower right with Heiligenblut in the upper left. Winklern is below Heiligenblut.


View 2009.09.24.location in a larger map

The next map is a track of our hike. The pension is in the lower right and we went through town and did a loop over on the left.


View 2009.09.24.track in a larger map

Train to Spittal

Today is a travel day, with the overall goal of getting to Spittal, Austria. Our pension offers a shuttle service, so it was easiest to just jump in the van for a one hour ride to Linz, Austria. Once inside Austria we should be able to catch a train to Spittal.

We were the only two in the shuttle and the driver didn't speak much English, so we spent most of the time enjoying the scenery. I noticed that the Czechs marked their roads with solid white lines along each side with nothing in the middle, but when we crossed into Austria it switched to a dashed white line down the middle with nothing on the sides.

I'd never actually heard the owner of the pension tell our driver where we wanted to go, so I was encouraged to see a sign welcoming us to Linz. He asked us if we wanted to go to the train station, and in a few more minutes were were there.

We stopped in at the ticket office and found that the once daily direct train to Spittal would be leaving in 10 minutes, so we bought tickets and dashed off to the platform. I also noticed that the station offered free WiFi access, so I used the iPhone to check email and found a couple responses from the pensions in Zell am See. I got off a quick reply confirming our plans to go to our preferred pension, and was able to send a second note telling #2 that we wouldn't be coming. As I pressed 'send' the train started to move out of the station.

There was some kind of problem with the rail line, so we had to transfer to buses at one point. It was unfortunate that the rails were kaput, but I give the Austrians bonus points for efficiency -- it was less than five minutes from when we got off the train to when our bus was loaded with luggage and people and rolling out of the station. Hopefully to the proper destination.

After a 45 minute ride we transferred back onto a train and shared a compartment with an older Austrian woman named Heidi. She was quite the world traveller, having been to several places in the states ("New York, San Francisco. Seattle, yes. Las Vegas, of course!") as well as South America, Asia, and a little bit of Africa ("Only Gibralter, Kenya, and Egypt"). We enjoyed visiting with her during the final portion of our train ride.

Our pension in Spittal was across the river and outside of town -- about a 30 minute walk. We found a path through a cornfield that got us off the main road and then took us past (and through) several farms. Our room looked out onto very steep pasture used for a cow and some sheep. From our second story room we could look eye-to-eye with the cow at a distance of maybe 30'. We could hear her breathing as she chewed her cud and watched to see if we'd do something useful (e.g., give her something to eat).



Our room made a great first impression when we walked through the door -- quiet, an excellent view, and attractive linens on the bed. Unfortunately, the substance was a little different. The sheets were polyester, it was a smoking room (as was the entire pension), and Beth found ashes in a variety of disconcerting places (e.g., the drinking glasses). It was not one of our favorite places to stay, but it provided a place to stay for the night.



The map below shows Cesky Krumlov at the top, Linz, Austria just below it, and Spittal an der Drau at the very bottom.


View 2009.09.23.location in a larger map

Graphite Mine & River Rafting

The Cesky Krumlov tourist map had an arrow pointing off-map and a small notation saying "Graphite Mine Tour" that looked interesting, so today we ventured "off the map" to see what we could find -- it was great.

Graphite has been mined in this part of the Czech Republic for 100+ years, but this particular mine was only started in 1975 (the youngest mine in the territory). It ran till 2003, when it was closed due to insufficient demand for the product.



Our tour group consisted of the two of us and our guide (named Milan) who spoke English with a limited vocabulary but excellent pronunciation. It was hard to remember to speak slowly and carefully when asking questions. They provided us with all the requisite safety gear for the well-equipped miner.



We rode into the mine in small cars pulled by a battery-powered locomotive. The ride was anything but smooth -- slamming from side to side, lurching forward and back, grinding and bumping coming from the wheels. It was loud enough that I had to cover my ears for most of the trip.



Inside the mine we looked at the air powered drills, how a rock face was rigged for explosives, the power shovel used to muck out rubble, and some stalactites which are growing from the ceiling.



At one point in the tunnel you could see a 4" wide vein of graphite running through the rock. As part of the tour we were required to get a smudge of graphite on our face, so Beth dabbed some on her nose.



We thought the mine tour was one of the highlights of Cesky Krumlov, but most of the tourists preferred rafting the river for their adventuresome activity -- it was probably the second most popular tourist activity in town. Lest we miss out, we spent the afternoon on the river. We picked up a yellow plastic canoe and with a quick briefing on how to navigate the occasional dam we were off.



The river was actually quite placid -- an occasional riffle and some tricky rocks in shallow spots, but nothing too challenging. Of course, that's not to say that we weren't challenged at various times. There were several rustic restaurants serving beer along the river; beer drinking being the *most* popular tourist activity in Cesky Krumlov, the Czech Republic, and seemingly all of Europe. We tried to stop at one but ended up spinning circles along the edge of the river. After such a fine display of skill I was too embarrassed to stop, so we did another full turn (just to make it look like the other ones were intentional) and then continued down the river.



We caught up with three guys in a rubber raft who were speaking English, and when we started talking to them we found that they were from Shoreline, Washington. Small world.

We found a gentle bend in the river that was more suited to our skill level and pulled in for a short break.



When we reached the take-out point a van was waiting to haul us and two other rafts back to town.

We spent the evening planning the final week of our trip. We have Internet connectivity at this pension (a surprisingly rare occurrence), so it is a good time and place to make plans. We're going to do some hiking in Heiligenblut and Zell am See and then catch the train to Munich for our flight home. We found several potential pensions and shot off email messages asking about availability.

The track below is for our river trip down the river.


View 2009.09.22.track in a larger map

Cesky Krumlov by Bike

Many of the tourist facilities in Cesky Krumlov are closed on Monday, so we rented bikes from the pension and headed for a mountain called Klet. It felt pretty strange to be riding without helmets, gloves, or cleats and the bikes didn't come with pumps, patch kits, or water bottles, so it was definitely a minimalist experience. I think I missed my rear-view mirror most of all -- I kept glancing up to see what was behind me and there was nothing there to see.



We had a map of bike routes and found the proper way out of town, but things kind of went down hill from there. The scale on the map was fairly course and it was hard to make out the detail, so we eventually just started following the road signs -- always a bad omen.



The road was paved and the scenery excellent, so the riding was very good. Eventually we passed a sign saying that Klet was only 2.5 km away (almost there!) and that was followed by a *long* stretch of no signs at all. The next sign said that Klet was 3 km away, and the one after that pointed up a steep dirt path through the woods (just 2 km!) that was marked with signs prohibiting hiking, biking, and cross-country skiing. Exactly how was one supposed to use the path? We decided to play fast and loose with the law and take the path regardless -- we figured that if anyone caught us we could just claim to be French.

We eventually got back onto the paved path and found graffiti on the road encouraging cyclists to keep pushing for the final stretch. Almost there!



The top of the hill had a restaurant (as expected), but it was closed for the day (not expected). We wandered around the summit for a bit but weren't really able to see much -- the visibility was limited by the haze. The trip back down was 10 km of coasting with no wrong turns; we even found where we'd lost the route on the way up.



We got back to the pension by mid-afternoon and took a nap after cleaning up. When we headed into town for dinner it was still too early to eat, so we walked through the narrow streets and back alleys. The river makes a series of big loopy S turns through town, so there's lots of river frontage and bridges going from one "peninsula" to another. The town has the requisite tourist zone, but it also has scads of tiny narrow cobblestone alleys, paths along the river, and elevated roadways crossing over stone arch bridges. We took a path that crossed over itself several times -- going under an arch down low and later on crossing the bridge up high. It was a very pleasant walk.





The map below is a track of our bike ride to Klet. It is missing the first part of the route, so it appears to start in the middle of the woods. The return from the top of Klet to our pension is complete.


View 2009.09.21.track in a larger map