Thursday in Austria (September 27th)

Thursday we traveled from Salzburg to Konstanz, Germany via Innsbruck. It was a pretty long day on the bus; several hours with stops here and there. I'm sitting not quite in the back, which is where most of the kids on the trip are sitting (okay, Don in the white shirt there isn't a kid but he's closer to being one than to the age of some of our senior members, who are over seventy). Most of the time we all get along fine but the kids can act up a little bit. Erica likes to kick my seat, and Brandee likes to listen to her iPod so loud that everybody else can hear it (I worry for her hearing).We stopped in Innsbruck for a midday lunch and sight-seeing; the weather had improved (mostly cloudy with some scattered blue skies) and in the high 40's, maybe low 50's.

Innsbruck is very high in the Alps, about 1500 feet, surrounded by much higher peaks (the winter Olympics were held here twice, in 1964 and 1976). We spent a few hours in the city center. Here's an elaborate building, the first you see as you enter the old town from the municipal parking lot:
This is the view of the major shopping street downtown:
And its corresponding street to the right:
Innsbruck seemed to have more genuine tourist shops (i.e. schlock) than Salzburg, which had very fine clothing & accessory stores. Still, there were some upscale places. In particular, the Swarovski Crystal company, which has a factory in Austria, has a very large store here. Some of the crystal items are very pretty but it's hard to be excited enough to stay in a store like that for too long (at least for me). But speaking of excessive displays of consumption, Innsbruck is home to the 'goldenes dachl' (golden roof) seen below. The emperor Maximilian apparently enjoyed sitting under this roof and throwing scraps to the entertainers below around 1500 or so. It's still there, hard to believe but true:
There was a nice lingerie store on the avenue, as Adam found out (notice the handcuff on the mannequin's wrist; a very nice touch) -
After shopping we had lunch at (it had to happen eventually) McDonalds. The kids (Bob & Jan's as well as Jim & Kristey's; that is, Erica, Tessa, & Adam) wanted some good ol'-fashioned American comfort food. And yes, Quentin Tarantino is correct, the quarter pounder with cheese is the 'Royale'. I stuck with the classic Big Mac myself, which tasted just like (here it comes) a Big Mac. meh. I tried to get a beer with the Big Mac but they don't do that in Austria (only in Germany). sigh.

After lunch we trooped back to the bus; the weather was clearing up, and I got a few nice pictures of the mountains around Innsbruck and from the bus as we traveled. This was a long trip, about 5 hours, with a stop along the way at Rosenberger (a mega rest-stop).




Erica wasn't thrilled to be crowned Queen of Rosenberger.
Brandee wasn't thrilled either but did a better job of pretending.
As we left Innsbruck our tour guides Ondra and Jen put 'The Sound of Music' on the bus's DVD player. I don't think I had watched the whole thing through since 1965, honestly, and it was pretty fascinating to be driving through the Alps as we watched the movie. Naturally, since I tear up at any movie scene with kids in it, I was pretty much sniffling for a couple of hours ... getting old sucks sometimes!

We got in to Singen, near Konstanz, around 8PM; early enough for a few drinks in the bar before staggering off to bed. Once again I had to troubleshoot the wifi before I could use it (in Salzburg it was reception issues; in Singen it's DNS server problems). Isn't this stuff supposed to be easy?

Anyway, tomorrow is sight-seeing in Konstanz, followed by a weekend of an Oktoberfest there and a parade in Stuttgart on Sunday. Coming down to the home stretch!

Later -