I collected the photos of our bike tour that were posted to Facebook (Thanks Chris for finding the link!). Click below to see them all.
Exploring Salzburg on bicycles
Fraulein Maria’s Bicycle Tour Photos
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Monthly Archives: June 2012
Salzburg Photos
Here are the pictures from Salzburg. We’ll have a few extra that our bicycle tour guide took soon. Click below to see the full album.
Don’t worry, it’s just apfel gespritzt
Waterfall Hike Photos
This album contains photos from our first hike, near Hallstatt, to a waterfall. Click the picture below to see them all.
No laws requiring mowing here! Cows, sheep, and goats love to munch on the wildflowers.
Dachstein Photos
The photos from our excursion up on the Dachstein cable car ready. At the first stop, we visited an ice cave. Photography was prohibited in the cave itself. From there, we continued higher to a few lookout points and had lunch at a refuge. Click the picture below to see the full album.
It may not look like much, but somehow, these curved chairs were perfectly relaxing, being out in the warm sun with a cool snowy breeze and views for miles around.
Hallstatt Photos
Our photos from Hallstatt are ready. We spent two nights in this picturesque town in Austria’s lake district. The pictures from our hike to the waterfall near Hallstatt, as well as the Dachstein excursion, will be posted in another album. The full album can be seen by clicking on the image below.
Overlooking Hallstatt, the lake, and the surrounding mountains
Vienna Photos
We’ve organized the first album from our trip: Vienna. Click the image below to see the full album.
Schönbrunn Palace from gardens
Day 26 – Two Opt Out
After the Hawaiian incident, Lauren was not looking forward to another long flight. They played some mediocre movies though, and in the end, it wasn’t as terrible as feared. Raul enjoyed the movies and did not find them mediocre.
After landing in Atlanta, the next several hours reminded Lauren that she really does still hate flying. Even though one already clears security before coming into the United States, another checkpoint is present before any connecting flights may be taken. Raul and Lauren both opted out of the body imager and received the enhanced pat down. Then they tried multiple times, without success, to get a free change to an earlier flight to St. Louis. Sadly, they were forced to wait six hours, including the extra delay to their flight, and arrived in St. Louis shortly after 8pm, 21 long hours after they had woken up in Zürich.
Raul’s parents and grandmother picked them up from the airport, and they all met Emanuel and Olivia for dinner at π. Grandmother is leaving to return to Romania in the morning, so it was the last chance they had to get the family together.
Confœderatio Helvetica
| Time | Plan | Sleep in |
|---|---|---|
| Day 26 | Sunday 10 June | St Louis |
| 09:35 |
Depart Zürich on Delta flight 67, seats 25AB Duration: 10h 30m, Total: 16h 2m Aircraft: Boeing 767-300 |
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| 14:05 | Arrive Atlanta | |
| 17:59 |
Depart Atlanta on Delta flight 1834, seats 17DE Duration: 1h 54m Aircraft: MD-88 |
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| 18:53 | Arrive St Louis | |
Day 25 – Back to the Beginning
For their final day in Switzerland, Raul and Lauren decided to take advantage once more of the Swiss Pass, as well as the conveniently compact size of the country, to return to the first Swiss town they visited, Appenzell. It took less than two hours to reach the town by train. Here they hoped to find a non-touristic store selling cowbells, since this is cow country. They were assured by several people that local farmers bought their bells at a certain shop on the main street. Despite these assurances, they decided not to buy a bell from this souvenir shop and resigned to returning home without one.
After a traditional Appenzeller lunch featuring the smelly regional cheese, they returned to Zürich. Ahead of them lay the daunting task of organizing and packing their bags one final time. They were somewhat glad to be leaving their hostel, as Lauren noticed during her shower that the bathroom ceiling was covered in mold.
They ate dinner at an Italian restaurant, and, as luck would have it, Lauren found a dark chocolate gelato at a stand next door. Although the texture was perhaps not quite as right as the gelato in Lugano, the “darkness” of the flavor was delicious. Raul and Lauren strolled the restaurant district, the Niederdorf, eating their gelato and stopping here and there to watch the Germany vs. Portugal soccer match that was playing on all the TVs.
Confœderatio Helvetica
| Time | Plan | Sleep in |
|---|---|---|
| Day 25 | Saturday 9 June | Zürich |
| 08:17 |
Depart Murten platform 1 on S5 15829 to Zurich Total duration: 1h 41m Saved S₣27 |
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| 08:56 | Arrive Bern, transfer to platform 4 on IC 817 | |
| 09:02 | Depart Bern | |
| 09:58 | Arrive Zürich, stow bags | |
| 10:15 | ▲▲Swiss National Museum, free | |
| 13:00 | Self-guided walk | |
| 14:00 | Zürichsee cruise | |
| 16:00 | Uetliberg, Zürich from above | |
| 17:30 |
Check in to City Backpacker Hotel Biber, S₣78 including sheets, no breakfast, free Wi-Fi Tel: +41 044-251-9015 sleep@city-backpacker.ch |
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Sights
Sleeping
Eating
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Day 24 – Delicious Luxemburgerli
Raul and Lauren left Basel in the morning for Zürich…and arrived to yet more rain. They stowed their bags in the convenient lockers and went across the street to the Swiss National Museum, a good rainy day activity. They saw many artifacts that used to decorate the Catholic churches and cathedrals before the Reformation swept them away. It really is a shame to see the grand buildings sit so starkly devoid of artistic distractions.
By the time they left the museum, the rain had let up, and the travellers began the town walk, roughly following the Limmat River to Lake Zürich. Near the end, they stopped to purchase some Luxemburgerli: one-inch cream-filled, macaron-meringue hamburgers in a variety of delicious flavors.
By this time, it was of course raining again, so they took a handy tram back to the train station, picked up their bags, and went to the dumpy hostel to check in.
They had fondue and rösti for dinner one last time and went to a tiny little room for a dessert of hot chocolate. The interior of the cafe was comfortable and rich, unlike the hot chocolate. After the drink, it was raining again, so they decided to turn in for the night. Lauren is reading an adventure book about rabbits, Watership Down, and Raul is getting a new high score in Bejeweled. The hostel is cheap (in an expensive city), and that’s the only good thing one can say about it.
Day 23 – No Cowbells
With so many activities they had planned being rained out at some point during the trip, Raul and Lauren acquired a free day to use. They thought about visiting France but ended up choosing Basel, Switzerland.
Before going to Basel, though, they took a train to a small town near Bern in an attempt to procure some cow bells. They wanted the same that a farmer would buy and not the touristic kind, so they sought out a hardware store. Since no tourist would ever have cause to be in this area, nobody spoke English, but they managed to convey their intent to one of the employees, and she dutifully started them on a wild goose chase which they had the good sense to ignore. As the young lady made some calls to try to help them, another employee and several customers got involved, each trying to aid Raul and Lauren and throwing in the few English words they knew to boot.
Their failed mission complete, they travelled back to Bern and on to Basel. They brought with them only their daypack, for in Bern, they had taken advantage of a useful railway service that allowed them, for a small fee, to ship their large backpack on to Zürich, where it would be waiting for them the following day.
Since Basel does not figure among the cities in their guidebook, Raul and Lauren stopped at the very helpful Tourist Information in the train station and there, made a hotel reservaion and got information on various city walks. When they arrived at their hotel to check in, they found it was a “proper” hotel, lacking the charms of a family-run pension. That said, it was one of the most comfortable places they had stayed in during the whole trip.
When they left the hotel to explore the city, it was sunny and warmer than anywhere else they had been. They followed two of the well-signed city walks. The most enjoyable portions were the ferry crossing of the Rhine and the promenade along the river.
It was just beginning to rain as they neared their hotel, so they decided to stay inside for the rest of the evening. Raul napped, and Lauren waited for the rain to let up to visit Coop and buy their standard picnic fare for dinner.