Dachau

All along our road trip, Germans had been coming up and greeting us excitedly in German, often talking motorhome talk and admiring our Possl. As I may have already mentioned, we had German number plates - from Dachau.

With this association following us throughout our journey, we decided that we couldn't return the van before visiting the Dachau concentration camp memorial. (Located only a short drive from the vans return location in Sulzmoos ). 

We knew it would be a somber day, and I decided to take no pictures, quite a change from my usual snapping away, but I didn't think pictures would do justice to the story of the camp and the lives that were forever changed here. And I wanted my focus for the day to be on the story of the lives affected here. 

Most of us have learned something of the horrors of the camps, and over the years I have read autobiographies, seen movies and plays and documentaries on the mass murders that happened. I don't think I can add anything further to the story of those who died, or those who survived, but look up Dachau if you are interested in knowing more. 

This was a well documented memorial site, austere, yet informative, telling a range of stories of those who were imprisoned here. 

Rafting parties

Our first afternoon parked up at the campground in Munich, and I'm not sure if I'm at the boundary of an old quarry with big trucks coming and going and clanking and carry on, or in some time forgotten concert where they perform Robbie Williams - Angel - followed by a heavy metal favourite. 

Just after we arrived and got settled, heather said she wanted to suss out where the party was. We kept hearing bands , sometimes playing old folk favourites, odd country music, pop hits, then some German number we couldn't name, followed by sections of accordion.

Heather called me over to see the craziest spectacle. Huge log rafts were floating down the river with live performing bands and beer guzzling revellers dancing away and singing along. 

It was a hot sunny day, and the river icy cold from the mountains. And we just happened to be positioned at the point in the river where these rafting trips ended. As the rafts pulled up, the band would carry on for 1 or 2 last popular numbers to end the journey with jubilant cheers from the rafters. 

Crazier still, was once the people had merrily dispersed (and empty kegs rolled off the rafts), the rafting crew would dissemble the raft, and a massive logging truck would drive down to the rivers edge, and load up the giant logs. Presumably to return them to the start position for the next trip. 

And note - the guys working on the ground alongside the hydraulic claws which grabbed the tree length logs wore no safety hats Zac!

Post Script - after a bit of Google time I learnt that the area 5-6 hours upstream where they depart from has a long history of rafting as a means of transport, and the party rafts we saw are built the same traditional way. 

Leaving the VAN

Last days with the van

I started off hating this van, naming her the "Beast", with her heavy gearbox, dash board signs to forever shift up yet another gear, and the wide berth on narrow lanes. But my driving a manual has greatly improved, my skill at manoeuvring through tight little roads with oncoming buses is now quite adept, and I love the van. 

She has been our home away from home. We have lots of cupboards and orderly ways to tidy up and then still be able to find everything. She provides us with a bed, and a place to wash, cook and even pee when needed. And now we are about to return her and the next phase of our adventure is about to begin.

It must be the nature of adventures that some angst is raised. 

I spent our last morning in the Salzburg camp making phone calls to recruiters to finalise the plans to meet up, present documents and hopefully be directed into employment. While keeping in semi regular contact with these people whilst travelling, there were still several hours of enrolment forms to complete, emails to send etc to maximise my interview time, so our first morning in Munich that's what I did. Along with all this is the concern that there is still one piece of documentation I require to work, the DBS check, and this is tricky as it requires formal proof of a UK home address which we will not have initially and then may still take several weeks to process. 

This meant we didn't venture into the city until about 1:30 in the afternoon, and the prospect of returning the van in 2 days, moving onto the UK, the uncertainty of how long it will take to get into a position, and the expectation that our living costs will rise in London, and our tight tight budget has left us feeling very stressed and quite anxious. 

But that's adventures right! If there are no unknowns, they are not adventures.

So while trying to jolly each other along, heather and I chose a "slow" afternoon in Munich city. We wandered about, ate lunch, and enjoyed several music stages - the first playing Irish music - some with German lyrics  - the second, in the very centre of Munich surrounded by beer gardens, country music. Here we grabbed a couple of beers and settled in to just relax in the sun and be part of the crowd. 

Then home to the van, to try and enjoy our 2nd to last night. We sat outside in the warm evening and did more planning and scheming, thinking of ways we can live cheaply and somehow anchor ourselves for the following ?4 weeks of uncertainty.

By the time we had finished, we looked up and realised that the evenings have lengthened over our short time here, and it's light right up to about 9:50 pm.

Munich Camp

Munich

Sun music and beer

Salzburg

Slazburg ...

a very easy city to visit

public transport is great 

our camp was expensive, but lovely gardens, big trees, great facilities and exceptionally helpful staff

has a great inner city walk amongst large trees from the old fort down to the river with perfect views at every turn ( thanks Deb for this suggestion)

celebrates Mozart's birthplace and we loved the museum in his former home where I saw one of the violins he played

Had a choir singing sounds of angels as we viewed the sights of the Dom (the cathedral) from our spot up in the balcony

has the lovely Mirabella gardens 

And was where I tasted my first aperol spritz... A cocktail drink I'm going to have to get dave to serve at the Big Orange.

And here we also did the ...

Dom Platz - the residence of past bishops and the rulers of the day - living in staggering and obscene opulence in the name of God and as the rulers of the day. Generations of these guys were heralded as the founders of the city as they funded and sought to develop the grand buildings. While we toured through huge stately rooms, heather commented that I had the attention span of a gnat, as I fast forwarded the audio guide and just took the interesting bits. But I'd usually fare reasonably well when she'd test me on my general knowledge at the end of the visit. 

I was particularly fascinated with the heating furnaces, something I've been seeing for weeks and not known what they were. In this particular palace, they were installed in the 1600's , and are often ornate ceramic towers that look a lot like giant wedding cakes, standing about 8-10 feet tall. Behind these were huge fire pits and chimneys, and a space where the coals and embers could be placed inside the furnace. These interior fireplaces were nestled between walls, in a space big enough for a small room in our homes, but I guess on the scale of these palaces, it was inconsequential. 

The most interesting fact I learnt here - the closer the guests got to an audience with the prince archbishop, the smaller the rooms became ( as not many got this supreme privilage), and the rooms were not furnished with chairs, but the ornate tapestries and frescoes were said to keep the would be guests entertained. As they were reminded of their place in the world according to the spiritual order.

At another gallery visit, where I chose to sit in the wings and rest up rather than tour yet another exhibition, heather announced that I had missed seeing a real masterpiece by Rembrandt. So up I got, whizzed through the rooms, looking out for the biggest and grandest, 

As Heather wasn't going to help me here. But they had saved the best for last, and in its own room, behind several layers of plate glass, was a small yet devine painting on copper, of an old women praying. Unlike Heather, I stayed and read the exhibit info, and so could educate her for a change on some of the details that contributed to making this a masterpiece. AND I really liked it. 

A few final thoughts before we head to the UK

Eyes front!

Heather has a recurrent eyelash problem where about every 4-6 weeks an eyelash grows inwards and starts to scratch and irritate her eye. Back home, she just makes a visit to the optician, and within about 2 minutes, he has plucked out the lash and she is instantly back to a state of comfort.

And so, at about week 5 heather started to feel the beginnings of an irritated eye. She was reluctant to deal with this in Slovenia, and considered getting it sorted in Austria, until the need versus opportunity ratio drove her to seek assistance. 

A helpful apocathare (chemist) looked up the directory and located 2 options in our vicinity in Salzburg. So we opted for the one in the old town, as we were heading back there anyway. Heather was reluctant to have just a technician do this simple procedure, and fair enough. When we located the rooms, I realised the Dr was probably a laser surgeon going by the unreadable signs and displays. We conveyed the message as best we could to the receptionist and were told to sit and wait. We were wondering just how much this may cost, now that we were more confident that we could communicate the necessary info to a competent practitioner. 

I guessed - maybe €30 and thought we would be lucky if it was only that much. This usually costs heather $10 at home, and does literally take 2 minutes. 

Heather later reported she got more worried about the cost when led into the consulting room and spied the beautiful art work on the walls. It ended up costing a whopping €70, but it was done, and would hopefully last until heather flew home for Hanas baby. 

One other story I forgot to blog, was while driving the wonderous Grossglockner - remember the high alpine pass that reaches summits on a road of s bends and steep climbs -

One particular useful feature of the van is the rotating captains chair. My drivers seat unlocks and swivels around to make a very cosy dining/lounging seat. Sometimes I use it just to make stepping back into the van easier as well, say for a wee stop for example. 

Well, while driving maybe the 3rd of the many tight winding bends, with heather gravely clutching her armrest and declining to take photos of the valley far below, I realised as I turned into the next bend, my driving was hampered by the quiet motion of my seat sliding around to the door, not what I needed when views of the oncoming traffic were already hampered by the steep gradient and tight corner, and it really was a long way down. I quickly pushed with my feet, swung my seat back to face the front, and got the darn thing clicked securely back in place before heather even noticed this small yet near catastrophe. 

Intimate places for the dead

Old Austrian towns have a beautiful way of creating intimate garden cemeteries, usually with a central well or tap and watering cans, and well tended family plots, one small space often shared by many.

At Hallstatt, land is at a premium as the rock cliffs come down straight to the lakes edge, and the houses are virtually on top of one another on the small stretches of land available. So in the cemetery, space is limited. To accommodate this, they have developed the practice of burying the dead, and after about 15 years, they dig them up, clean and bleach the bones, and place them in a small crypt. More recently they took to painting the skulls. The last person was added in the early 90's and people can still request to be placed here still, though cremation has mostly alleviated the problem of space. This place, though a bit eerie, was not at all gruesome, and had a very intimate feel to it, and seemed to be a place where people could remember those that had passed away in a loving way. The patterns painted on the skulls were representative of  a persons attributes and values.

This rich Baron had a chapel built for his elaborate contributions, and requested in his will that he be lifted up every 50 years and paraded around the town and his castle across the lack

In the old town in Salzburg, St Peters church has a small cemetery, where many of the graves are decorated with metal plaques with beautiful ornamentation of saints, madonna's  and angels. The graves are again shared by many, and the plants and gardens well tended. Here we saw the burial place Haydn, and Mozart's sister.

Mining

Salt mine caving - where's Zac when we need to check out the safety process

Yesterday we camped at the lovely Steinbach on Attersee lake. It had been another hot hot day and so we made the most of the clear waters and had 2 afternoon swims. Heather even swam out to the pontoon, but we both got the willies thinking about the big fish that lurk there, and the water was so clear and deep, you just may see them coming.

We drove to Saint Gilgen, a pretty old town on yet another lake in the Salzkammergut region. Had a fantastic lunch, look around. The church held some lovely early art, including a piece donated by Mozart's sister, as they used to come here, and Mozart had a house on the lake shore. Then off again.

Cold trout, on toast with fresh horseradish cream, and white asparagus with hollandaise and delicious potatoes

It was a Sunday, and there were beautiful fresh flowers in the church

Then we drove to the picturesque 4500 year old town of Hallstatt, perched on the lakeside. This place is famous for the salt mining that has been occurring on the mountain for the last 7000 years, and continues still today. 

Heather had planned out the itinerary while I was busy job hunting, and so I blindly followed when we agreed to do the somewhat expensive salt mine tour (€28 for me but HG got a senior discount). First this involved a fun funicular (cable car) ride up the mountainside. I thought we might get to enter some mining cave entrances for 20 meters or so, and see a few displays, and didn't see any English brochures until the way out. So I was a tad alarmed when we were handed  mine entry attire - heavy cotton pants and shirts, with picture explanations ensuring everything was covered. We looked a bit like eastern block Teletubbies, but I decided that since no hard hats were distributed it would probably be ok. The was no info, or explanations about what we were about to do, and the guide - speaking in German and English told our group to enter the tunnel, walking in single file along the centre of the narrow rail track. He called to a guy at the back and asked him to put the chain back across the entrance when he was the last to go through. 

We'd seen on the interpretive display boards at the entry room that the tunnels took enormous pressure from the mountain, and steel and wood was used to secure the tunnels and frequently needed restructuring. Holly Heck! We really were in a mining tunnel. Sections of the tunnel were made from wood, with steel arched girders bracing the timber, and some sections were bare rock. We walked on in single file. There were video displays at places along the way that explained the history of the salt mine. The body of a prehistoric miner had been discovered here in 1734. He was well preserved due to the salt, and the miners of the day took his body down to the town, where the local priest was reluctant to bury him as he was not baptised. 

At one point we were 150 meters below the surface of the mountain. I tried not to think about Pike River, but couldn't help wondering that we had had no safety briefing, and I wondered what Zac would make of this all. 

At 2 points in the tour there were "miners slides" to get to lower sections - but I was too chicken and took the narrow stairs, but heather went down. 

At the end of the tour, our guide announced that we got a train ride up to the surface. We sat straddled on carriages a bit like at kowhai park, but a larger scale, told to not touch the walls, and keep heads low. I was just about to take a picture when off we went, through a tiny tunnel,whizzing along in the dark, just seeing enough to know I wanted to keep my head down.

Miners slide

Camping at Hallstatt 

Our delicious van lunch

This was a tasty ?aspic we got from the supermarket