annhig

hi everyone,

as I have found that the trip reports that I enjoy most start this way, I'm going to start with an overview, and follow that up with a more detailed account of our trip, from which we returned, with not a little relief, last friday.

first of all, you will have gathered from the title of this trip report that its defining characteristic was the weather - which was wet. not just wet, but at times, rain of biblical proportions fell, so that the danube overflowed, roads were closed, houses were pumped out, and worst of all, we were inconvenienced! that said, we did our best to have a good time, and stiff British upper lips were much in evidence.

here's our itinerary, plus links to the hotels we stayed at. I'll let you know what we thought of them later....

Day 1 – fly Ryanair to Bratislava. 14.55. stay www.hotelmarrols.sk/
[€150 including breakfast] [1 night]
Day 2 –Hydrofoil to Vienna . Stay http://www.hotelaustria-wien.at/ [€144 /night] [4 nights]
Day 3- Sun Vienna.
Day 4 –Vienna.
Day 5 – Vienna
Day 6 – Pick up hire car. Leave Vienna and drive along Danube to Salzkammergut area. Check-in http://www.garni-buchinger.at/ Gaestehaus Buchinger, St. Wolfgang. €30 pppn. [4 nights]
Day 7, St. Wolfgang
Day 8, St. Wolfgang
Day 9, St. Wolfgang
Day 10 – Leave St. Wolfgang. Drive to Kitzbuhel. check into http://www.pension-hinterseer.at/ [base of Hannenkahm cable car] €45 pppn.
Day 11,- Kitzbuhel
Day 12 – Leave Kitzbuhel. Drive east then south over the Grossglockner pass.
Stay at http://www.ederhof-heiligenblut.at/ €30/pppn for 2 nights
Day 13, Heiligenblut
Day 14 -Leave Heiligenblut and drive to Graz. Stay http://www.pension-graz.at/ [€39 pppn]
Day 15 - Drive to Vienna and return hire car to Vienna airport. Take airport bus to Bratislava airport. [leaves every 30 mins on the hour, takes one hour].

we used Bratislava as our port of entry as from our home in Cornwall, our ultimate destination of Vienna is not easy to reach, without going via London. Ryanair flies from Bristol, which gives us a reasonable 3 hour jouney at either end of the trip, into Bratislava, which is only 60 miles away from vienna. in retrospect, flying into Vienna and out of /Salzburg, or even Munich, might have been easier, but possibly less fun.

anyway, back tomorrow with more details, and possibly, if you're good and promise to sit up straight, DAY 1.

pja1

Hi,

Looking forward to your report. I better stop slouching I guess. One out of two isn't bad.

Paul

bettyk

Sorry you had crummy weather. I have found that summer travel in Europe be can treacherous!

Hope it didn't ruin your trip too much.

yk

Hi ann, didn't expect you to start right away! Looking forward to the rest (though I understand doing laundry is more important).

deladeb

Hi Ann, I was thinking about you hoping you were staying dry but... We just got back late on 7/6. We had but 4 hours walking around Saint Gilgen instead of 3 or 4 days. Due to the forcast we headed to Innsbruck and then south to the Stubaital valley where we found sunshine, but we were visiting from 6/25-7/4. For us it wasn't as bad as I had feared and we found places easily by winging it.
Looking forward to the rest of your report.

annhig

paul - thanks for the interest, but one out of two what???

bettyk - thanks for all the help you [and others] gave me when we were planning this trip. we didn't spend long enough in St. Gilgen to find the B&B that you favour but we did have a vey nice "kaffee und kuchen" there before walking back to St. Wolfgang along the pilgrim way on our last day. those pilgrims were certainly tough...trust us to choose the hottest day to toil up this very long trail over the hill. we wre very glad we'd had our cakes and ale first.

yk - ditto for your help and support. as you see, I haven't!

deladeb - though we only got back one day before you, I suspect that by arriving later, things for you did't seem too bad. somehow, when you arrive somewhere in the wet, and it continues [mostly] wet, it blights the rest of the holiday, even the better bits. or it did for us. we did change our plans a bit - we abandoned Kitzbuhel after one night and headed to Salzburg, where we reckoned that if it did rain, there would still be things to do, even if we didn't much want to do them. LOL. then we made for a village near Vienna that we'd found when we were staying there and discovered that they were having a wine festival towards the end of our stay, on the basis, that if all else failed, we could get drunk. which we didn't!

hope to start the report proper tomorrow.

regards, ann

wanderfrau

I'm waiting for more...

pja1

Hi ann,

"if you're good and promise to sit up straight, DAY 1."

Looking forward to hearing about your trip!

Paul

bettyk

Ann, we are planning to spend several more days in St. Gilgen at the Schernthaner Hotel in September. Can't wait!

I'm certainly hoping we have good weather. We've really been lucky the last few years, so Murphy's law is always in the back of my mind.

thursdaysd

Missed the first post - definitely looking forward to more. So sorry to read about all the rain!!

annhig

paul - ich bitte um verzeihung. [just showing off!]

bettyk - didn't spot the Scherthaner hotel, I'm afraid. we got off the boat from st. wolfgang, had a quick look round, allowed DH to buy a sily hat, grabbed a late lunch, and got back on the boat to go across to the spot where the "Pilgerweg" starts.

september certainly cannot be worse than June, when it comes to rain - the lake was so full that the swimming platform of our gasthof was completely submerged, and therefore, not much use.

wanderfrau & thursdays - so am I. work is interferring mightily at present, but I'm trying!

regards, ann

tcreath

Ann, I love Austria and thus I'm greatly looking forward to reading more!

Tracy

bettyk

Ann, it's on one of the quiet side streets leading to the Rathaus. It's not a place you would walk by unless you really knew where you were going!

annhig

bettyk, shame we didn't find it.

the place we stayed was fine, but if I had the choice, I would try to stay at the Falkenstein just up the road near the boat dock. it is right on the lake [the road runs the other side of it, not between it and the lake], has a good restaurant where we ate one night, a nice atmosphere, and we got the impresion that people go back year after year. sounds as if your favourite is the same sort of place.

tcreath - I'm trying!

regards, ann

annhig

ok, some preliminaries:

flights - we reluctantly decided to fly with Ryanair from Bristol to Bratislava. there were several reasons for this which seemed like good ones at the time. Bristol is our nearest major airport and is a mere three-hour drive away, [helpful when we're on the way home] and we are very familiar with it, usually flying easyjet from there. but easyjet don't go anywhere near Vienna [well, they do go to Prague, but then carhire gets difficult, or so we thought at the time] and we've been to Prague, and Krakow, and DH likes eastern european cities, so Bratislava seemed ideal, being only 60 miles or so from Vienna, whih is where we wanted to start our trip.

but unlike e'jet, R'air's pricing policies leave a lot to be desired - the price you see IS NOT the one you pay - flights priced at £12.99 & £2.99 ended up being over £50 each way when the taxes were added in. and that was before we decided that we couldn't manage with only checking one case, and had to alter the booking...which leads me to

luggage - R'air charge nothing to ckeck-in online if you just have carry-on, but £20 if you want to check a bag. as well of the charge for the bag, of course. so we meanly decided that we would only check one bag, and carry-on the rest. I spent ages looking for a bag that complied with their size requirements [different from everyone else's of course] and even bought one, which i then decided didn't comply and wasn't big enough anyway. so i ended up paying extra [to be fair, not very much] to alter the booking so that we could check two bags. thank goodness I did this before I did the on-line check-in - it's impossible afterwards.

packing - r'air only allow 15kgs per person [and no pooling] ti checked luggage and another 10kgs in carry-on, which can only be one piece, including hadnbags, cameras, etc. which is where I panicked, because I could not work out how we could get everything we needed for a fortnight, including my handbag which i need for travelling, in so little luggage. I had visions of getting to the check-in only for them to say that my bafg was too big, too heavy, and in any case, I needed to get my hadbag inside it. nightmare. so much to DH's disgust, I altered the booking and found another bigger case. Even then it was tight, and the electronic luggage scales were used a lot before we got the weight distribution right.

to book or not to book? - on previous trips like this, which DH and I had taken several times pre-kids, we had booked very little ahead. but you lot had influenced me to the extent that I felt it would be better to plan in rather more detail than we had before and book all our accommodation in advance. although I still understand why people do this, in retrospect it would have been better just to have booked our first night and in Vienna, and have left the rest to chance. there is LOADS of accommodation in austria, and when we changed our plans and needed a hotel in Salzburg, we found one in about 30 minutes at a very reasonable rate too - probably better than if we'd booked in advance.

anything else? - oh, yes, car hire. we planned the trip in the way we did so that we could have the first few days in Vienna car-free. but it turned out that picking up a car in Vienna was remarkably hard going. the plan was to pick up the car on our way out of Vienna, and return it to the airport 10 days later. However, there appear to be no car hire offices inside the ring, and very few in the centre itself. autoeurope gave us a long list of offices in the city, all with cars of the type and size we wanted [small and cheap] but despite having a very detailed map, it was very difficult to work out how we were gonig to get there. in the end we plumped for one which seemed to be an easy underground ride from where we were to be staying, and hoped for the best. in retrospect, it would have been better to have let the hotel organise it for us, as they offered to do for a very few euro extra. you'll have to keep reading to find out why!

ok - that's the prelims go out of the way - now onto the trip!

JulieVikmanis

Another Vienna and Austria fan awaiting your full report--and sitting up straight too I am.

annhig

feeling a bit demoralised - I just spent ages on Day 1, and then somehow lost it..... arggg. I'm going to do it on WORD then copy it this time!

DAY 1.

You don’t really want all the tedious detail about how we got up at 6am, left huge lists of things to do for our offspring who were going to be house-sitting for us, drove to the aiport, parked, endured check-in, the endless queuing and checking of passports, the battle for seats etc.etc. do you? Good. But I will whinge, not for the first time, about being required, at what should have been just a bag-drop, to repeat all the stuff about whether we’d packed ourselves, left our luggage unattended, inside leg measurements, date of last period, etc.etc. ok, whinge over.

So we’ll cut to the good bits, which started when we landed in Bratislava, to find the sun shining, the temperature warm, and our taxi [arranged by our hotel] waiting for us. I am sure that it would have been much cheaper to get to the hotel by public transport, but after the debacle in Berlin [when it took 2 hours to get by train from the airport to our hotel when a cab would have taken 30 mins, which still makes me blush at the memory of my incompetence] we ALWAYS take a cab. The journey took about 20 mins, and cost the €20 we’d been quoted.

The hotel Marrol’s http://www.hotelmarrols.sk/ quickly lived up to its TA rating, with a cool and airy entrance hall and lounge, a warm welcome [and cold complementary drinks] while we checked in, and we were quickly whisked up to our room on the third floor by the lift, which we operated with a security key [presumably provided on the basis that thieves won’t bother to use the stairs, LOL]. I'd originally booked it through Venere [or one of the other booking sites] for €150 room and breakfast, which seemed a lot, but it really did tick all our boxes, being close to the river and the old town , and having the level of luxury that gets the holiday off to a good start. but then, thanks to a suggestions made by another Fodorite, [thnsk, Good-Will] I checked the rate offered by the hotel about a week before we left, and found that we could get the same room for €99. even if we had to pay extra for breakfast, the saving would at least pay for the taxi. so i quickly cancelled the original booking, and rebooked with the hotel direct. Hooray! [i also checked our hotel in Vienna at the same time, but there had been no change, and the rest of our accommodation was already pretty cheap so there was no point.]

The room, though not large, was very well equipped [and we all know that size is not everything] with full bathroom, nice toiletries, FREE minibar, A/C, and [a first for us] a computer terminal with internet access. On the next floor down was a health spa [a bit too pricey unless you’re on expenses] and a nice terrace with again, free drinks and comfy sofas. But we wanted to get out and explore the town, and first stop was to try to find the dock where we would catch the boat in the morning.

This proved to be simplicity itself, being just round the corner and across the road on the banks of the Danube, and not only could we find the dock, but we found the office and were able to pick up our tickets too, despite not having been bright enough to bring the booking receipt with us. I had found out about this service from a guide-book [I’m tempted to say Fodors but I actually think it was the green Michelin guide to Vienna] and booked on line at www.twincityliner.com about a month before we left. It cost €19 each [it’s €17 on weekdays, but we were travelling on a Saturday] and although the bus is quite a lot less, it’s well worth it - more about that tomorrow. From there, we set off to find the town but were soon sidetracked by the sight of a bar with a terrace with umbrellas and a view over the river, so we stopped for a couple of beers, or as they are called in these parts, “dva piva”. [which was about all the Polish we could remember from our April trip to Krakow, and rightly guessed that the Slovak wouldn’t be much different]. At £1.50 for ½ litre, this boded well for our trip. After a third beer [not each, between us!] we tore ourselves away, and made for the old town, which we instantly took to. There was some sort of festival going on [featuring Indian dancing for reasons we never established] and the streets were lined with bars and restaurants all nicely busy, though it was by now late afternoon.

One unusual feature was the number of sushi bars we saw [at least three that I can recall – are Slovaks particularly partial to raw fish?] but we were full of beer so we had a wander round, exploring the streets and the various sights, most of which were closed by now, but the castle was advertised as open so we made for it. It’s a bit of a hike to the west of the main town, but the exercise was good for us, and the views from the top are excellent. The castle itself is closed for renovations, and the museum had closed at 6pm, but that didn’t seem to matter much. We could see along each bank of the Danube [which is a seriously big and fast-flowing river] and across to the new bridge, which apparently has a good restaurant in the rather futuristic pod that sits at the top of it, a bit like a flying saucer. Then we made our way back into town, and tried to find a restaurant to suit, ending up at one of the ones in the main “drag” and had, guess what, pizza. [not my idea, i'd have preferred sushi, but who wants to start a holiday with a row [sorry, argument] about what you’re going to eat? – we could do that later!] But it was a very good pizza, and we stared with a plate of rocket and carpaccio of beef which was lovely, the wine was good, the position lovely, and we were on holiday.

After that, we made our way back to the hotel for a bit of a nap, and finished off with a drink in the lovely square by the theatre, before going finally to bed. Is that a spot of rain we can feel? Surely not…it’s not going to rain is it?

Tomorrow – the catamaran to Vienna – [surely the only way to travel], and the start of the rain.

annhig

DAY 2.

You will have guessed by now that when the day dawned on our first proper day of holiday, the weather was somewhat less than clement, but we tried not to allow it to dampen our spirits. Not really wanting to spend €10 each on breakfast [which would eat up most of our savings on the room,] we had looked for somewhere suitable for breakfast the night before, but finding nowhere in the vicinity, we’d decided that we should take the line of least resistance, ie the hotel’s offerings. And weren’t we glad we did - a really good buffet with hot and cold choices, plenty of fruit, endless tea of coffee, and prosecco if you wanted it [we didn’t].

After reluctantly dragging ourselves away from the food, we had a little while before the boat was due to leave, so we explored this great little hotel a bit more, finding a library with lots of ideas for activities [I liked the idea of the guided tour of local wineries, and the cycling tours, which weren’t probably meant to be combined, not if you wanted to do some serious tasting!] and a complete set of the penguin classics, in English. Lucky the traveller who had the time to read just one, let alone the lot. Not to mention the endless bowls of apples, which I have to confess we diminished by two, so lovely did they look [and taste!]. ditto the bowls of little sweet biscuits which were places thoughtfully around the public rooms in case you felt a bit peckish. Anyone wishing to visit Bratislava would have to go a long way to better this hotel and should I ever find myself there again, I won’t stay anywhere else. Oh, that we could bottle this hotel and take it round with us!

Finally we just had to leave, and took ourselves and our luggage [thoughtfully reduced by Ryanair’s regulations to a manageable level] off to the www.twincityliner.com offices in double quick time, wishing, not for the last time, that we’d had the foresight to bring an umbrella. Or better still, TWO umbrellas. But there was a large waiting room, and we sat down to wait for the boat. Which was where the system broke down, because it seemed impossible to work out when and where the boat would come in. It turned out that there are several boats going from the same area, and we had several false alarms, with us, and other travellers, following each other like sheep to the various gang-planks only to be told that we were in the wrong place. In fact “told” is the wrong word – waved at would be more accurate. But eventually we all [several tour groups and individual travellers like us] got to the right place, and boarded the boat.

Apart from some reserved seats at the front it was first come, first sat, and I luckily got us some seats at the side, whilst DH stowed the luggage at the back. Sadly the rain was still coming down so the views of the banks was not all they might have been, but in good weather, you would have a splendid trip along the Danube, complete with commentary in several languages, including English. I cannot think of a better way to enter Vienna, and would definitely recommend this route to anyone.

After about an hour we started to enter the environs of Vienna, and within another 15 mins, we were tying up at the Schwedenplatz dock, right in the centre of the city. Unfortunately the weather had got worse, and we saw to our dismay [and I’m sure that of others] that the dock was unprotected from the rain and that there was a very steep flight of stairs up to ground level. If I have a complaint, it is that the access to and from the boat was pretty poor – approx 12 steps up to the office at Bratislava, double that down to the docking level, and in Vienna, again, a flight of about 24 steps. Anyone with a disability would be in severe difficulties. Fortunately we are still able to cope with such obstacles, just about, and we managed more or less OK to negotiate them. Which left us with the quandary of how to get from where we were to our hotel. I had a map I printed off their website, but if you are anything like me, your brain goes all mushy when confronted with map in strange town. I’m OK when I’ve got my bearings, but the first day or so is a bit hit and miss.

So there we are in the rain, looking at this map, and trying to find the hotel Austria in the Fleischmarkt. [http://www.hotelaustria-wien.at/] How hard can that be in Vienna? We had booked it partly because it was so close to the boat bock, so I knew it had to be nearby. I had convinced myself that I knew how to get there, so I led DH on, with more confidence than I felt, across the road, and towards the centre of town. Rather to my surprise we came to some steps, but nothing ventured we lugged our bags up them, only to find that the Fleischmarkt ran out at that point and became another street altogether. Nothing for it but to get some directions, so I walked, dripping, into the nearest hotel and asked, in my best German, for directions. Which to my surprise I got, also in German, and realised that we had been walking in the wrong direction. So we had to lug the bags back down the steps, walk back along the Fleischmarkt, and lo, there was a sign to the hotel Austria, up a little side street, no more than 200 yards from where we had started off.

Another reason for booking this hotel had again been its standing on TA, and the welcome we received lived up to its billing. We were dusted off, checked-in in double quick time, and directed to our room, again on the third floor. This time the room was bigger, ditto the bathroom, and, it turned out, exceptionally quiet. No a/c, and not much in the way of toiletries [we’d brought our own, but they are very cheap to buy] but a minibar that we could use as a fridge to store our milk, AND a kettle, so we could make TEA. Bliss. [did I say that I had packed proper English tea-bags? Well, I had, and very glad we were for them too.]

Returning to reception, we asked about transport passes, and were offered the Vienna card, costing €18 for 72 hours, rather than the ordinary travel card, which would have cost €13 for the same period. To be fair, they told us about that one, but didn’t sell it – we’d have had to buy it from an underground station or information office. Of course, all that I’d found out here about the two options went completely out of my head, and rather than the transport only card which I had been wisely advised to get, we opted for the Vienna card, which as well as covering all the trams, buses and underground, gives various discounts for museums, and some other attractions and even cafes and restaurants. In theory, if you visit enough museums etc. you should recoup the extra cost of the card or even profit from these discounts, but what you don’t find out until you get there, is that most museums offer discounts for other categories as well, in particular “seniors”, and that you can only get one discount at a time. As the discount for seniors was invariably as good or better than the Vienna card discount, we would have done just as well with the ordinary card, as one of us is a senior. Ho hum.. my own fault entirely. [this would also apply of you have children or students in your party]

Then grabbing a hotel umbrella, and grasping our trusty Michelin guide to Vienna [lighter and more detailed than Fodors, I’m afraid], we ventured out to explore. As it was past 1pm, our first thoughts were for food and drink, and we quickly found a restaurant, or rather, were quickly driven by the rain into one. What to have for our first meal in Vienna? – well it just has to be Wiener Schnitzel, doesn’t it? Served as is traditional, with potato salad and cucumber, and washed down with a viertel of Gruener Veltinger [the local white wine]. That’s better. It wasn’t great, but it was warming and we were in the dry.

Eventually we had no choice but to venture out into the rain again, and made our way to the Cathedral, dodging the horse-drawn carriages, who were not doing a very good trade, and finding the doors, of course, on the opposite side of the building. A lot has been written about Stephansdom, but I have to say that I was neither terribly impressed nor moved; it seemed to be overwhelmed by tourists, with not a lot else to recommend it. So after a few minutes we made our way out, and turned our steps towards the Hofburg, hoping for better things.

One fodorite had advised me NOT to visit both the Hofburg and Schoenbrun palaces, and to favour the latter over the former. How glad we were that we ignored this kindly meant advice. Once we had found our way inside [not the easiest task] the first job was to decide on what tickets we wanted. Luckily we decided upon the “sissi pass”, which covers not only the main rooms of the Hofburg and the treasury, but also the Schoenbrun as well, and the Kaiser’s furniture depository. With my Vienna card discount, and DH’s senior one, [oh rats, I wasn’t going to tell you which one of us was the senior] this turned out to be a really good deal and even better, at the Schoenbrun meant that we avoided all the queues too.

We don’t go much on seeing cases full of silver, so we bypassed the treasury and made straight for the state rooms. These are now set out with an exhibition on the life of the empress Elizabeth, wife of Kaiser Franz Joseph, aka Sissi, who was no less than the Princess Diana of her day, complete with the pressures of being in the public eye, eating disorders, unsympathetic in-laws, the lot. Really, the whole thing was very well done, and what’s more, it’s all in English as well as German, which is a huge help. I don’t need to describe the royal apartments to you – you will have seen similar many times, I’m sure, but the sissi theme certainly added anther dimension. After and hour or so we’d had enough, so we found our way out, and made for the museum café for the first proper Viennese coffee of our stay. Plus our Vienna cards gave us a small discount if we had apple strudel, so how could we refuse? The only problem was which sort of coffee to have – most Viennese cafes offer a choice of at least a dozen, if not more, and this one was no exception. Eventually I picked an “Einspaenner” [strong black coffee with whipped cream or “Schlagobers” on top] and DH had a pot of coffee with milk on the side, which he kindly let me share. We won’t be able to do this too often especially as the strudel came with schlag too.

As we exited the café, we realised two things – the good news was that it had stopped raining, the bad news was that there was some sort of street festival on, and the noise was truly ear-shattering. Whichever direction we walked in it seemed to follow us, and in the end, we gave in and went back to the hotel. DH is particularly sensitive, [yes, I know he doesn’t look it, but it’s true] and he swears that the noise drove out all his impressions of the Hofburg, which he still doesn’t remember visiting. Which is a shame. After a nap we were ready to venture out again, and try to find our first proper Viennese dinner. To find out about which you’ll have to wait!

yk

Hi ann, sigh, all that rain surely would have dampened my spirits (no pun intended).

stokebailey

Oh, Ann. You do have fun! Looking forward to the rest.

At the HI Regent Park in London, the minibar items were lined up in such a way that there was no room for anything we might want to keep cool. A little sign warned that if any of the little packages or bottles in there was moved, that unopened item must be taken IMMEDIATELY to the front desk to avoid being charged for it. You got the idea that there were high tech sensors under each candy bar, as under the Hope Diamond. So we dassn't scoot things aside and make room for our yoghurt etc.