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Far, far away

Sunday, December 11th, 2011

We’ve just had our one year anniversary of arriving in Austria, and celebrated with a vacation from Austria.  Not that we don’t like it here, but most of the travels we had over the last year have been in Austria or our neighboring countries. While we saw some amazing things and had some great experiences, we thought it was about time for a real “holiday” where we could just relax and not have to figure out any languages or navigate any strange roads.

Deciding where to go was a little harder.  In the US we probably would have hopped on a plane to Hawaii or the Caribbean, but here there are some other interesting choices.  We decided to take advantage of our position in Europe.  The Maldives are about 24+ hours of travel from most places in the US, but just an 8 hour direct flight from Vienna.

With that decision made, we spent a wonderful week in an over-water villa, eating spicy curries, drinking good wines, soaking up the sun and generally being pampered at Constance Moofushi (and it looks exactly like the pictures on their website).  The snorkeling in the Maldives is some of the best that we’ve done.  The trips out to the reefs were great, but even from our villa we could watch sharks, rays, and angel fish every day.

Boarding the seaplane to leave on the last day was sad, but just as shocking was the cold weather that awaited us back in Vienna.   It’s Winter!

Here’s a view of the villas taken from our kayak:

Getting ready to snorkel and I already have a visitor:

Posted in Austria, Living Abroad, Maldives, Travel | 2 Comments »

What border?

Thursday, October 20th, 2011

A group of people we know from the US and UK were on a holiday in the Dolomites in Italy last month.  Since it’s only a 3 hour drive from where we live, they invited us to meet them there go hiking.  It’s a really beautiful area and one that I’m sure we’ll visit again.

The most surprising thing about the trip was discovering the area called Südtirol (South Tirol).  It used to belong to Austria, but as a result of WWI and WWII eventually became a permanent part of Italy. While it might officially be in Italy now, the population has chosen to ignore the fact.  The homes are the same style of “Heidi houses” that you see everywhere in Austria, and the road signs are  in both German, listed first, and then Italian.  Most people we met were tri-lingual (along with English), but speak German to each other, and the food was wursts and schnitzels, with a little pasta.  Not quite what you imagine when you think about spending a weekend in Italy.  I never would have even known that we left Austria, except for all the “I” license plates.

The owner of the B&B where we stayed gave me a history lesson, as well as some strong opinions on the regional government, languages, and the possibility that they would someday vote to re-join Austria.  It’s a very interesting piece of history that was completely new to me.  You never know what you’ll find when you cross a border.

Here’s a view from the Dolomites in the “Italian” Alps:

Posted in Austria, Italy, Living Abroad, Travel | 1 Comment »

It’s actually sort of green

Wednesday, September 28th, 2011

I’m talking about the “blue” Danube.  We got a first hand look a few weeks ago when we visited the Wachau region of Austria.  The Danube in this area winds through a twisty valley with vineyards along one side and orchards on the other.  Both sides have ample castle ruins and ancient churches, as well as a good share of cafes.  The other big attractions are the bike paths which follow along the river and through the little towns along the way.  We packed up our bikes and headed to Krems at one end of the valley. From there we spent a day cycling, sightseeing, and wine tasting until we ended up in Melk, home of a famous abbey.  After staying there overnight, it was nice ride back along the other side.  The weather cooperated which made for a perfect weekend.  This story is better told in photos:

Before:  the new bike rack in action.

Eric among the grapes, checking on next year’s wine.

Finally, the green river…

Posted in Austria, Living Abroad | No Comments »

Twin Peaks

Tuesday, August 23rd, 2011

Nearly everyone in Europe is on vacation this month.  It’s really amazing how many foreign license plates you see on the roads in Austria heading south to coasts in Croatia and Italy, or stopping off to enjoy our mountains and lakes.  After watching all the happy people on holiday, sitting in cafes, riding bikes, and lounging in the sun, we finally took off for our own vacation this week.

Our first stop was Innsbruck, then on to the Ötztal to do some hiking.  It’s a beautiful area, but our next stop was even more impressive.  The Seefeld area is surrounded by mountains and we headed up in a cable car to get a better view.  We found a great circuit hike that included two peaks, and while it was a lot of up, down, up, down, the payoff views from the tops were fantastic. 

At the top of most peaks there is a “Kreuz” or cross, usually with a book to sign.  Here’s the one on the Reitherspitze and the view:

Posted in Austria, Travel | No Comments »

Zwo Bier

Friday, August 19th, 2011

Now that I have recovered from the Kirchtag celebrations I thought I would take one more post to mention a few more thoughts about the festival.  Before it started all of the locals and the expats who’ve been here a while kept warning us that it would be crazy and we would just want to get out of town.  I think they underestimated us, because we had a great time and weren’t really to0 bothered by the crowds and the noise.   Of course, we were participating in and contributing to the crowds and the noise, so I guess I  didn’t mind it.

The local newspaper estimated that there were over 400K people visiting for the festival last week.  That’s pretty amazing considering there are only about 60K people who live in the whole town.  Even more amazing is the organization of event.  Even after the big parties on Thursday and Friday nights, the streets were swept and completely cleaned up by morning.  On Saturday night around 3AM a big line of about 10 trucks waited at the end of our street.  As soon as the last band stopped playing, they pulled in and started taking down the tents and packing up the tables and benches.  By Monday morning, it was hard to believe anything unusual had ever happened.

The other weird thing about Kirchtag is how the attendees changed over the week.  The first few days were clearly just diehard locals who live in the oldtown.  The next few days were more people from the area, but still mostly Austrian.  The majority of these folks were dressed in Tracht.  By Saturday the fashions and the language changed to Italian, as huge numbers of our southern neighbors came to party.

The topic of language brings me to another point.  I’ve been getting more comfortable with everyday transactions.  I know how to ask for things at the deli and how to respond when the checkout clerk asks for my customer card or whether I need a bag.  Some of these expressions become routine after a while and I don’t have to think too much about them anymore.  However, the real barrier to our progress with German is the accent here.  Many people in this area speak a different dialect that is completely lost on me – I can’t understand a word of it.  Even those who speak “regular” German (I won’t call it hoch Deutsch because it certainly is not), speak it with a strong regional accent. We are just beginning to figure it out after months.

“i hob…”  is roughly how they say “ich habe…”  and it gets more complicated from there, as some words are not just pronounced different, but actually a different word. It’s all part of the experience and generally everyone understands us, if not the other way around.  We learned quite a few new phrases during the festival, the one that got the most use being “zwo bier.”

A few more scenes from Kirchtag to finish off – If you want to see the dancers, the parade, and more from the set up, check the link to our photos on Smugmug to the right at “Our Photo Gallery” under Other Travels.

Posted in Austria, Living Abroad | No Comments »

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