Austria

Day 3 - Tuesday 14 Sept

After a reasonable night's sleep and an excellent full breakfast we left the hotel, making our way out of very busy Mannheim, traveling on the atuo barn headed for Austria.  Germany has a population of over  60,000,000 which increased from 190,000 after three wars.  Hence, with such a huge population the traffic is very intense so road rules and restrictions are very different than in New Zealand. To gain a drivers license in Germany it takes one year and costs 1000 euros.  There is no restriction of speed for passing and the inside lane is kept strictly for fast cars. Quality cars like Porche, Lamborghini, Aston Martin, Furai etc can be seen doing high speeds in this lane.  Tickets are issued to drivers driving too slow!  An autobarn is the name given to the highways and are usually at least 3 or 4 lanes wide going in either direction.  During the wars they were used to move the soldiers fast.  The roads we were traveling on since we left London, all lead to Rome.  This provided a link between the countries during war times.

We continued traveling down the autobarn passing the outskirts of Stuttgart where Kevin and his family live.  It is also the home of the Porche and Mercedes Benz assembly factories.  Many European cars are manufactured in Germany and re-known for their solid construction.

After the historical 16th century Rhine River we saw the previous day, the country changed to modern, commercialised Germany.  This part of the country has been recreated since the bombings of world War 2.  It is a flourishing agricultural area with rich soil providing ideal conditions for vineyards.  Along the river there are many large, wealthy chalet type houses called 'sloss'.

 We stopped at a highway cafe, called an auto grill, on the outskirts of Munich.  At this time the annual Munich Beer Festival was being held, which attracts huge crowds each year.

Our journey then took us through the beautiful mountainous area of Bavaria and into Austria where we stayed the night in Innsbruck, a lovely town set in the Austrian mountain area.  It is a very popular place for snow sports in the winter and hosted the Winter Olympics.  The down hill track which was used at the event, was easy to see.

We were taken on a guided tour of Crystal Glass Centre and saw the beautiful Christmas Wonderland display. We then wandered around the small but traditional town centre with its reputed golden roof at the end.  There are lots of very old buildings in their original state and of course Austria being the home of many famous composers, I visited the Mozart display and shop.

 Our hotel was only a short walk from the town so Simon met us with his umbrella held high and a big 'Tally-ho' and we were off to 'Grauer Innsbruck Hotel'. This is was an old traditional hotel set close to a historic church, in a very narrow back street.

After a traditional Austrian dinner we went to a Tyrolean dance / singing / instrumental concert.  It was great entertainment and everyone got into the atmosphere.  Each country was called out and people from that country had to stand up and the Austrians sang a song related to it's nationality.  There were only 6 New Zealanders in our group. (About 12 in the entire audience) but we made our presence known!