15 August 2006

Austria & The Alps Day 4 - On to Bad Aussee - 1740

After three days of almost total damp (mostly actual rain!), it was no surprise to wake up at 0730 to the usual sound of car tyres on wet tarmac. I had toyed with saying "bugger it" to another day in the wet and heading off to Italy, perhaps even Venice.

In the end the weather was shit everywhere in Europe, or so it appeared on the net. As we had only 50 miles to go today I planned a more circuitous route via the Wolfgangsee and Mondsee (where Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer married in the Sound of Music!)

Claire @ Wolfgansee Tourist Office

Mondsee Church
Then to Attersee to Bad Ischl (where Doris threw a wobbler and took us through the same tunnel three times) where we saw the same group of bikes inc 2 1200 and 1 1100 GS's; not one of the miserable b*****s bothered to return our greeting wave. So much for the GS Brotherhood.

The weather looked up after Attersee so for the first time since Sunday morning we could ride without waterproofs! Big HURRAH!

We arrived at the hostel in Bad Aussee just before 3pm and luckily were able to book in. Our double room without a view!

Jugendherberge
After unloading we changed into civvies and walked into town. The guide book (Rough or otherwise) says the hostel is 150m from town. My arse it is! More like a mile BUT 150m above the town at the top of a cliff! We found the mountain goat shortcut on the way back from a map in the tourist board window.

Apart from eating places and most petrol stations everything was shut for the Maria Himmelfahrte public holiday. At least today I could take some pics on the Nikon as I remembered to put the CF card in it!

Don't get me wrong here.  Youth Hostels in Austria are superb generally and cheaper than hotels.  many have twin or double rooms - https://www.oejhv.at/en/about-us/ 

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