The Grossglockner Road

Austrian countryside, near Grosskirchheim (it’s actually spelt Großkirchheim in German), on the approach to the Grossglockner Road from Lienz, Austria

Continuing from where I left off in the last post, here’s our final road trip of our 2015 2-Weeks Summer Vacation in Europe. From Vintgar Gorge in Slovenia, we made our way northwards again, because we had to catch our flight back to Dubai in two days’ time from the other side of the Alps, i.e. from Munich, Germany. We also had plans to meet up with sister Kim’s family (for the first time ever) in Munich, and were looking forward to it. The only problem, is that in between Slovenia and Germany, is the Alps, and Austria! And the most interesting route between where we were, and Munich, is the Grossglockner Road! Or more accurately, the Grossglockner High Alpine Road, the highest road in Austria, named after the highest mountain in Austria!

D’ya think we’d give a place like that a miss, since we were already so close??? Even if it costs a bomb? (Yup, you have to pay a separate toll, and it ain’t cheap… I remember it cost more than 100 bucks! For toll alone! And that’s on top of the blanket toll that all cars already have to pay in Austria).

And that’s how we ended up in the town of Lienz, East Tyrol, Austria, to spend a night before our journey across the Alps on the Grossglockner Road. Here’re the pictures!


Gasthof Gribelehof, Lienz, East Tyrol, Austria – This was where we booked our one night stay in, but not where we eventually stayed. The hotel friggin botched up our booking! …We initially booked for the night before, but then changed our booking when finalizing our plans before flying off to Europe, so they had ample time to do the change, but failed to realize that we had changed the dates. Bummer! They arranged a room for us at another nearby hotel (Bierkeller), which was cheaper, but didn’t have as nice a view as this one! What a waste. We could see the whole of Lienz from here!






What the heck, might as well hang around and take some photos of the Gasthof Gribelehof compound


The road to Gasthof Gribelehof goes underneath an Alpine Roller Coaster! (The guesthouse lies on top of a hillock). There, below is the town of Lienz


Alpine Coaster, Lienz - Gasthof Gribelehof can be seen on top of the hill, on the centre left of the photo


Alpine Coaster, Lienz, East Tyrol, Austria


Bye-bye, leaving Lienz for the Grossglockner Road – outskirt of Lienz with a view of the Gailtal Alps (Lienz Dolomites) towering above behind / beside Lienz




At the village of Winklern, right after crossing the state border from East Tyrol to Carinthia


Großkirchheim, Carinthia, Austria


The countryside just before the start of the Grossglockner Road (It’s spelt Großglockner in German. Yup, they have a special symbol for ‘SS’. I guess German snakes would go hißßß…)


Finally, the Großglockner High Alpine Road…


The last photo we took of the Grossglockner Road before it was completely shrouded in fog… What a bummer, all that toll we paid, and we didn’t even see half of it! The southern part was fine. North of the range, and everything was foggy, gloomy and cloudy like most of the days on the second week of our Europe trip

From the Grossglockner Road, we would end up stopping at Walchsee for a quick lunch, before entering Germany, and getting lost in the city of Munich (bloody GPS led us to the wrong street, how would I bloody know that Munich Airport isn’t in Munich City?!?), resulting in us being very late in meeting Kim, Daniel and little Jared… And that is a story I’ve written a long time ago.

Alright, this is the last post from our 2015 Europe trip, Auf Wiedersehen. We’ll be back. Just wait!

(How do I remember all these place names? I don't, but I have Google Maps! Don’t underestimate Google Maps mate. I love Google Maps, if only Google Maps was around when I was younger, …sigh!)

A Series of Austrian Lakes

Semi-gloomy Austrian lakes to be precise.


Hallstatt, Salzkammergut, Austria

Here’re photos of our Europe 2015 trip after we left Salzburg. From that nice sunny morning in Salzburg, we made our journey southwards to hopefully catch an equally sunny afternoon in the delightful ‘lake district’ of Austria, Salzkammergut, before heading for the borders of Slovenia! Unfortunately, the further south we went, the cloudier it became. See for yourself.


First lake on our journey, Fuschlsee


The place in this photo was just by the road of where we stopped at Fuschlsee. I Googled Map it last week, and guess what I found. It’s the friggin Head Quarters of Red Bull, the energy drink! Red Bull GmbH. What a surprise!


Second lake, Wolfgangsee




Third lake, Hallstätter See






Hallstatt (on the shores of its namesake) is a picturesque lakeside village in Austria. The news of its charm eventually reached China. And then there’s no turning back. The Chinese loved it so much that they started building a replica of the entire friggin village complete with parish church and all! Don’t believe me, Google it! No wonder the place was thronging with Chinese tourists when we visited!


And this is what Hallstatt looks like in better weather, and with a better photographer – picture ‘borrowed’ from Wikipedia compliments of http://www.csakany.com/pics/2007EuroTrip/files/hallstatt.jpg. Now you know why the Chinese love it


Justin at Walchsee – OK, this ‘See’ (lake) is not on the same leg of journey as the others in this post. The other lakes are all in Salzkammergut, on the day we travelled from Salzburg to Slovenia. Walchsee on the other hand, is near the German border, when we were making our way from Austria back to Munich to fly back to Dubai. We stopped here for lunch en route to Munich to meet Sister Kim’s family for the first time!


A hotel near Walchsee – Seehotel Brunner (I found that out from Google Map!)


Our fish lunch, Walchsee, Tyrol, Austria

The Town of Music

Salzburg! The town of Mozart and the ‘Sound of Music.’ And what a nice surprise, because we finally got a sunny break, after days of miserable, gloomy, wet weather!

Salzburg was where we spent the night after our outing in Königssee and Eisriesenwelt (the Ice Cave) in 2015. This was actually my second visit to Salzburg.

On my first visit in the summer of 1994, I spent the night sleeping at the railway station, drunk on red wine. When I woke up, there were 2 fellow drunkards guessing whether I was Chinese or Japanese. I said Malaysian, and left. I’m a proud Malaysian after all, hah! Malaysia Boleh!

On that 1994 trip, Salzburg was bitterly cold (no, the red wine didn’t work), and this was in summer, in the middle of friggin August! We spent half a day sightseeing before hopping on to a train to our next destination. So, it was indeed a nice, sunny break for me to see Salzburg in a completely different light in 2015!






Flowers at the Mirabell Garden, Salzburg, Austria


“Doe a deer, a female deer…” Does this place look familiar? Mirabell Garden was where part of the famous musical, “the Sound of Music” was filmed


A love lock bridge (Makartsteg) over the River Salzach, Salzburg


The suburb near our hotel where I parked our car. See that black one, by the bushes, that’s partly obstructing traffic, that Opel? Luckily, they didn’t fine me, haha


A street view in Salzburg city


Mozart, …OK, a statue of Mozart, in Mozartplatz (Mozart Square), where else?


Mommy with little 10-month old Jayden at Mozartplatz overlooking Residenzplatz and the Salzburg Cathedral


The fountain at Residenzplatz






Inside the Salzburg Cathedral (Dom zu Salzburg)


Getreidegasse, a street in Salzburg… notice the vertical shaft going up the hill behind the little church at the end of the street? I think it’s a lift shaft, but we didn’t try finding out

Journey to the World of the Ice Giants

Just back from a fabulous 2 weeks’ holiday in the Caucasus! (Exciting, huh? But photos will have to wait, hehe). Meanwhile, back in Dubai, work has been piling up like nobody’s business. (What’s new?)

Therefore, it’s yet another picture post.

At work, the Company has found an alternative Project Manager for the new project that I was posted to. In my place! Thanks to the ever-so cautious Consultants of the so-called ‘extremely prestigious project of national importance’ who did not trust the ability of yours truly. They think that I lack RTA (the Road and Transport Authority of Dubai) experience. But our Company still wants to keep me in the Project?? For what? I have absolutely no idea. But what the heck, a job’s a job, and as long as they’re paying me salary, I shouldn’t have any complaints, right? I’ll just have to make sure I get due credit for the work that I do, hmmmm….

Now, back to the post. This was what we did when we found it too wet in the countryside in Königssee, Bavaria. What do you do when it rains dogs and cats in your once in a lifetime (OK, make that a decade) Europe trip? Something indoors, like a museum, or a church, or shopping malls, market places? Why not a cave?!?!

And that’s where we went, Eisriesenwelt, World of the Ice Giants, an ice cave across the border, in Austria!


The path to Eisriesenwelt – We thought it’d be like some cave trip in Malaysia, etc, drive straight up to the mouth of the cave, have a quick tour, click some photos and that’s that. But no, not Eisriesenwelt. To get there, after buying the tickets, we had to walk 20 minutes to get to the cable car station, wait another 15 or so minutes to get a place in the cable car (the cable car trip itself is only about 5 minutes, if you choose to walk, it’ll be 90 minutes!!!), and then walk another 20 more minutes after getting off the cable car! The cave itself, if you follow the whole tour, will be about an hour and 15 minutes!


There, Eisriesenwelt!

Eisriesenwelt so happens to be the largest friggin ice cave in the world! More than 42km long! Yeah, no kidding (Wiki it willya?) Unfortunately, no photos are allowed inside the friggin cave! (What good does that do? You go all the way to visit and can’t take back a photo or two for memory’s sake?!?) (I guess the cave management wanted visitors to feel how it felt like when the first explorers discovered the cave in the 1800’s). And that’s why we only have photos of the journey up to the cave. Besides, we didn’t finish the cave tour. It’s a single row of people walking on wooden staircases that goes up an equivalent of 40 storeys (that’s what the guide sez …to scare us off probably) in pitch black darkness and freezing temperature! It’s like walking into a friggin freezer! With flame lamps, which blow out every once in a while. The guides had magnesium lamps which give off bright intense light for short moments before dying out. This is caving experience in the early 1800’s! We went up a few flights of stairs before calling it a day. Hey, we had a 10-month old baby Jayden with us and a 6 year old Justin! When we u-turned back, so did a couple of other families with young children.

Here’re the photos!


The doorway into the ice cave – on the left are flame lanterns which you can carry into the cave. Above the door, you can see the sign saying No Photos! Right in front, you can see some white bloke blocking my photo of the line of tourists entering the freezer of a cave!


Hohenwerfen Castle, Werfen, Austria – This castle lies just below the ice cave


High in the mountains on the path to the ice cave – Can you spot Mommy and Justin in the photo?


A view of the countryside from the path


The path showing a pedestrian tunnel (no, it’s not the ice cave) that we had to walk thru to get from the cable car station to ice cave proper


Another view of the countryside from up above, with a view of the Hohenwerfen Castle from above


Papa and the kids, on the way to Eisriesenwelt


Calling it a day, back at the pedestrian tunnel


Getting from the tunnel back to the cable car – Hello little Jayden, where did you just go?


Hohenwerfen Castle – Bye-bye Werfen. We’re leaving for Salzburg!