Innsbruck, Rain and Shine

debs/ December 10, 2017

Gelato is cheaper than a bus ticket here [1]; so naturally, I had gelato everyday and walked everywhere.

After the past couple days of terrifying experiences, I had already decided on the train on my way to Innsbruck that my two days in Innsbruck will be chill.  I will tone down the walking, not try any mountains, and just enjoy the city.  I mostly followed through with that, so that translates to a pretty boring blog post. (Poor you.)

[1] don’t quote me on that, I never checked!

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Day 1

The day started out pretty rainy. Again. At this point I just accepted that my whole trip to the Alps will be rainy and foggy and just embraced it.  Again, my spirits were high in the morning (does that make me a morning person?) and they rain did not dampen my mood (I can’t say the same for my shoes).

I was really proud of myself for setting up this cheap hands-free umbrella-holding getup.

Starting at (1), I decided to walk into Innsbruck through the network of hiking trails in the mountains north of the city.

Because of the thick fog, there wasn’t much visual stimulus before (1) and (2) on the map. Furthermore, the roads were paved and the incline not too steep.  The perfect environment for me to zone out of reality and into my head.

Besides being self-congratulatory about the aforementioned hands-free umbrella situation, I thought a lot about the past few days … and I remember distinctly the concept of this website was conceived, pretty much in the middle of (1) and (2).

 

Location (2) is the top part of Mühlauer Klamm and I walked down along the stream as indicated by the line on the map (Google maps didn’t recognize a trail there).  Notice how well aligned my picture was? (see right) Well, that’s because I had both hands free.  And why is that? Because I have an “automated” umbrella-holding rig.  I am a genius.

The trail turned into a residential area that turned into Innsbruck proper.

At location (3), I was already in the city center.  The whole city is really really pleasant to walk around in.  The buildings and streets were distinctly European and lovely.  The mountains in the background (which were visible because rain stopped and fog lifted at this point) made everything seem magical.

I find that I keep comparing my experience in these European cities to places like Blue Mountain Ski Resort or Jasper in the Rockies or Disneyland … but all those places no doubt drew inspiration from Europe.  It’s like I saw the knock-offs before I saw the real thing, and now the real-thing also looks like a knock-off.  It’s like going to Hong Kong and thinking “This place is just like Pacific Mall, but everywhere!” (true story).

Yep, so I walked around all the roads between 3 and 4, partially so I can see the inner city area completely. But mostly to scope out the best gelato. 

In the vicinity of (4) is a gelateria called Tomaseli.  For being so popular on Yelp, I found the price super affordable.  Plus there were so, so many good flavours.  I went for the double scoop of my go-to flavours: hazelnut and pistachio!

I walked around a bit more.  Sat at the park at location (5) to journal and enjoy the nice weather.  Then I went back to (3) and picked this up:

It’s a chocolate raspberry strudel that I was eying at a cafe called Kröll. I made a lot of good decisions today. Good decisions should be rewarded…. with … more gelato???

Yep, I went back to Tomaselli at (4) and got ANOTHER DOUBLE SCOOP.  Yes. The picture above are two separate instances of gelato from the same place.  I don’t even remember what the other two flavours were, but they were good.  These 4 scoops of gelato were definitely the best ice cream experiences I had this trip.

 I decided to walk home along the southern group of mountains, but at location (6) I was blocked by construction and just had to make due with walking along the edge of the city.

At (7) there was a really nice cemetery across from some sports area.

At (8) there was a castle.  I walked around the castle area but it was getting darker now and I was a little spooked by the windy roads in there, so I left after hanging out with some ducks and peacocks.

Now I was at the edge of what I’d consider Innsbruck, and at (9) there was a pretty desolate trail behind a grass field along the highway ramp.

At (10), there was a water treatment plant beside a lake. 

On the other side of the water treatment plant, there was a lake. There are several activities for people here and it seems like locals like to come here to chill.

The whole area between (9) and (10) was just so confusing and random to me.  Like a field, a water treatment plant, and a recreational area all surrounded by major roads and highways … it was so trippy.

Between (10) and (11) was a more industrial part of town.  That combined with the setting sun also made the whole stretch less inviting. It was around 10pm when I reached (11), a McDonalds.  Since all grocery stores were closed, I thought I’d be a responsible human being and get something to eat.  I had a snack wrap or sorts and a strawberry cheese pie (the seasonal special exclusive to Austria!)

At this McDonalds, I learned that Austria has a Hazelnut McFlurry.  I don’t even care if there’s an amazing version of hazelnut gelato at Tomaselli.  I don’t even care if McDonalds is probably just using hazelnut syrup.  I had to try it.  This would become my mission for tomorrow.

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Day 2

Despite telling myself that my time in Innsbruck would be really chill and relaxing, I still ended up walking over 20km yesterday.  Also, since I had to catch a train back to Munich at night (to make it to my flight to Norway!), I planned to just take it easy on this last day before WWOOFing in Norway for the next month and a half! I roughly planned to walk into and out of town in a loop that’s reverse from yesterday taking slightly different roads.  I had one goal today: Try a Hazelnut McFlurry.

Seeing that the first McDonalds I went to, near location (1), didn’t have an Hazelnut McFlurries available, I rerouted my path to the next McDonalds towards town.

The Mcdonalds at (2) also didn’t have a Hazelnut Mcflurry.  But that’s okay, they must have it closer to the city center.

But at (3) they didn’t have it either.  But that’s okay, this was a dinky McDonalds inside a mall.

When they also did not serve Hazelnut Mcflurries at the heart of the city, at (4), I was getting concerned.  WHY DON’T THEY HAVE IT?? I knew I was going to be in Munich later tonight/early tomorrow so I Googled whether the special Hazelnut McFlurry was a European thing rather than an Austrian thing.  Nope, Hazelnut Mcflurries are only in Austria! It’s today or never!!

I walked across the bridge from the inner city area to the University area along the river (indicated by the pink line) until I reached the last McDonalds in the city, at (5), that would be reasonable for me to walk to….

YESSS FINALLYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY.

I must say, this is the best McFlurry I have ever had.  I strongly suspect they just added hazelnut syrup to the plain McFlurry base, but still.  Why is literally every McDonalds in the world better than Canada’s?

Having accomplished the day’s goal, I was far more at ease.  I went back to the city center along the other side of the river to (6).  Things I wasn’t able to appreciate through my McFlurry Madness were now appreciated.  Just look at how pretty the city is, and good the weather was:

Then I went back to Kröll, the strudel place I went to yesterday, and tried their savory strudel! Since it costs more to have it in the cafe, I took it out to the park at (8) and it was soooo good!

It was still relatively early in the afternoon and I felt like I’ve seen enough of the city, so I decided to take advantage of the good weather and take some of the trails among the northern mountains to go back to my AirBnB.

Across the river that surrounds the city, I walked up to the Alpine Zoo at (9).  I didn’t go in, I just went past is and kept hiking up.  Not only does Google maps not show all the trails, but isn’t really good at showing the relative elevation either, so here’s the rest of my walk superimposed on a picture I took of a trail map:

At (10) I kind of lost the trail and had to scramble through some steep inclines…

Eventually I found the path again and at (11) there was a nice rest area with a cafe, a petting zoo, and playgrounds.

It still felt too early to go back to the AirBnB… so I pushed myself a little further and went to (12), another hiker’s rest point/cafe.  At this point I really regret planning a “chill” day because the weather was so good, and the hikes around Innsbruck seem so much tamer than the ones around Garmisch-Partenkirchen, and I was already half way up at this point! Ahh…. Oh well.

Nothing spectacular about the descent from (12) to (13).  (13) is the same field I passed yesterday morning when it was too foggy to see anything.  This time, in good weather, the view was stunning (there’s a picture in a previous group of panoramas).  I was back in the AirBnb by 6pm or so and had plenty of time to shower and pack.  Yet somehow, I ended up walking even more than yesterday? (See map)

I took an evening train from Innsbruck to Munich along the Austrian side of the Alps.

On the train, the ticket checker told me something that I didn’t really understand partially because of the accent and partially because of the content.  Thank God, another passenger noticed I didn’t understand and went out of the way to explain.  Basically, the section of the train I was on will be ditched in Austria, and if I wanted to go to Munich, I need to leave this section at the next stop and run to a section of the train closer to the front. I was sooo confused because the entire concept of different parts of the train being separated at locations along the way was so foreign to me.  The fellow passenger patiently explained it all.

This also reminds me, this morning when I tried to pre-buy a ticket, I was having some trouble getting a ticket to Munich and a guy waiting for the train actually approached me to see if I needed help!

I am so grateful for the kind strangers that went out of their way to help me. Honestly, I might still be in Austria right now if it weren’t for them.  I also wonder if I could have survived if I travelled solo anywhere else.