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 Today my plan was to join Kurt Exenberger of the Bike Academy for a mountain bike ride. But rain poured down, so we put this off until tomorrow. That was ok, it gave me  a chance to get to the Hahnenkamm, the steep mountain that gave Kitzbuhel its famous name in […]

This man’s grimace comes from the strong drink he’s been passed, Baumann’s Wurtzelgeist, with Alpine herbs. It does down like fire, but the aftertaste is pleasantly herbal.  We had just come down from our long hike on the mountain and this is how the hikers like to celebrate another good […]

On the train to Kitzbuhel, I parked myself on the wide leather seats of the first class car, thanks for Rail Europe, who hooked me up with a Eurail pass days before I left. As I settled in and turned on the iPod, the conductor approached with a stack of […]

At breakfast at the Hotel Kitzhof, I read the Independent newspaper, and found a story by Tony Paterson about a Baron. It seems that Eberhard von Gemmingen-Hornberg, a German aristocrat, was hoodwinked into believing he had shot a trophy stag, which turned out to be a tame deer that loved […]

Faithful readers, I must take it all back. I know I was railing about Kitzbuhel being a tourist trap yesterday, but as I suspected, a day here doing something really fun has changed my tune. We met up with Englebert at the tourist office and we followed him to a […]

After a long and productive (wrote my story) train ride from Graz, finally reached Kitzbuhel about 3:30 pm. Taxiied to my hotel a guesthouse up in the hills, where the owners raise dairy cows and chickens. My first question of my innkeeper, of course was ‘do you have wireless?’ and […]

Sitting in an internet cafe at the Graz railway station. Now I know what is it like for our internet cafe customers who have to hurry and finish their email and their blogs. This is a little different because here the instructions are coming at me in German, as are […]

I had a sandwich at this cafe in Graz, while the tram glided by, close but nothing to fear. I am so impressed with the extensive network of these electric trams, with flat screens that show the next stop and all sorts of other information, and easy to use, automated […]

Today is a wonderful day and I can’t remember when I felt so good. I woke up refreshed, sleeping a little late in this hotel bed, with the sun streaming in and the river Mur rushing by next to me. I went down to the Tribeka Cafe and Rosterei, a […]

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We visited many wineries and wine shops today in Austria, and I came across a huge bottle in one of them. Not sure what to call it, I found out this: Standard Wine Bottle Sizes: These are traditional standard bottle sizes for Champagne. Split1/4 bottle 18.7 cl Half1/2 bottle37.5 cl […]

We drove into the Styrian countryside today, it was a bright clear day, sunny and bright, the kind of day where you want to spend as much time as possible sitting in the sun, like the cows we passed enjoying their corner of a hilly pasture. Our first stop was […]