Friday 11 February 2011

Day Eight .... Run To The Hills ...

Wednesday

Its soo very tempting to burst into The Sound of Music with that Title.......



Must say we're pretty lucky here, I never imagined that we would get invited out so often, its great that people want to show us their country...and I do want to see Austria ....beats hanging around at the camel farm all day - we'd go loopy! Henceforth time to shrug off those smelly jodphurs, don the leather jacket and hit the road jack! After the morning ritual a couple of G's friends drove us to the enchanting Hamlet of Dürnstein deep in the Wachau valley. Certainly a radiant day for it, the blazing sun practically washed through those glacial breezes. Anyhow today's trek was to reach the ruins of a mighty fortress crowning the curious town of Dürnstein.- little cobbled streets, plenty of taverns est16th-18th C and a baroque monastery in blue! - The Castle is  famous for having imprisoned of King Richard The LionHearted --ooooh--when he was on his way back after deciding the Crusades might not have been such a good idea.. We hiked 520 ft of rocky steps to clamber about the ruins excited as excited things! Dazzled by the views that could have been from some equatorial country, taking a breather at the highest point actually shelling off our layers!! SHOCK HORROR! A good dose of sunshine vitamins - J was ecstatic for the glorious sun, poor Australian :p  - - strolled back down the easy way - i wish they'd have said haha! The rocky cliffs the castle was built atop also battle sites for Napoleon and WWII ...cool..
The Danube sparkled so that I nearly wanted to jump in ..... perhaps if there had been a sauna nearby..

Drove though Krems - busy city, big prison - to a view point high above the hustle bustle where J and I promptly dozed off on the bench under the suns rays!! Off to find some nosh and a large beer!! YUM - goulash soup followed by sausages, although Austrians don't seem to know hot dog style yet, but they do know how to drink - Beer, some water and Wine and then SPARKLING WINE MMMmm !  The latter was after coffee at E's, she also laid out some chocolate biscuits - with alcohol in too - we devoured those all but two!  The drive home saw us enraptured by a blissful glowing sunset - G's place is snuggled right down in the valleys, we only get to see the last hues in the sky - but back to the big golden penny casting soft azure tones against the trees and the sandy coloured monastery above Melk. Winter crept back again, you could see frost glinting in the shadowy places by the woods along the streams ..5 degrees..4...2...

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