TravelWinter

Leaving for Easter vacation

It´s been a while since our last post, mainly due to a lot of stress in our jobs. But now we are off for Easter vacation and we’d like to take you with us on our trip to the Alps.

This time we decided to spare ourselves for the long car trip through Germany and rather try a more relaxed way to travel, which involved different kinds of transportation.

But first things first: after our last working day before Easter we decided to give ourselves a treat with a relaxing time in a SPA, followed by a dinner for two. Since Roland’s working place is in Nøtterøy near Tønsberg and our ferry the next (early) morning left from Larvik (only a few kilometres from Nøtterøy), we decided to sleep over at Farris Bad. Unknowingly we were really lucky, as this weekend it was “Aufguss-Weekend” in Farrisbad. For this event, world champions in “Aufguss” were invited to show off their skills. We enjoyed the Aufguss show of the Saunawizards very much and had a relaxing time trying out all different SPA facilities. After the Sauna we went for a very nice dinner before we fell asleep, getting ready for the trip the next day.

First stage of the journey to our Easter vacation:

The next day started quite early. Since we had to catch the speed ferry from Larvik to Hirtshals. 7 a.m. was boarding so we had to get up around 6 – but still a lot better than getting up at 4 to get there from Oslo. The trip on the boat to a bit longer than 3 hours and off we went to Denmark

Second stage of the Journey:

Now we headed down south towards Hamburg. The drive from Hirtshals to Hamburg takes around 5 hours. To break it up a little we did a little detour off the highway and through Kolding, once the domicile of the kings of Danmark. Kolding is a little town in Denmark, where Roland once was working on a project. So we drove a bit around in town introducing Katharina to the places he has been while away on the project for almost a year.

Short stop in Hamburg:

Despite the short detour in Denmark, we arrived in Hamburg much too early for the check in to the car train. So we decided to take a quick visit to the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg. We thought it would be an easy one to get in. But due to the masses of tourists storming this new attraction in Hamburg, you need to get tickets to get in. We found out that it is faster to buy tickets upfront on the internet. However, than you are bound to a certain time slot which you have to reach and it costs 2 Euros. If you do it spontaneously it’s free. Queuing without pre-booked tickets, you’re dependant on the number of available tickets after the online reservations for each of the 30 minutes time slots. So if you have bad luck you might have to wait for some time to get admission.

However, we were lucky and got inside. It is really an impressive building (by Herzog & De Meuron) and we decided to come back again for a guided tour in order to be able to see the concert halls from the inside.

Third stage:

And off we went to check in on the car train that got us from Hamburg directly to Vienna.

After a good night on the train we finally arrived in Vienna – relaxed and awake to start our last stage for this journey to the Alps – driving from Vienna to Ramsau.

Sleeping all the way through Germany and arriving in sunny Austria was a treat. The last couple of kilometres were easy and we arrived in our destination at 2 p.m. – early enough to shake out our legs with a nice little backcountry tour up Hochwurzen.

A very easy BC-Tour with a great view:

Download file: Roland_Mosheim_2018-03-25_14-12-53.gpx

We can definitely recommend taking the train instead of driving through Germany by car. Even though it takes a bit longer, it is far more relaxing. Tried both, cannot compare 😉

Stay tuned for some more stories from our vacation and Happy Easter!!

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