A Week in the Tyrol

Early in our stay in Mayrhofen, we took a cable car up a mountain whereupon we came across a man whose job it was to look after goats. His was a solitary existence, a consequence, at least in part, of the curious way he spoke and the excessive volume of his utterances.

But it was from him that we learnt of a significant improvement in the health of the hills on which he stood. The hills have apparently benefited enormously from melody based therapy and so it appears that earlier reports of their death have been greatly exaggerated.

And as you’d expect, so excited was I by this heartening news, I couldn’t help but share it with others!

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‘Zwei adler bitte’

Imagining that I had by now developed a degree of proficiency in the German language, it was with some confidence that I said these words to the young lady who was sat in the mountain top kiosk outside where yesterday’s open air falconry display was about to take place.

But despite the politeness of my request, she handed me the pair of adult tickets I had wanted rather than the two eagles that I had, I realised later, erroneously just asked for!

Which was probably just as well. For not only would I have struggled to squeeze them into my suitcase, close as I already am to my 10kg baggage allowance, but they’d also have posed a problem when it came to passing through airport security as some overzealous officer would, likely as not, classify their talons as a disallowed sharp object and then insist that they somehow flew themselves home instead!

Just garnering opinions. Does anyone else think that the ticket machines for Austrian ‘Pay and Display’ car parks shouldn’t be located quite so close to bus stops?

I only ask as I can conceive of a situation whereby a hapless non-German speaker thinks he’s bought a couple of tickets for a trip, let’s say from Ginzling to Mayrhofen, only to find that, when the bus eventually arrives, he’s actually paid to park his nonexistent car.

Twice.

Just a thought!

If my time in Austria has taught me anything it’s just how much Mozart and me are alike!

Here then are three things we have in common:

1. Both short in stature – Mozart is estimated to have been just 152 cms in height.
2. Because of our appearance, both best viewed in dim lighting – Mozart is said to have believed his nose looked like a potato, hence his apparent preference for being painted in profile
3. Both past our best by 35 – the age at which Mozart died.

But despite the last of these similarities being particularly striking, it was nonetheless a little disappointing to be asked by a bus driver this morning whether I was a senior citizen! Unless of course I misunderstood, and ‘pensionär’ is the German for musical genius.

No, I didn’t think so either!

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Related autobiographical blogs, some more tongue in cheek than others:

To read ‘Salzburg: some favourite things’, click here

To read ‘Mozart, McDonalds and Music’, click here

To read ‘Holiday Dining’, click here

To read ‘Sharing the important things – on introducing your grandchild to cricket’, click here

To read ‘The green green leaves of home’, click here

To read ‘Two of a Kind’, click here

To read ‘Two photos both alike in dignity’, click here

To read ‘We went to the animal fair, the diary of novice grandparents’, click here

To read ‘A cricket tea kind of day’, click here

To read ‘Poor Imitations’, click here

To read ‘Three times a patient’, click here

To read ‘The Life I Lead’, click here