Jack returned to me on Tuesday afternoon with a jar of vegemite, a packet of TimTams, a re-sized engagement ring and no beard. Winning combo.
We stayed in Vienna for one last night (so Jack could recover from spending close to 50 hours in transit within 6 days) at Donaupark Camping Klosterneuburg which ended up costing just under 22€ per night.
We left Vienna early on Wednesday morning and headed west to Salzburg. We visited this city on our last trip but loved it so thought it would be nice to return. We stayed at Panorama Camping Salzburg for 33€ and it was probably the most luxurious campsite we have stayed at (based purely on the incredible amenities – still drooling).
From the campsite to town was about a 15 minute bike ride along the river which had us envying people who got to ride this as a daily commute. Once in town we wandered around for a while before heading back to the campsite.
We woke early the next morning and headed half an hour down the road to Berchtesgaden in Germany (seamless border crossing because well, there is no technical border) to climb to The Eagle’s Nest aka Kehlsteinhaus aka (one of) Hitler’s houses.
This trip had been about 4 years in the making (since it was closed the last time we were in the vicinity) so Jack was peaking. The hike to the top was about 8km with 870m of elevation and took about 2 hours. The walk itself was an unrelenting uphill battle but the 360 degree views from the top made it all worth it.
After a little walk around and a couple of steins (in preparation for Oktoberfest), we made our way back down to Peggy. The walk back was a lot quicker because a) it was downhill (duh) and b) we rode for about 30 seconds on the ‘golden’ elevator.
NOTE: there are shuttle buses available from the base of the mountain to basically the top with the price being about 16€ pp return. From the bus drop off area you can either walk for 20-30 minutes to the top, or take the elevator which is included in the bus ticket. Since we walked from the base to the very top, we paid nothing and were told to purchase a ticket for the elevator once we hopped on. The operator said nothing so must have assumed everyone had tickets from the bus so we got a free ride – small wins.
We were absolutely exhausted once we reached Peggy so quickly picked a campsite close by. Camping Simonhof was nice enough (but with a horrible receptionist) and cost 26€ for the night plus 5€ for wifi.
We had planned to do another hike on Friday morning because there was so many trails around the area, but could barely move after our efforts from the day before so we instead had a very slow morning before packing up and moving on.
We had to be in Munich on Saturday so headed north from Berchtesgaden and picked a spot by Simssee (which is a lake). The driving through Austria and Germany is some of our all time favourite and we are constantly surprised by how beautiful it is and this drive was no exception. We arrived at Simssee and found a really shaded, large and most importantly free carpark with a little bar to boot. After a few beers we turned in knowing an early start was on the cards for the next day.
We were on the road early the next morning and headed into Munich for what was sure to be a wild few days. We had pre-booked a spot at Oktoberfest Camping München (65€ per night for 4 persons) and pulled up to a mad house. Check-in took well over an hour and we were lead to a spot in the middle of what seemed like a million other campers. Our friends arrived later that day so we decided to stay at the campsite and head into the festival the next day.
Come Sunday, we dressed up in our dirndl / lederhosen outfits with a thirst for beer. The campsite was 100m from the train station and the journey took us just under 30 mins to get to the fair ground.
Oktoberfest can only rely be described as organised chaos and/or The Royal Easter Show on crack. It was a typical carnival with the obvious attraction being one of the many beer halls. It was pandemonium by the time we had arrived and after walking through a couple of the bigger beer halls, we quickly realised we would be hard struck trying to get a table inside so, we grabbed a table outside of the Augustiner tent and obviously excited by the whole situation, the day only went downhill from here.
About 4 steins and 2 hours later, we had all managed to lose each other (me with Jack’s phone and wallet) so at varying points throughout the night we all made our separate way back to the camp ground with our own hilarious story to tell.
Until Week Eighteen. Tchuss x
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