Klagenfurt, Austria.
Hey Everyone,
We hope you are all well. It has only been a few days since my last couple of updates but since it gets dark, and very cold, here from 4.30 pm I have some free time to spend on the computer and so will write to you.
Last week we travelled from Graz to Klagenfurt with Ollie’s Grandma’s cousin, Isolde - we have begun to understand the family connections to Ollie. Isolde drove us to her brother’s place in Klagenfurt so that we could stay with Wolfgang and Annemarie for a while. On the two hour (ish) drive here we reached a point in the mountains 1200m high and we saw snow, real snow. The villages up there looked cute, but cold, with their snow covered lawns and pitched roofs and fir trees blanketed in white snow. I wanted to stop and get out and play but we were on the autobahn (motorway) and therefore, we could not stop and play.
In Klagenfurt, we met Wolfgang and Annemarie who live in a typical Austrian house - two storeys, wooden walls and floor, and warm on the inside - with a small river at the end of their garden and fir tree covered mountains in the background. Klagenfurt is a quieter place in winter because its main attraction is Austria’s biggest lake, the Worthesee. This lake rarely completely freezes but still no one wants to swim in it at this time of year.
We cycled around part of the lake the first day. The Worthesee looks big and still and pretty, reflecting back the images of the fir trees and wooden houses around it. However, it felt good to get back inside after riding into icy wind that streams through all the gaps in your clothing despite the scarf, gloves, hat and many layers one wears.
The main town of Klagenfurt is medium-sized and being renovated for the UEFA Cup (European football) in 2008 in which three games will be played at the new 64 million Euro stadium. Klagenfurt has good shops, lots of coffee houses, a farmers market and currently another Christmas market so there is much to do.
It is the cold, though, that has captured our attention the most, and, apparently, it is not even that cold yet. Around Klagenfurt all the lakes except the Worthesee freeze and, once the ice is 10cm thick, people go ice skating on them. Now, it is just the puddles that freeze, the edge of the lakes and rivers and my handwashed jumper when I put it outside to drip dry for a bit before hanging it inside. I brought is back in stiff and frozen and full of more water then when it went out.
We took a walk to one of the lakes nearby in a fir tree forest and saw our first frozen lake. The ice was only about 2cm thick but Ollie could barely break it with a pine cone. We also heard for the first time the noise of objects on frozen ice. The noise is a kind of high-pitched frequency that emits as long as the object hurled skids across the ice. Ol felt brave enough to put his hand in and gets some ice to throw on the ice which made a beautiful noise as it shattered.
Wolfgang took us for a drive up into the mountians near the Slovenian border to see snow. Unfortunately, no snow had fallen for about three weeks but we saw a half frozen field with ice sitting on the grass and went for a short walk in the 0°C temperature. However, the God of snow favoured us with a random field of snow machine-made snow part way down the mountain. I had been informed that this snow is as much real as real snow.
So now I have played in snow. Our footprints were the first to grace the top of the beautiful, white with a tinge of blue, snow hill. Ollie covered me in snow; the proof is in the pictures. However, when we arrived home, about 30 minutes later, Ol discovered a golf ball-sized lump of ice inside his t-shirt and a soaking wet t-shirt, so I had my revenge.
We also took a drive into the centre of Austria and into the Alps to see real, real snow. We drove past a couple of ski resorts and past some villages covered in snow. We stood in some 20cm deep snow and froze our toes even though they our toes were in shoes.
Staying with Ollie’s relatives, who are actually Austrian, has allowed us to try heaps of new foods that we wouldn’t have ordered ourselves. At Wolfgang’s we have had saurkraut, literally sour cabbage, a type of sausage meat in a big ball with different herbs and barley in it which is a speciality of the region, Carinthia, goulash, which is actually a Hungarian meat stew with a half ton of paprika in it, and my personal favourite, roasted chestnuts. Today, we will try potato sausage.
Roasted chestnuts as we know them from Christmas songs are warm, soft, and taste a bit like unpopped popcorn kernals do when you reach the bottom of the popcorn container. Ollie does not like them. Ollie also does not like the coffee houses so popular in Austria and with Wolfgang. His local provides us with an espresso coffee, tiny milk chocolate to melt in it, and hot frothy milk; this is quite nice.
On the first of December, the first day of Advent and an important day here, we went to see an evening parade of Krampus. Krampus are a companion of Saint Nicholas (Santa) and as wikipedia describes them: ‘Krampus are variously depicted as horned, shaggy, bestial, or demonic. They whip everyone that comes on their path.’ Basically, that is exactly what they do. The suits they wear are amazing, they look like the ugly things in Lord of the Rings, carrying axes, scythes, sticks and whips and one with paraffin that blew out smelly black smoke over everyone.
The parade started with loud bangings of bells and drum beats, then the lights lit up their way and the Krampus began to walk by ‘attacking’ the people at the front of the barriers. I was glad we were not at the front; they are really scary and grab people as they pass and don’t let them go. The next day I saw the beginnings of another parade and saw all the 16 year old boys getting ready to put their masks on and realised why it was mainly teenage girls getting attacked the day before. Some little kids get so scared when they see the Krampus that they burst into tears.
We have also taken a day trip out of Austria into Italy. It took us about 40 minutes to drive to the Italian border from Wolfgang’s house. Two and half hours later, we arrrived in Treviso and tried to park. If you ever want proof there are too many people in the world try parking in Italian towns. We finally found a park after half an hour of driving round and had a look around this medieval town. We then had lunch in a pizzaria before going to Marostica.
Marostica is another medieval town surrounded by a large wall to keep the baddies out. We saw a skating rink in the town centre but did not want to embarrass ourselves in front of the many ten year olds on ice. We had hot chocolates, because I could not stomach another Italian espresso, made from actual melted chocolate and then tried not to throw up because we drank a whole cup of melted chocolate.
The next stop was Bassano Del Grappo and we had a Grappa, the famous spirit from the town that tasted like brandy. We saw its bridge and the World War Two gun shot wounds in the building next to it. Finally, we went on to a town in the hills called Asolo and had tea at the café frequented by Ernest Hemingway.
Then we drove the three hours back and got whiplash from braking for the crazy and erratic Italian drivers. We also drove through thick fog in the Alps which provided us with two second visiabilty, i.e. a light came into view up ahead and two second later we passed it. On arrival back in Klagenfurt we drove over newly salted roads as ice had formed on them. So the drive back was a dangerous adventure for us to see.
From
Ollie and Sophie.
