The hotel was our cheapest so far, at 90 euros for the night, but had a massive room with incredible views. It also had the first tub of any of our hotels on the trip. The tub was also the longest bathtub I've ever been in, with a full foot more legroom when sitting down with legs out. Here was the view from our room:
We mostly spent the day resting. We tried two shops, but they were overpriced and didn't offer anything interesting. To be fair, one had a snow globe that I considered as a gift, but it seemed unlikely to survive the rest of the trip. We ate both lunch and dinner at a local publike restaurant, Postalm. I tried a beef consomme soup, with cheese "pressknodel." It was good, though the cheese bit was an odd texture. Later, we both tried a mushroom dumpling with vegetables, which was quite good and again, quite odd.
At night, we tried to get some shots of the town at sunset, but we couldn't find the best route to take pictures. We settled on a hill across from town, facing the sunset.
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| Look closely to see Stephanie |
Here are some other shots I took:
Today, we had another near three hour drive. About forty five minutes into the drive, at Innsbruck, we stopped at a camera store to pick up a wide lens for me. I figured that it would come in handy in Switzerland. We arrived at out bed and breakfast around 1:00. Unfortunately, the owners were not in. I happened to look up and another guest was opening the window. She came down and let us in.
My booking confirmation showed check in time at 2:00, but when no one came, we decided to use their desk phone to call the number on the reservation information. I actually tried this earlier, but accidentally used their international code first, which didn't work. This time we tried it without the code and got through. The owner told us the code on the lock box to retrieve our room key.
First we drove to the tourist information center, which is about fifteen minutes away. Liechtenstein is tiny, so we first had to cross the bridge into Switzerland, drive a few miles, and then go back over the bridge into Liechtenstein. We were given some maps for the three hikes we are interested in. The first one began about 15 minutes away from the office. They informed us however, that due to construction, we had to take a different route to the hike, which would take a few minutes longer. We drove up the mountain and parked our car at the hike beginning. As we had read online, there were nice free bathrooms at the parking lot.
Not many people bother stopping in Liechtenstein because it is expensive and there is not much to see. One reason to stop is for their hikes. This first hike was the biggest and hardest of the three we picked out. I had actually picked out two hikes before the trip, and found the third hike that I was interested in, the night before. The name of today's hike is translated as The Prince's Way hike, known as Furstensteig.
The trail reportedly is very well maintained, but not supposed to be great for people with height problems. Since people ranted and raved about how good it was, I decided to push myself to do it. The weather for the two days we are in Liechtenstein report the same, scattered rain throughout the day. I packed our two ponchos into a tiny backpack and clipped it to my belt. I also only brought my handheld camera. We found mixed reports of how long the hike would take, ranging from three hours and seventeen minutes to five hours.
We began the hike, which started easily enough, through the woods, winding upwards. Then, we suddenly reached the cliff sides. It was at this time that it began to rain. We donned our ponchos and waited. After about ten minutes it began to subside. As I said earlier, I decided to push myself, hoping that the more scary looking area would not be long. It was long.
I kept my poncho on in case it did rain and I would be too afraid to put it on due to how narrow the trail was. This provided the additional benefit of partially obscuring the view. The negative effect is that I sweat into the poncho and soaked it from the inside out.
I only got two pictures while on the rock cliff portion of the hike:
I walked in front, and due to fear, I kept moving until this part of the hike was done. It was tough for me due to the heights. Unlike the crags in Taiwan, I did not feel the same level of elation and pride after I had completed it. I decided that I really don't enjoy pushing myself, and from now on I will pick less fear inducing heights. The problem with this, of course, is that most hikes involving any kind of movement near the side of anything invokes fear for me. It will be interesting to see how I will do on the mountains of switzerland. I am dreading all of the cable cars/ropeways already. I didn't like sky rides as a kid and I don't like them now.
Here is a picture in front of a bench. I sat on the ground instead.
After the more terrifying portion, it turned into an easygoing gravel path downward, which then turned into an ascent. I wasn't scared here at all, as the paths were wide. My legs were simply tired of stepping upward. Once at the top, it brought us to a grassy path that very slowly descended on the other side. We were treated to beautiful views and a constant ringing of cow bells.
About halfway down the path toward the parking lot, it began to rain. I put on my poncho, despite the sweaty interior, and we continued down. Due to the rainy weather, it became so foggy that all good views disappeared. Near the end, we discovered one of the sources of the cowbells.
Back at the car, I ducked into the bathroom to unzip the leg portion of my convertible pants, which were wet from being below the poncho's cover. We finished the hike in about two hours and fifty minutes.
We were hungry, so we located the nearest coop, which was closing thirty minutes later. It would take us twenty minutes to get there. We pasted by Vaduz Castle, which is an oddly shaped castle. I stopped in the side of the road to take a picture, but someone was trying to make a turn to where I was. I decided to skip the picture and move onward. They then pulled into my picture taking spot and sat there. Oh well.
We got to the coop in time. It was in a tiny two floored shopping area, with an ATM out front. I retrieved some Swiss Francs here, as Francs are the currency of Liechtenstein and Switzerland. We used the last of our euros at a gas station before the border. Stephanie asked why the groceries were so expensive. I explained that the prices in Liechtenstein are supposed to be super high.
Back at the hotel room, Stephanie looked into it, and it seems like this country has the second highest GDP per capita, following only Monaco. Stephanie also said that the internet refers to Liechtenstein as a tax haven, among other odd things such as only giving women the right to vote in 1984. The internet also claims that the country has more registered companies than people.
In any case, the food was good. I tested out the new lens from our window.
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