Today is our last day in Tamsweg and we must say the weather has been fairly ordinary lately. We have had more wet days with loads of cloud cover than the sunny days we had expected. But it hasn’t stopped us from venturing out for some trips. We went to the small village of Murau which is the “home” of Greg’s favourite beer! Of course, we had to visit the brewery but decided against doing a tour as it was in German so we sat and had a beer instead!

The Saint Matthews church was built in 1790. The Austrian churches are very different form the Italian ones although the frescoes inside are still beautiful.

The views along the Mur River of the old timber framed buildings were lovely.

An interesting fact about the village is that during WW2 a Nazi POW camp was located in the town to hold British POW’s. At the end of the war in May 1945, local resistance fighters freed the remaining POW’s and successfully held the approaching Red Army forces to make them believe that the town was already occupied by the British.

There is a church which we see from our house, and it is a Pilgrimage Church so we thought we should check it out. St Leonhards Church used to be one of the most important pilgrimage destinations in Austria back in the Middle Ages. It was erected in 1443 and enlarged and fortified in the late 15th Century, in view of repeated Otterman invasions. Inside was quite stunning and the surrounding buildings were also quite pretty.

We got a great view of the village from the Church which is positioned on a hill above the village.

We then stopped at another small village Mariapfarr. Its claim to fame is that an assistant priest in the village called Joseph Mohr, wrote the words to the Christmas Carol, Silent Night Holy Night in 1816. Another church in the town was also on the Pilgrimage Route. The Basilica Mariapfarr had a surrounding cemetery which was a quiet and beautiful place.

We had been waiting with anticipation for the Tamsweg “Wald Fest”. We had no idea what the festival was all about but knew that the “Samson Parade” was happening. We ventured down to the main square and then Samson appeared along with the town Brass and. We have since discovered this is a tradition in the villages of only the Lungau region of Austria and is also on the UNESCO list of Cultural Heritage, so were very lucky to have seen it.

In short, the giant Samson is carried by a strong Lungau man. He dances the “Samson Waltz” and is accompanied by 2 little people (dwarves). Samson can be up to 2.5 metres high and can weigh up to 100kgs. They played music and danced in the main square then proceeded along with loads of people up the main road, stopping every so often, drinking schnapps and dancing, to the main festival fairground about one kilometre away!

We decided to head out of town to do lunch at a nearby village called Ramingstein, and it was great. Rhonda’s cordon bleu was bloody huge but bloody nice and Greg’s roast pork with sauerkraut was just as good and we finished with homemade apple strudel. Yum!

We then decided to call into the fairgrounds on the way home, 3 hours later we were still there, drinking beer, listening to the oompah brass bands, and standing on tables and just generally having a great time, along with hundreds of others. It was lovely to see everyone in their traditional clothes, singing and dancing and just generally having a wow of a time!

Seeing that the weather the next day had improved slightly, we decided to drive another mountain pass. This one was called the Solk Pass. The first stop of the day was at the pretty village of Schladming, made even more stunning by the backdrop of snowcapped mountains. Coffee and apple strudel was ordered for morning tea and we enjoyed sitting in the sunshine with those gorgeous views.

Then we headed up the pass, and it wasn’t long before the road became more narrow, steeper and no lines. Added to that was also the fact that cows seemed to like lying halfway across the road in places. At some stages the incline was 15%

We stopped just before the summit at Osterkehre, 1700 metres for our picnic lunch. The hills were truly alive…… with Gregory!!!!!

At the summit,1793 metres is a small church, Solkpass Kapelle. The views were stunning, snowcapped mountains, waterfalls and Rhonda didn’t even close her eye once! It was a great day!

Two days ago, we ventured into the city of Salzburg to pick up Stew and Lynds who are staying with us for a little while. Unfortunately, the weather was a two umbrella day but we still enjoyed our trip down memory lane from a long time ago!

To escape the rain we went to one of the oldest coffee houses in Salzburg, Cafe Tomaselli and had 2 coffees instead of our usual one, and surprise surprise, a piece of apple strudel to wait for the rain to stop.

We picked Stew and Lynds up at the train station and went back into the old town for dinner. The traditional wiener schnitty was again very good as was the bratwurst and sauerkraut.

Yesterday we ventured to the rather touristy small village of Hallstatt. It is known to be the most photographed place in Austria so get ready for Greg’s photos!!!!!

As you can see, we did have some cloud cover which was a little disappointing as we were heading up the mountain. Stew and Lynds went on a Salt mine tour while we decided to take a cable car ride up to the “Five Fingers” on the Dachstein-Krippenstein Cable car , up 2100 metres. We took 2 cable cars to the top, then a 30 minute walk to the 5 fingers viewing platform.

Although we had a lot of cloud there were times of sun where we saw the lake down at Hallstatt. It was rather chilly up the top though but well worth the trip.

We met Stew and Lynds after we had both finished our adventures and headed off for lunch. We found the Gasthaus Koppenrast, and it was sensational, sitting, finally in the sun having a fabulous lunch. In Greg’s opinion it was the best meal he has had so far in Austria. Rhonda decided that she needed a pasta fix instead of more schnitty and snags, and it was the right decision, it was yum!

Tomorrow, we leave our little mountain retreat in Tamsweg and head to another mountain retreat in Neukirchen am Grossvenediger (its along one!).

So it’s that time again, already had a few drinks so it’s time to pack!

Hopefully our Austrian summer has now arrived. Fingers crossed.

Lots of love

Greg and Rhonda

xxxx