Fairytale Castle, Innsbruck, Swarovski Museum

Road trip to Neuschwantein Castle and Innsbruck 

And so nearly 2 full months after returning to Japan, I finally have the mood and time to write again. Of course memory fades so I don't really remember as much as I wanted to write down so lucky you will be spared of the dreary details.

DAY 1

Sunrise from my uni dorm room. Definitely the most dazzling sunrise that had greeted me in a long long while. We went to fetch the car which IY had pre-booked. Super happy that we are driving there instead of the original plan to take public transportation because all the worthwhile spots are scattered along the way.

Chiemsee Lake, our first stop! I was hoping for a green water lake but this looked a lot more like the sea. We're already in Germany at this point btw.

M helped to create the background by tossing her handmade muffin to the seagulls.　*sniff*

There it is. Our pretty fairytale castle perched between the snowy-capped mountains.  M kindly suggested to stop the car when she saw I was trying to get a good picture.

The town where the castle was located was dreamy as well.

Hohenswangau Castle-The other castle which is also located within walking distance. We were confused at first and wondered if this was the fairytale castle. It looks like a lego castle to me^^. Pity its cuteness is dimmed by the much more famous Neuschwanstein Castle.

Since you cannot drive up to the doors of the castle, you can either hike your way up the hill (40mins) or take the shuttle bus with an arbitrary schedule. We waited for nearly 30 minutes without knowing if the bus would really come and finally gave up and started leaving when the bus showed up and we all scampered back.
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 There's a bridge especially to admire the castle from afar.

On our way to the castle. Really like this shot.

The door of the castle. The reviews online mostly said the tour inside the castle wasn't worth it so we didn't bothered to go in.

ga-ga-ga Finally a green-water lake! The sun was already setting so it was getting less and less greener by the second.. I forgot what's the name of this lake.. Plansee maybe? It was on our way to Innsbruck from the castle.

Didn't want to upload this photo as I don't want my dear bf to be jealous...but my legs soooo thin here, how can I resist??

Some creative couple poses to be remembered :D
On our way back to Innsbruck we saw a lot snow-capped mountains. It was kind of funny to remember how desperate I was to catch a glimpse of them back in Nepal when it's just almost everywhere in this area.

DAY 2 - Innsbruck, Swarovski Museum

Weehee~ I've lusted after this museum after I first saw it on 9gag. 

Many hard to understand art inside.

must.take.selfie

mini maze behind the museum

Though I enjoyed the museum, I wouldn't say it was worth the price of the entrance ticket. It was mostly art pieces made with crystals. Would definitely have been nicer if they write about where the crystals come from, how they manufacture and design it etc.

Olympic ski jump

 It was a wet and gloomy day and rained on and off so the main attraction of  Innsbruck, the capital of alps was nowhere to be seen. With normal good weather you would be able to see the majestic alps surrounding the town.

Whereas with my friends here I would have to think twice before inviting a new friend to join ina trip, these guys really made me feel welcome.. always making sure I'm not left out and would apologize profusely whenever they accidentally talked in spanish. I feel damn lucky to have met them^^

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COST

rental car :                133euro/5ppl

gasoline :                    79euro/5ppl

hostelling international : 25euro

swarovski museum :      11euro

Czech Republic - Prague

weekend at prague

24/1/2014～27/1/2014 

I love the Fridays here! The office is like a desert by 3pm (just learnt that most of them go back at 1pm). And last Friday we just left for Prague before lunch like it's the most natural thing to do!

Four hours of bus and we are in Prague by 17:30! Surprisingly, the buses and trains in Austria are almost as punctual and reliable as Japan! This is the street where Hostel Mango was. 

14 bed dormitory but my bed was in a smaller, slightly more secluded room inside the room so lucky me!

  

The common room in Hostel Mango. va-va-va-ness.

It's like in a caveeee. 

The two ladies from Basque. N on the left and O on the right. O and I are in the same research lab in JKU and she has been a total angel to me: introducing me to her gang of Basque friends, lending me her frying pan and tupperware, trying to include me in her activities as much as possible, and this time, inviting me along on her Prague trip with N who came to visit. She's 3 years younger than me but I'm being taken care of orz. *shame on me*

The first thing we did after dropping our luggage at the hostel was to hunt for dinner at Atmosphere Cafe Pub which was recommended by O's friends. The interior looks like a pub but the atmosphere is that of a restaurant. It's a pretty weird concept for me to find dinner in a pub. Prague is famous for having the cheapest beer in Europe. This humongous one was less than 2€ but I'm not a fan of alcohol so this news wasn't very exciting for me.

Randomly strolled around the town to take in the night view and we stumbled onto Old Town and the Astronomical Clock. You can (almost) effortlessly navigate the famous places in Prague just by foot. There's Charles Bridge and on one side of it you have the castle, on the other side of the bridge you have Old Town with the Astronomical Clock, Jewish Quarters, and Wenceslas Square.

Day 1

Free tour! Just drop by the astronomical clock at 11pm or 2pm and look out for people with umbrellas.

Baroque style church. There's a myth that once a thief tried to steal some holy statue from here but the statue gripped his hand and wouldn't let go. His hand was then mummified and still hanging near the entrance door.

Sexy pregnant sexy woman statue by a controversial artist.

This one is interesting. It's a monument dedicated to Kafka, who's regarded as one of the most influential author in the 20th century (according to wiki) and the statue depicts Kafka riding on an empty suit. Take a guess at what you think it means before seeing the answer. Hint: It represents most of the society now.


okie dokie??


Answer: Kafka hated his 'bread' job at his insurance company which he did just to pay the bills and wanted to devote more time to writing, thus the empty suit. 
He wasn't well-known at all while he was alive, but after he died, his best friend who refused to follow Kafka's instructions to burn his writings, had them published instead. Only then Kafka's fame sky-rocketed.

The Jewish Quarters

Apparently the Jewish's activities were limited to this area. I really don't know much of the Nazi or Jewish history. I blame on Malaysia's education system where ONLY Malaysia's history was taught. So all I know is Parameswara, Melaka tree, Malaysia's "hero" who assassinated James Birch for being disrespectful to the local customs... by outlawing slavery =.=

A break before continuing the tour to Charles Bridge and Prague Castle. It was -10°C so we were really grateful for the chance to warm up.

View of Prague Castle from Charles Bridge.

John of Nepomuk - a national saint of Czech Republic

le story: Nepomuk was the queen of Bohemia's confessor and the king got curious of his wife's secrets so he demanded Nepomuk to spill the beans. When the confessor refused, he was thrown into this river. Then abracadabra!! Five stars circulated above the water he drown in and so the people hailed him as a saint directly after he died. 

You see the pattern now? I really feel for people like him and artists whose works only become valuable after they die. If I ever have to choose, I will never hesitate to become filthy rich and famous for the short time that I'm alive rather than to be remembered forever after I die. 

Here's another monument showing ol' Nepomuk resting under the water. There are many other statues along Charles Bridge but these were the only ones whose story was explained to us.

The stairs up to the castle. I read like it's a real hard walk and there were tips for taking trams but this is really not that high or far for me and I was wearing boots with heels.

I was expecting a disney-style stone castle but it was actually just a complex of normal-looking buildingsss and this cathedral was the nicest looking one there. It looked very similar with Mariendom, the cathedral in Linz. Size-wise this is obviously bigger but the interior of Mariendom wins it hands-down when it comes to making me feel awed and like there really is a god.  

Our tour ended here and we tipped our guide 200CZK for the 3 of us so it was like only 2.5€ per person for the 3 hour. She told us from the very beginning that she would appreciate any donation if after the tour we felt that it was worth it and also that she will not mention another word of it - and she kept true to her word. No raised eyebrow when other people gave even less money. Her name is Klara so look out for her if you want to do the free tour!

Famous souvenir for Prague but I find marionettes creepy.

The food here is a lot but we never seemed to learn our lesson and kept having tons of leftovers. I asked for the restaurant if they had aluminium foil and the waitress replied apologetically that they only have boxes if I don't mind. And she returned with this cool airtight sealed box LOL.

Us with Yuko, the first Jap I met after coming here. I was thrilled to meet her in our hostel yesterday and we chattered late into the night. She was just the nicest girl -offering us her hairdryer without us asking. Really wanted to ask her to join us for today but it didn't feel right since I was just an invitee myself. Yuko is traveling Thai-Czech Republic-Poland-Austria-Croatia alone for a month. Super daring especially since she didn't speak much English.

Day 2

Cannot believe I paid 150CZK to have myself out-of-breath not from the beauty of the scenery - but from climbing up this 300 steep spirally (if this is a word) steps tower in Prague Castle. It felt like the bbq/picnic game where you circle the same spot for 10 times before you attempt to race... except you do the spinning part for 15 minutes. There wasn't much to see up here and we went back down after we de-froze our poor toes. 

Dancing House 

The other girls KO-ed after climbing this tower and decided to chill out until their time for the bus back so I strolled here myself. Inside is just some offices so I didn't bother to go in.

 Really glad I decided to spend an extra night here by myself. It felt liberating and I began to notice more details around me.

How beggars in Prague begs

Day 3

It snowed on the last day and it felt so magical and purtyyyy

Old Town in snow version

Astronomical Clock

On every hour the skeleton on the right side would ring the bell, reminding us that we are one hour closer to our death. On the left most, there's a man holding a mirror representing vanity, then a miser holding a bag of gold and the right most is pleasure/entertainment.

Wenceslas Square

I dragged myself here just to feel productive because all I did was got myself cheated, souvenir shopping and getting lost the whole morning. It's not as touristy here.

After this few days, I still couldn't really tell how Czech people look like because during this whole trip I can only be sure that I met ONE Czech. The rest were from Russia and other neighbouring countries who came here for a better life.  

Bye praggy! 

You're the first famous European city I ever visited!

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Notes:
Hostel Mango
Extremely friendly and helpful receptionists with smiley faces all the time. Or at least the two pretty receptionists I met were. If they didn't know about something you asked, the answer isn't the typical "sorry, I dunno", they would look up on their computer immediately. Free (but weak) wifi, free towels, free soap and shampoo. free padlock to lock your own mini cabinet, sockets beside your bed. Less than 2 minutes walk from Charles Bridge on the castle side and less than 10 minutes walk from a subway station so I'd say the location is perfect. Cheaper to book on hostelworld → 6.49€ than their own official website and even cheaper (by 0.50€ anyway) when I extended another night after I arrived there.

To there:
From linz, the cheapest option would be the studentagency bus. Price differ if you choose round ticket etc but about 16€ one way. But as the only day to leave Linz was Sunday and to return is on Thursday, no chance of using it. *sigh* The pain of living in a small town. From Vienna you have a lot of days to choose from.
So we took the second cheapest way:  westbus one way 22€. And it has WIFI!!!!

Transportation within:
Besides the subway from the main station Florenc (where our bus arrived) to Malostranka (where our hostel was), everything else was within easy walking distance.

My fav website for Prague info:
http://www.myczechrepublic.com/prague/

Must-do:
Free tour 
Walk along the river to Dancing House in the evening

*/