Mary and Maurice World Tour 2023

Early visitors found a thundering waterfall at the head of the Gastein Valley. What to do? Some bright spark must have said as a joke "Let's build a village on both sides with a bridge over the raging cataract". So they did.  Eventually, they discovered numerous mineral springs and thermal caves, all of which were advertised as having health benefits which attracted tourists, and thus the decision to build was proved sensible.  Well, that's my version.  The official legend involves saints performing miracles to cure a wounded deer with the mineral spring water.  The truth is probably between these two stories.  Whatever the true history, there's no doubt that there are many such springs and visitors come from all over just to soak in the healing water and breathe in the healing air. Some visitors just wash their hands...  One other story about the healing water: someone in a wheelchair went in hoping for a miracle, and it worked! The...

One of our keenly anticipated adventures was to cycle from Vienna to Budapest along the Danube.  When the time came, we discovered we'd be riding 7 days x 50 km per day, potentially in 27+ degree heat.  We wimped out and caught the train. As we have done elsewhere, in Budapest we grabbed Hop On/Hop Off bus tickets which once again proved to be an excellent option to see maximum sights with minimum fuss and cost. Even if a certain taller passenger did have to duck under the many roadside trees, much to the amusement of a certain shorter passenger.  And the first thing we did on the bus was to get off, for a 'free' walking tour. I say 'free' because it was only available if you had bought the fully optioned bus ticket, plus the guide asked for tips at the end.  The guide was a born-and-bred local so, as we have come to expect from local guides wherever we have been, the tour was excellent, informative and entertaining. Our two favourite stories...

Austria has mountains, so Thursday seemed a good time to climb one overlooking Vienna...  We also climbed a local 1000 year old tower, marvelling at how it was still standing when many younger buildings had long since collapsed.  How to top that vigorous start to the 2nd half of our week? Friday answered that question...  The day started with Mary spotting a sign advertising a 'Piccolo Bar'. "Aha!" she cried, "We have to go in there".  Roland advised perhaps not, the reason becoming clear as we got close enough to see the window dressing...  Off to the Belvedere instead, where we found a long queue at the ticket office, raising doubts that we would even be able to visit. Roland was volunteered by Mary to investigate the availability of tickets, because "You speak German and we don't".  Roland obediently strode purposefully past the queue to make enquiries, and returned with 3 tickets to enter in 45 minutes ti...

Inspired by our cultural success the previous day, we booked in for a 'Beethoven Tour' on the Rhine.  It was a nice cruise, however there was no mention of Beethoven at any stage, nor any commentary for that matter. Given we saw old art in a modern art museum, I guess we shouldn't have been surprised by a Beethoven tour that didn't feature Beethoven. How to console ourselves?  We were not the only ones bemused by the lack of Beethoven. A group of partying ladies at the next table asked the steward that very question, and received a shrug of the shoulders and a request for their drinks order. Mary solved the problem by playing one of Beethoven's symphonies on Spotify, much to their amusement! Safely back on shore we walked around the UN precinct, which includes the old West German parliament. We did wonder why the streets were so empty, however our hosts reminded us that it was Friday afternoon, and finding a civil servant still at...