Interrailing in central Europe

YOU HEAR ME?!

Hello, if you feel that the text below is a bit too much for you, or are here just for the pictures, then this is what you need to know: We are Interrailing and have visited in Austria, Germany, Czech Republic and Slovak, and are having a great time.

19.6 Bruneck – Innsbruck - München

But first, let me take a selfie!

We started our Interrail trip actually yesterday with careful planning of the cities we would visit and the trains we would take. Then we woke up early on the morning, packed our things and hit the route. We had to make two train changes to get to Innsbruck but there were no problems at all fortunately.

We could have taken the ski lift...

When we reached to Innsbruck we left our bags in the lockers in the train station and asked from Tourist Information where could we go hiking near the city. He recommended us Hungerburg, where we could get by bus. The bus left in front of a museum near the train station. The bus “J” was already going when we saw it and we waved it to wait us. Even from outside we could see that the bus driver was not happy; he was shaking his hands and he had the most impatient look on his face. As dumb tourists we didn’t mind and tried asking him the price and where to stop. He started almost yelling us in strange language we didn’t know and waved us to go to sit. So we got a free bus drive up to Hungerburg.

Hungerburg was 865 meters up and we made almost 300 meters ascent, walking three hours on the side of the mountain. The route seemed steeper than anything we have walked this far and there were these lunatic mountain bikers coming down from the top that we had to look out for. Because we have already seen amazing places like Drei Zinner and Pragser Wildsee, this time the view seemed “ok”. We could see whole Innsbruck below and the alps on the background. We stopped for a little while to have something to drink in Arzer Alm, and then walked back to Hungerburg, where we took the bus back down to Innsbruck. Not knowing how or what to pay from the trip, we paid again nothing.

Night at München

After having delicious meal at Burger King, we took the train to München. On the train trip the view got flatter little by little, on to the point where the ground seemed like it was ironed. There wasn’t mountains to be seen anywhere. It was weird.

When we got to München we were stunned on how big the city was. We realized it would take more than one day to explore this city, but at least we’ll get a glimpse on it. 

We found Hostel Wombat and took a private room for two. The room is clean and nice and if we would like to get drunk, this place would be made for it… but we’re here to explore, and have to get up quite early (damn..).

Now we have eaten apparently Vietnamese food (and sushi) in a restaurant called “China express”, walked some while in the city and are hitting the sack. Tomorrow we’ll have the day to explore some more and we’re continuing our trip to Prague in the evening as well.

20.6  München – Prague

Aino's amazingly artisticc photos BY GLEB

We had a big breakfast at the hostel Wombat, where we stayed the night. It had been easy to find it because it was so close the railway station. We checked out after the breakfast, left our bags in the lockers in the hostel and went out for a little shopping. We only had time to travel through one big street, mainly because we walked so slowly. We visited a big church on the way and the old Rathaus, where there was an exhibition of very weird art... there were furniture that were playing music. For example a stove was made into a vinyl player.

We found a good looking place to eat that served burritos, burgers, tortillas and some finger food. Gleb had a big barbeque meal and Aino ate some sort of chicken-rise-tortilla-cheese-thingy. We left with full stomachs back to the hostel so we would make it to 17 o’clock train to Prague.

The train trip to Prague took nearly 5 hours, a buss would have been half an hour faster, but we took the train nevertheless. When we reached to Prague it was really late, but we had a clear vision where we would find a hostel. We had checked hostels via Internet back in München (it was  only then that we realized that they don’t use euros in the Czech Republic) and put in mind Hostel Elf, that seemed to be quite near the railway station, and that had 24 hours reception. Well, after little navigation problems, we found it quite fast, but they didn’t have rooms for two nights, so we kept on going. The second hostel had no rooms at all even for that night, so we decided to take the third one, no matter what. Hostel 1 had a six-person-room left, and surprisingly they had a Finn at the reception. The Finn said that the hostel is usually very nice, but at that time, there were more drunk people than sober… and they were pretty loud. We went to sleep listening as the drunk people headed to bars and clubs.

21.6 Prague

They required a picture, so Gleb said yes

The morning was better; the people at the reception were nice, guiding us to find a hostel for the next night. We called a hostel that had private room for two with shared bathroom, even though it seemed quite expensive 1200kr/ person for a night.

We headed downtown after mild navigation problems (yet again) and visited not only one but THREE museums. One was about the both world wars in Czech Republic, the second had a handsome collection of wax models of real persons and the last one made us question Tim Burton’s sanity with his work (actually it almost made us question our own sanity as well). As we were walking back, we felt like having some sushi again and found a pretty expensive place to take some.

Later, when we checked in to the hostel, we found out that it was only 1200kr for the both of us. As we both already had 1200kr cash, we decided to take a taxi to downtown, had some expensive drinks at some expensive hotel bar and take a taxi back to the hostel. It worked out well, we got rid off the extra 1200kr (50 euros… such a good idea).

22.6 Prague – Bratislava – Wien

We woke up to have some breakfast and walk to the Train Station to catch the train to Bratislava. The train left around 9 o’clock and it took 4 hours to Bratislava, so we only had a little to explore Slovak’s capital city. We asked a pair of policemen how to walk to the city center. The town seemed little compared to Prague, but it was really beautiful. Aino really liked it better because it didn’t seem so stuffed. The weather was a bit too nice; it was 30 degrees in the sun and we had our hiking gears on (we thought we were going hiking, but didn’t have enough time for that). Gleb had to find a book when we found a bookstore and it took him about an hour to pick one. We walked to the old city center, which had some funny statues and beautiful buildings side by side. The center wasn’t big so it didn’t take us long.

We had to wait an hour at the Train Station for a train to Wien, because they were rebuilding the railway. The train to Wien took only an hour and in Wien we figured out that we should have made some information search about the city or the hostels in there. We found the way to center but the city is ENORMOUS. We asked for a map in some hotel and he guided us onwards. We found a restaurant that had free wi-fi and had some sushi (no, we don’t eat anything else) with the free wi-fi. We found Hostel Wombat again, marked it on the map and finally, after long day of walking and navigating from one place to another, found a place to rest.

23.6 Wien

Keep up, please

We woke up, had some breakfast and visited the center. We walked about four hours, visiting shops and taking pictures of the sights. The museums and churches all paid too much. Instead of spending our money on seeing magnificent art and architecture, we went shopping, near the Wombat hostel, where there was a street full of shops. Aino would have liked to visit Prater, which had for example a 100-meters-tall swing; the Praterturm. Unfortunately we had been walking the whole day and felt pretty tired, so we just went back to the hostel and relaxed. By the way we ate Chinese food (not sushi) today and some Turkish food (not kebab).

Our legs start to feel quite stiff, now that we have been five days on the road, just walking and walking and walking….

slurps