14 July 1998
We drove on through
some of the highest passes in the Austrian Alps. It was very pretty, but not
nearly so high or dramatic as the Rocky Mountains. We read later about the
highest peak being almost 4000 meters; that’s only about 11,000 feet. Colorado
has something like 8 peaks over 14,000. I didn’t realize the Alps were smaller
than the Rockies. We pulled off into a little village called Bichlbach, where
every house looked like a picturesque chalet, with baskets of flowers on every
balcony. The family lives on the ground floor, and has several rooms to rent on
the second and third floor. They are probably all full in the winter. We
stayed in one place that had a queen size bed, everywhere else we had kings.
Most of them were comfortable enough to sleep on, but there were 2 or 3 where I
slipped my air mattress under the covers. All but one had the same type of
covers, a thick blanket that was just big enough to cover one person, and it was
inside a sheet. The sheet was sort of like a pillowcase for the blanket and
buttoned around it at the bottom. All of that type had separate covers for each
person. In Italy, where it gets hot, they used sheets like ours. At most
places, whether private room or big hotel, breakfast is included. Another nice
thing is that restaurants post their entire menu outside the door. When we
would go for our long walks, we would stop and read the menus. By the time we
had finished our walk, we knew where we wanted to go back to for dinner. We
decided on spaghetti that night, and were very surprised to have it served to us
in large bowls, not like soup bowls but more like mixing bowls!
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