TravBuddy.com: Hallstatt Travel Blogs and Reviews

Hallstatt, Austria

Thu, 31 Jan 2008 06:52:57 PST

Hallstatt, Austria>, Oct 08, 2003

Hallstatt is a very picturesque and quaint town about 20 miles east east of Salzburg in the Salzkammergut region of Austria. This town was built around the Hallstatt Lake and surrounded by steep mountains, making the building a bit cramped. The only way to reach Hallstatt is via a train that will arrive on the opposite side of the lake and to take a boat across.

Despite the gloomy and lousy weather during our weeklong stay there, we had great fun exploring the trails and sights in the wind and rain which ultimately made it such a memorable trip.

The town seemed to give a very cramped feeling as most of the houses were built just next to the lake and upwards on the steep mountains. However the town itself was a very pretty sight. Many of the houses had fruits trees growing just next to the walls of their buildings with some of the fruits just within easy reach from the pavement.

The most bizarre attraction in the Hallstatt town was the Beinhaus (Bone House). Dating back to the 12^th Century AC, there were over 1200 skulls of which 610 skulls had been painted in flowery designs with the date of deceased written on them and stacked in neat rows along with the next of kins. Even though the skulls were all nicely painted, it was still an eerie feeling to be inside the bone house with all the skulls and bones!

Echern Valley, lying to the back of Hallstatt town, provides many easy trails up the beautiful landscape of the Glacier Garden. We had great fun hiking on the trails and taking in all the beauty of the nature, waterfall and forests despite being most of the time out in the rain.

Hallstatt has around 7,000 years of salt mining history and it is really worthwhile to make a trip to the Salzwelten mines. We went on the guided tour through the salt mines and saw the well preserved corpse that was found in the mines in 1734 which had been pressed flat and had tightly grown into the rock. We were told that it was about 3,000 years old. Another attraction in this place was the Mega Slide - Europe’s longest wooden slide (64 meters). The speed of the visitors down the slide was measured by a radar and printed on the pictures as a souvenir for the visitors. That was a great way to speed without being fined!

Although October was not the skiing season yet, the cable cars up the mountains were already operating and we decided to go up the mountains to have some fun. Indeed, we did have fun as there was a snow storm and we could barely walk more than 15 meters away from the cable car station in the strong gale and snow. We had to retreat and return to the cable car station to get ourselves warmed up again.

The lousy weather continued and Hallstatt was still shrouded in the mist by the time we left the town after all the fun we had.

Hallstatt

Fri, 26 Oct 2007 10:50:28 PST

Hallstatt, Austria>, Dec 25, 2005

The weather wasn’t very good and we wanted to wait if we get better weather for skiing so we used the day and drove to Hallstatt. Hallstatt is one of the famous cities for tourists and only 17 kilometres away form Bad Aussee. Its postcard beauty, the old buildings and the salt mine attracts every year thousands of tourists from all over the world to come here.

Hallstatt not enough space so the buried the bones of their deaths in a camber. (They stopped practicing this about 60 years ago).

Austria - the Danube Valley, Linz and around Hallstatt - by Tash

Tue, 02 Oct 2007 10:10:16 PST

Hallstatt, Austria>, Sep 25, 2007

Perhaps it’s the mountain air, beautiful scenery and clear rivers but Austria has really made an impression on me. From the clean pale stone of the buildings in Vienna to the winding roads through the mountains I can’t help but feel relaxed and just happy to let the surrounds soak in.

We left Vienna and drove across to the Danube valley. This is a winery area with scattered castles, churches and monasteries to overlook the valley. We stopped in Dürnstein, a little town on a curve of the river Danube and from here got our heart rates up with a climb up to the Dürnstein castle ruins which overlook the valley and give great views free of charge. The view was tainted a little though with the level of smog which coated the valley with a brown haze which given it was a clear day was quite disappointing. Anyhow, otherwise a great little walk up to the top and from here we got an appreciation for the amount of rock climbers here that were hanging off almost any rock face you could lay eyes on. I think I will just stick to the track though with all the oldies.

We continued driving along the river and stopped at Melk just to take a look at the Stift Melk (the abbey). Along the way I bought a couple of road side apples which although delicious couldn’t match our local huon valley apples and they certainly hadn’t thought to take the next step and dip them in delicious toffee. Perhaps if I move to Austria, I could start up my own street side apple store. My grandfather did after all use to have a Huon valley orchard so surely it’s in the blood.

Anyhow so we stayed just outside of Linz at a family run little hotel. Super friendly people the Austrians seem to be. I didn’t quite expect it but in general they have been fantastic and so helpful.

We then continued our scenic drive through the mountains until arriving at the lakeside town of Hallstatt. Finally a glorious sunny day and my photos look like something out of one of our guide books. The day was going well, we found some free parking at the local school instead of using the designated car parks which given that there is a real restriction in space as the town is set where mountains meet water, they were charging 4.10 Euro flat rate for parking!! Rip-off.

My luck continued and Marcus and I dueled at a game of outdoor giant chess while soaking up a tan. It’s a good thing I am writing this section so that I don’t gloss over my victory! That’s right, pawn for pawn, knight for knight, it was all looking like a stale-mate when things went very pear-shaped for my opponent. A wrong move cost his bishop and I strove forwards to victory! (ok, so we won’t mention exactly how many moves I strove on for to obtain the kingdom of the chess board but the couple who took to the bench to watch us play weren’t complaining). So I may not have won the Ten Pin Bowling duel in Washington DC but I have beaten Marcus in a battle of minds! I don’t think I will even have the opportunity to say that again, so I am just trying to make the most of it.

Another rest day in the mountains as the next day decided to throw wind and rain out of nowhere. This in conjunction with a closed cable car and no way to get up to the Giant ice caves forced us to lounge around for a day in our lakeside view hotel room which unfortunately didn’t have hot water for some reason, YAY!" relaxing holiday!

More scenic driving through the mountains and we were in Salzburg for the day. Another city, another castle on the hill above, another church and we were back to the European crappy weather where everything is grey and rainy.

Last Day In Hallstatt

Thu, 12 Jul 2007 19:52:47 PST

Hallstatt, Austria>, Oct 17, 2006

We are dead tired from the hike we did yesterday. The day started off
with something like this; “Let’s just take in an easy hike today.”
Five hours later we were dragging ourselves back into the room. We embarked on
an easy hike and ended up hiking three quarters of the way up the highest peaks
around. It was a very nice hike, went through some amazing woods with
all the fall colors on the trees and the forest floor bellow. You should
see the roads they build over here; they go straight up the mountain hugging 
thousand plus foot cliff edges and all one lane with small pull offs
every so often. They also have a thing here where if they can’t go around
the mountain the go through the mountain! After the hike we ate some food
in our room and crashed for the next 5 hours, turning in at 21:00. There is
not much to do here once the sun goes down and man does it go down fast
here this time of the year!
Today we went and sat in the sun next to the lake to try to warm up.
After watching the ducks and swans for a bit we decided to go check out the 
Catholic Church that has a room in the graveyard full of skulls and
bones. They are painted, and have the names and years on each one. There is
limited space for bodies so after 10 years the bodies would be removed and the 
skulls would be bleached and painted and placed with the long bones in
the bone room. This continued until the Catholic Church gave the ok for 
cremation. Colin and I were going to go check out the world’s oldest
salt mine, but we read there are over 600 steps you have to climb and we
said,“BAG IT!!” Our legs are way too tired from yesterdays death march.
We finally found some WIFI here that we could connect to, but it is in the
shade and in the shade it was 45 degrees; Brrrrrrrrrrrr!!! It’s about
nap time over here in Hallstatt, in a few hours the sun should be shining
on our WIFI spot and we will be heading back there to send off some more
e-mails and check on the next place we are off to tomorrow.
Tomorrow we are off to Badgastein, Austria. It has some hot springs
there and is a very popular winter resort. We plan to stay three nights there
before moving on to Croatia.
Until next time this is Judge saying, “Gruss Gut” (may God greet you) this 
is what Austrians say to one another.

Hallstatt

Mon, 25 Jun 2007 19:20:24 PST

Hallstatt, Austria>, Oct 16, 2006

Hallstatt
Arrived in Hallstatt this afternoon, the train ride here was amazing. 
Passed through some beautiful countryside full of lakes tucked in
between towering mountains. We had to take a boat across the lake from the
train station to get to Hallstatt, that was a nice little ride. The town of 
Hallstatt is very small but has a lot of charm. We walked to the end of
the town, which can be covered in about ten minutes; sat in the sun and
watched the day tourists leave. Talked with some Austrian tourists that was
here on a company sponsored outing. They were some goofy guys; one thing we
have noticed is that Austrians do not have as much of command on the English
Language as much as Germans have. This town clears out and we have the
run of the place after 18:00. Since this is the off season for around here
we are pretty much all by ourselves. The place we are staying in is called
Gasthof Simony; it is over 500 years old!! This city is ancient; it has
been around longer than ROME!! An entire epoch known as the Hallstatt era 
800-400bc tells you the importance of this small city due to its salt
mining trade. Tomorrow we are going to head out and explore this city and 
surrounding area.
Well I am off to bed, here it is only 21:18 and I am tired and there is
nothing to do here. This is definitely one of those places where it is
early to bed and early to rise.
Goodnight.