The drive from Vienna to Salzburg to Innsbruck to
Vaduz to Luzern took about 9 hours for roughly 700
kilometers. Of that, a whole 10 minutes were spent at
the Austria-->Liechtenstein border crossing, and
another 7 minutes were spent crossing the country of
Liechtenstein. I've driven through 4 countries today -
Austria, Germany, Liechtenstein, and Switzerland - the
most countries i've ever been to in a single day. i
COULD go down to italy which is only about 1.5 hours
south of here, but i dont want to come back to Luzern
in the dark. also, technically i'm not allowed to
drive the rental car in italy.
so anyway, the z and y keys on all keyboards have been
switched and its driving me sane+++
argh
sane!!!
yeah, lot of other keys are switched too.
Innsbruck is gorgeous -- a tiny little city surrounded
by cliffs on all sides. well, actually they're
mountains, but looking from a Shell gas station in
Innsbruck, they're basically all just cliffs rising
straight up thousands of feet. Ooooh yeah shell gas
station - i've been meaning to write about that last
few days but keep forgetting.
My rental car is quite strange -- it's got daytime
sensing headlights, meaning if i go into a tunnel (of
which there are many), the lights turn on. When i exit
the tunnel (of which there are many also), the lights
turn off. Nifty little feature, but on one of these
occasions i was trying to turn on the lights not
knowing they were already on, and by mistake i turned
on the high-beams. NOT a good idea inside a tunnel+++
... errrr.... !!! i got a few people flashing their
lights at me and a truck driver honking at me from
behind because of that. and i couldn't even see how i
turned them on, so i couldn't turn them off! oh well,
eventually i did.
gas tank: First time i had to fill up on gas was in
Munich. Well, i couldn't figure out how to open the
gas tank! there was no lever inside the car to flip it
open, and the door itself wasn't opening by hand! i
had to go inside and ask for the cashier to come help
me figure this thing out! He came out, pushed on the
tank door, and it opened. I felt like an idiot. I
filled gas and started driving to Salzburg.
Today morning in Vienna I had to fill up the gas
again. And AGAIN i couldn't get the darn thing open!!!
I knew i had to push it to open, but it wasn't
budging! i went inside the store again but the cashier
didn't speak english and didn't understand a word of
what i was trying to say. so i went back out and
waited for someone else to come by.... and waited...
and waited.... one guy pulled up and i asked him how
to open the gas tank. He looked at me like i was an
idiot (which i was), and pushed on the tank door and
it opened again! i couldn't figure it out!! why can
everyone else do it but i cant??? well, as it turns
out, the car has to be unlocked for the gas tank to
open. ok, so NOW i know. i wont feel like an idiot
next time.
maybe.
Back to Innsbruck -- it's a beautiful city and i want
to return some time. I hardly spent about an hour
there for lunch and gas fill-up.
West of Innsbruck, the road goes through many tunnels
(insert the headlight incident here) and next to some
lovely emerald-colored lakes before entering
Liechtenstein. The border checkpoint there was the
only place after landing at Zurich airport that i've
had to show my passport and drivers license and
international drivers permit. they kept me there for
about 10 minutes while they stamped my passport
"LIECHTENSTEIN" ... then it took me 7 minutes at
60kmph to cross that country and enter switzerland.
Now I'm in Luzern, an extremely crowded town south of
Zurich where it's faster to walk than to drive.
Parking is next to impossible on the streets, although
i did find a free parking garage about 330 feet from
my hotel. or 100 meters if you prefer. My hotel room
is about twice the size of the mercedes, and it's got
a pink bathroom. There's also a nasty step down right
inside the door where I almost tripped the first time,
and 1 foot in front of that is the closet jutting out
of the wall, inside which is the tv and next to it the
bed.
cozy. :-)
So this is where i'll be next 4 nights and 4 days,
until the end of my trip--driving around everywhere in
switzerland and possibly germany (really tempting to
go back there).
so far i've taken about 80 or so "good" pictures, and
they'll be posted on my webpage as soon as i get back.
Nope, i didn't take any pictures of any of the
pastries in Vienna. And no, i'm not bringing back any
because i'm very mean and selfish and...
"uncivilized".
Besides, it's too late now anyway - i'm no longer in
Vienna!
SO ... that means that if you want any you'll have to
go there! Which you should anyway.....
auf weinerschnitzel,
-me.
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