Sept 20, 2012

Today was a driving day. First, we headed over to Liechtenstein. Why? Why not!

Okay, the real reason was so that we could find a geocache there, and add one more country to our list of places where we have found geocaches.

And we found it. In the parking lot of a McDonalds. It being close to lunch time, we broke one of our promises to ourselves and dined there. It was a very modern and very clean restaurant.

And, for your viewing pleasure, a photo of beautiful Triesen in Liechtenstein.

Sept 20, 2012

So on we drove, into Austria. And with little effort on our part, thanks to our GPS, we found the hotel. And absolutely no idea where to park.

I figured that the no-parking space right in front of the hotel door would be ok to park in while we checked in and found out where to park. But we noticed it a bit too late. So we decided to just go around the block and aim for that spot again. Big mistake! The concept of "around the block" works reasonably well for your standard gridded city. But without a single right-angled street, we were getting nowhere fast, so we had to ask our GPS to direct us there again. (Once the GPS thinks he has delivered us to our destination, he stops navigating to it!).

But we ended up going the opposite direction to where the no-parking zone was.

But hey, we had learned from our German friend that some rules are merely suggestions. So I told Stephen to park in that no-parking zone the wrong way - like, what the heck, wouldn't two wrongs make a right?

Then I had to go in, hope that the desk clerk spoke English (which he did), and find out where we were supposed to park. I told him where we were right now, and that Stephen was really worried - the desk clerk said "No problem. This is Austria. You're ok for 10 minutes.".

Then the desk clerk directed us to a nearby parkade, which the hotel owns, apparently.

OK, we get to the entrance of the parkade. And wonder why the guy ahead of us isn't doing whatever he has to do to make the arm go up so he can enter. Eventually, a car exitted the parkade, and the guy was able to push the button, get his ticket, and thus make the arm go up so he could enter.

This did not bode well for our hero.

Because when Stephen got to the ticket machine, it indicated (we think) that the parkade was full. Stephen kept pushing the button, but to no avail. No ticket. No arm lifting. And by this time, there was a car behind us. So we were basically blocked there, until perhaps another car exitted.

After a while, I decided to head back to the hotel, if for no other reason than to complete the check-in process.

When I got there, I told the desk clerk that the parkade appeared to be full. He said "Just a minute", and went into the inner sanctum. He asked if mine was the white car. I said yes. He pushed a button, and caused the arm to raise. He then was puzzled, because the white car wasn't moving. I figured that by this time, Stephen might not have even noticed that the arm had raised. But before too long, the white car moved into the parkade. And the poor sucker behind us got to wait!

But the story does not end here!

The desk clerk had told me that if the parkade was really full, there were some Reserved spots on top that belonged to the hotel. So I trundled back to the parkade, in an attempt to find Stephen in case he was roaming through the parkade trying to find a spot.

Because there was one other secret - the only way out of the parkade was with a ticket. And since he didn't get a ticket on entry, he was stuck there forever (much like Charlie on the MTA, for those who are old enough).

Anyway, I couldn't find Stephen in the parkade. But I found a lot of empty parking spaces. So I figured he had found one and had headed for the hotel.

I got back to the hotel, and the desk clerk told me that he had told Stephen to go to the 1st floor because that's where I would be.

I got to the first floor (what we could call the second floor), and didn't find him! So I called his name, and he answered, from the second floor (what we....).

We finally connected. As we left the hotel to get the rest of the luggage, the desk clerk seemed so pleased to see us both together! And we were pleased, too!

Anyway, after all that excitement, we went for a stroll along the shore of Lake Constance, the largest lake in Europe.

Here are a few photos of the sights.

First, the upper part of a gondola lift, the Pfänderbahn. We plan on hiking there one of these days.

We saw a blimp.

We saw some swans.

We saw some sailboats.

At the Bregenzer Segel-Club (Bregenz Sailing Club, I figure).

I have saved the most interesting for last. On our stroll, we came across a huge open-air auditorium, with what looked like a stage set under construction or deconstruction out on the water. The globular thing sort of looked like a head, with a bunch of huge books in the neck area. There were piles of stairs. And the gigantic golden frame off to one side. We were puzzled. Because there were a whole lot of posters advertizing Mozart's Magic Flute for next summer, and this didn't look flutish at all.

After a visit at the tourist information place, we got more information. This was a take-down of the set used for the newly commissioned opera "Andre Chenier", which ran from mid-July to mid-August. This is a photo of the poster in one of the tourist brochures.

That is a huge stage set. And it looks like it would be an, er, interesting opera!

Anyway, from here, it is really really close to both Switzerland and Germany, and Stephen would like to get a bike track that includes all three countries.

We shall see what tomorrow brings.