Day 76: The Long and Winding Road

Date: Thursday 12^th June
Staying: Camping Kasern – Salzburg, Austria
Distance Travelled: 361.6 Miles
Song of the day: My Mistake – Split Enz

I’m going to admit upfront that I’m going to leave you in suspense about the song of the day. One of us will explain when we get it all sorted and in the meantime, I’m just going to say “Oops”.

So, day 76 dawned bright and clear, and Cam and I were both sorry to be saying goodbye to Lauterbrunnen and Switzerland. It is a beautiful part of the world, consisting almost entirely of mountains, valleys and lakes, and the landscapes are not ones that will be readily forgotten.

It’s always good to have a plan, and today we had three. Our first target was the tiny principality of Liechtenstein. We were going there primarily to just say that we’d been, and to send postcards home (stamps being one of the mainstays of their economy). Liechtenstein is separated from Switzerland by a river, and Austria by mountains, making it one of the few landlocked countries that is surrounded by landlocked countries (Cam is full of these interesting titbits of information). It actually turned out to be a very picturesque little place, small enough for us to drive into (at around 4,000 people), and was dotted with cafes and shops selling stamps. We spent all of 1.5 hours there, having had our passports stamped at the tourist office for €2.

Our next aim was to make it as far as Innsbruck, where we could (if tired enough) stop for the night. Having acquired our road tax vignette for Austria we ventured on. As Innsbruck drew closer, we were faced with a dilemma. Should we drive on to Salzburg? Unfortunately we didn’t have a clue how far it was, so I made an executive decision that if it was only 90km or so, we’d drive on. If it was 200km, we’d stop for the night. We finally got to Innsbruck, but, having not seen a road sign yet with Salzburg on it, we still had no idea how far it was. Finally we saw the exit to the campground, and we decided to drive on, still entirely in the dark. About 500m on, there was the road sign – Salzburg 200km! By now it was too difficult to turn around though, so we forged on. Fortunately we made it to Salzburg with no more disturbance than a few road works, and found our campsite without a hitch. In all it was our longest driving day at around 550km. Needless to say I was fast asleep by 9.30pm.