Inland seas

Before we handed our apartment key back, we went for an early morning walk along the river, where the plane trees are pollarded into marvellous shapes and people stroll, run, walk and cycle to take the air. 

We trundled our cases over the cobbles, stopped for a coffee at Ledererengasse, and then up to the station.  We checked train times with Edith, and found our train. The guard was super-efficient and highly critical that we had not filled in our EuroRailPass paperwork in advance. He was Indian. 

Our hugs at Attnang-Puchheim were so tight and warm! How lovely to see Edith again! She was our au pair over 30 years ago, and moved with us from London to Faversham. 

These two tiny ancient villages now conjoined are famous for being a railway junction, and their very name makes Austrians snigger… but for us this is a pleasant little community in rolling farmland, and with distant mountain views. It was smashed to smithereens with bombs at the end of the war so does not have as much antiquity as other towns.

Edith and her husband have divorced, a messy arrangement regarding ownership, rights and responsibilities for their business and property. She was so ill when it happened she signed papers which no-one in their right mind would agree to, and he is absolutely unwilling to go back and renegotiate, so she is stuck with half a house, half a garden, his office downstairs, his new woman’s car in her garage, all very difficult.  She is coping brilliantly, inspired by Jesus, making a new life, and we have had a wonderful time reminiscing and teaching each other English and German.  She comes originally from Burgenland (one dialect), lives here in Salzkammergut (another dialect), speaks ordinary Austrian (dialect of German), and of course normal German as taught in schools… Her demonstration of how these all vary is hilarious.

She had made us a fantastic meal of Wienerschnitzel - perfection! so we ate till bursting and then went on a tour - to the lakes, the inland seas of Austria.

First we went to Attersee - a huge shining expanse of the clearest pure water - with delightful walks and groves of trees. It's nearly 50 square kilometres, disappears round the edges of the mountains.

Families were playing, everyone out taking the air on such a warm sunny afternoon, and the swans showing off their beauty. The water is really remarkable - drinkable, clear down to the bottom. It’s unusual for us to see the swans’ feet doing their own exquisite underwater dances.  We walked round the edge, past a beautiful reconstruction of a neolithic pile village… (straight out of my After the Ice book!) and on to the rich people’s summer houses - right on the water’s edge. 

    

This is where Gustav Klimpt came to stay - there are photos showing him with family and friends on the jetties (still there), wearing a ludicrous artist’s smock, showing off his considerable shoulder-bits, posing (a lot), as ‘the artist’.    Funny.

Then we retraced our steps, queued for ages for delicious ice-cream (aaaggh! far too much!!) but found a table to sit and talk and eat….. Then back to the car.

Edith then took us on to Traunsee - round the edge of this huge inland sea, the roads blessedly free because this was a Sunday in March….. she says it’s utterly choked in summertime.  We went past the huge mountains shining in the late afternoon sun, their massive grey cliffs and faces looking down on us like vast wise old uncles, home no doubt to sprites and ice-goblins, masters of metal smithery, full of ancient secrets, a remnant of the Ice Age unphased by modern life or talk of global warming… It’s cold up there!

Traunsee has a slightly different character, though the water is just as shiningly clear and drinkable.  The towns have an aristocratic feel to them - castles, hotels, grand squares… One we had been to long ago, with the carillon on the front of the Rathaus….   We heard music - live! - from the Swan Hotel at Gmunden and despite the waiter saying it was closed we went in, and there was a band, oh such fun! Called www.krauhoelzl-musi.at with Styrian diatonic button accordion, tuba, various flugelhorns, cornets, trumpets, and a vivid boisterous bumping joy about them, interspersed with singing and a really astonishing clapping accompaniment - one clap against the other - really exciting. Later I saw they are quite famous, play huge gigs as well as weddings, and Edith says they play the typical local music.  I drew them (to their astonishment) and gave them the drawing (to my own astonishment).  

  

Back home for talk, looking through a wonderful photo album from when Edith was our au pair (the childen will wriggle when they see some of the photos), and eventually to bed… filled with good food, old memories and pleasures of being in such a lovely place.