Recorded by Eddy

The train from Salzburg to Zell am See was only about two hours long and couldn't have came to a more beautiful end. If the drive alongside the little river, deeper and deeper into the Alps with castles and small villages passing you by wasn't to your liking, you were bound to be struck by the view in Zell am See. To the right was a lake at the foot of some massive mountain. While it probably wasn't big enough and definitely too serene, we talked about how funny it would be to take a couple of jet-skis out there. Turning then to the left was Zell am See, a great little Alpine ski village at the foot of yet more mountains. Giant mountains everywhere around here.

Brad, John (Mike's Bike Tour participant, see Bavarian Tale #2), and I first followed the path through town marked by signs marked "i". They led to the "Information" office. We were helped out by two pretty schwiete looking young babes that ran the place. We told them simply that we wanted to ski and needed a place to stay nearby. They were super helpful to us, unlike the woman who came in and asked very vaguely for "in…for….may…tion." She did not receive pleasant looks from the off-duty snow bunnies behind the counter. We were told that we needed to catch a bus from the post-office to Kaprun, which was 12 kilometers away (oh, that's helpful to a couple of Americans not on the metric system). We were also given a map with a street circled and told that we could stay in a pension called Frühstückpension Erika, or as it became know Hotel Erika. The price to stay would only be 18 Euro per night.

At the post office, I went in to mail some postcards, while Brad and John took off to grab a quick something to eat. So far this would be the second time in five days that I've eaten at McDonald's. I don't even eat there that much in a month at home. I told Brad that this would be a good time to play a little One Player Random Order Selection (1P-ROS). That meant that Brad would pick out something to eat for me without any input as to what I wanted or how much I felt like spending or eating. Man, was I pleasantly surprised. I received the McCountry Deluxe meal. It was a giant sausage patty with grilled onions and a mustardy mayo-ish sauce on a roll. Basically, it was a patty melt (sans cheese). Excellent. I gave it a 7.9. The fries were standard though ultra-yellow and were served with a giant-sized ketchup packet. Finally, someone with brains invents a ketchup packet for normal people. Oh, and a Coke. We all sat and ate our McDonald's at the bus stop and watch these grade school kids fighting and winging juice boxes at each other.

Twelve kilometers works out to about 5 miles or something. Kaprun was very similar to Zell, just a little bit less commercial and more homey. We got off in the center of town and navigated ourselves using the street map we were given with Hotel Erika's street circled. We kept getting further and further away from town. There was a faint lowing of cows nearby and the smell of manure started to waft about. Then we found the Peter Burkdesstrasse (something of the sort). That was our street. We were pretty worn at this point. The five-minute walk was already approaching an eternity. Our packs were getting heavy and our breaths short. Hotel Erika's was at the very top of the street. It was heaven to finally reach it.

We walked inside and started calling out for Erika. Finally, this very nice woman came up from downstairs and kind of nodded to us. Nods and gestures pretty much became our only common form of communication because Erika spoke absolutely no English. Our German, likewise, was kleine or langsam or something. We followed her up as she pointed out two rooms upstairs and kind of shrugged asking if that was fine. All of her gestures were accompanied with fast-talking German (we ignored that). We accepted the rooms. She pointed out the shower and the toilet. Through some complex series of signs she asked when we wanted breakfast. We told her seven.

The rooms were the nicest that we stayed in during the trip (they even came with glass drinking glasses). Off the balcony to one side were hills, a castle, and fields; to the other side were the enormous Alps where we would be skiing the next day. There were actual semi-normal home-like decorations all over the house, including a whole shrine of elk heads and skulls (not normal). After settling in for a little, we decided to take a hike back to town for dinner (ummmm, lambschnitzel and weissbier).