Monthly Archives: December 2017

Chapter Wanderlust: Dining in a 1400 house at Braugasthof Hallstatt

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One of the very best decision that I made in Hallstatt or perhaps the whole of Austria is to have a meal at Braugasthof Hallstatt. It is one of a little traven or cottage located along the banks of Hallstatter See! Dreamy, scenic and peacefully, you can choose to dine at little tables along the banks and have your meal with the view accompanying you or choose to dine in the traditional house where the restaurant is housed in, this houses are more than 600 years old. Built in the 1400s, it is definitely a warm cosy feeling while eating inside! Dining the freshest fish from the lake, by the lake, doesn’t gets much more real than this!

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Chapter Wanderlust: Gasthof Bergfried Hotel Hallstatt

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Many of you peeps whom have follow my post or this trip series so far would have known that Hallstatt is top of my bucketlist and the best place that I have ever step foot on! I mean you can definitely do it as a day trip, touch and go, in fact the bulk of the tourists do this! But why should you step into the common ground. Stay, stroll and enjoy one of the greatest place man ever found. Take your time, after all this is one of the most leisurely place that you could find yourself in! This also gives you the opportunity to really embrace and experience how Hallstatt really is. Getting away from the crowd and buzz that the huge amount of tourists arrive in the late morning to afternoon that makes it so much more touristy! But I got to say! Hallstatt is a small town, in fact even a bottle of water cost up to 3 times more that what you get in other cities! Take it into consideration that Austria is one of the country that water is dirt cheap! Thus to really enjoy the scenic, quietness and peacefulness of the place the cost really increase. Expensive accommodations, food……all leads to the increase in the costs. Being a small town, there isn’t much place to stay at. I did have to say I did book the place pretty early, in fact roughly around 3 months prior to my trip and the only options available was only Gasthof Bergfried and another one due to a conference in town! Let me take you on a tour of one of the most beautiful room in town!

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Chapter Wanderlust: How To Get To Hallstatt? X Train Journey from Salzburg

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I believe that this destination is no longer new to you all. Either way you must have heard of Hallstatt or see a gorgeous picture of it on your instagram or some travel resources. God, even the China tourists like it so much that they build a replica it in their own country that is also named “Hallstatt” in Luoyang, Boluo County, China. Stay tuned for this coming up as I had a pretty funny thing about it to share with you guys! Back to the main point of this post before I start to go crazy on Hallstatt and salivate! Pronounced as “Hall-Starch” is it one of an alpine village in the heart of Austria. Known for its nature and picturesque sight, it is a popular tourists destination! It used to be famed for the production of salt. With the sight of nearby alps and directed situated on the similarly stunning Hallstatter See, now this is where we are going today!

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Chapter Wanderlust: Salzburg, City of Mozart

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When you think of Salzburg, you probably thought that it is a very artistic cause it is known as the birthplace of Mozart! I must be very bad to say this but Salzburg isn’t anyway near the top of my list at all, it was just simply pretty okay for me only. Being my first city in Austria, it is just like what I heard about the country, the place is clean and nice, people are not as friendly and they hate their neighbours, the Germans. If you have read the previous few post of mine you will know that due to my train delay I arrived in Salzburg pretty late. I simply only have time for a meal on the day that I arrived.

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Chapter Wanderlust: Cafes in Salzburg

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Austria

Coffee

Cakes

They all go hand in hand! Please don’t tell others that you have ever step foot in Austria if you didn’t visit an authentic Austrian café, drink a cup of coffee and order a cake from the ladies in the café. Oh yea, a good note to remember is if the staff are polite to you in it. It isn’t an authentic Austrian café! In an Austrian café, the waiter will always take your order from the menu, this includes coffees and other food items and then the females would be the one that goes around with a platter of cakes for you to order from. The funny thing is that you paid for the cakes and coffee in separate bills, this, I could never understand!

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Chapter Wanderlust: Hotel Adlerhof Salzburg

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After a whirlwind journey all the way from Amsterdam, Seeing The World In Steps is finally checking out another country and also another brand new city. Finally Austria after hearing so much about it. The land of Mozart, here I come. It was almost dark when I finally arrived in Salzburg, Salzburg main train station sure look gorgeous. It is a little walk to the main portion of town. Nearby the train station you can also find eateries and supermarket that are open later and definitely on Sundays. With the train delay and the winter approaching, I really didn’t had much time to tour around on the first night that I arrived. Hotel Adlerhof is a pension like hotel that I find. For those who are unsure with the term pension, it refers to something like a bed and breakfast, it is a nice alternative to hostels and airbnb, some of them are really nice. You get close to hotel service at a cheaper price! It is pretty nice, the location is near to the train station, perhaps about a 5-7 mins walk and it fit my budget. For those whom are interested, I paid about 95 SGD for a single room per night and it comes with breakfast!

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Chapter Wanderlust: DB Lounge Munich Hauptbahnhof

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On my previous post, I mentioned that I was taking the ICE train from Amsterdam all the way to Salzburg, oh god that was a long journey! To make things even worse, my first train was delayed which created a domino effect and I miss all my subsequently train. Thankfully I took first class which gave me access to the lounge, if not I would be a monk from 8am in the morning till 6pm when I finally arrived in Salzburg! Cutting things short, after finding the next available train, I had an hour to spare which I went to check out the DB Lounge located in Munich Hauptbahnhof. I was pretty impressed by it. Yea Train Lounge are a thing despite it being not as famed as their airline counterparts. They are usually located in the few main stations and there are a few various ways where people could get access, one of the most common one would be travelling on a first class ticket!

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Chapter Wanderlust: DB ICE Train Amsterdam – Salzburg First Class

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Time Check, Holiday is finally over I can say. I am currently writing this on the first sector of my flight, SQ007 from LAX – ICN in Business Class. Not as spectacular as it sounds, so stay tuned for that flight review. I did get many post done though, between chitchatting with the crew, getting coffee, I actually managed to write about 5 to 6 post. Back to the point, I would like to share with you the ICE product of the German Deutche Bahn! ICE is also known as the high speed train of the famed German DB. It is the name for the Germans train where they could go up to 300km/hr. I had really high expectations for the European rail system but trust me, after this Chapter Wanderlust of mine, I totally reconsider my view on them. They are not as trustworthy as it seems, totally bullshit where I thought train would leave on the dot and arrive on the dot! If you are following this trip of mine, you will know why I am so disappointed with it in the end. On the bright side, the perks of taking a train in Europe would be the ease, stations located almost right in the heart of the city, no borders control and ample space, I got to point out that the various staff that I had encounter, the service of all of them, Germans, Austrian, Brussels, Italian train service personnel are pretty good. For those who have not tried it before, usually high speed train would need a seat reservation but for the ICE it is not compulsory. I almost got it the hard way where previously I almost couldn’t find a seat on the train from Cologne to Brussels.

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Chapter Wanderlust: Amsterdam

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Amsterdam, everyone have been talking about Amsterdam! Oh you gotta go there, oh why didn’t you head to Amsterdam. I can say it out loud that I finally did it on this trip of mine in Europe and it is one of the decision that I will never forget in my life. I am currently on the ending phase of my two and a half months of adventures in the world. Currently in Seattle, Amsterdam is about a month old and I have already been to a ton of cities and numerous countries after Amsterdam and the memories are still fresh in my mind. Yea you get tons of unpleasant smell in the air and it is always associated by being a sleazy chill place where you can do what you want but it is completely so nice and safe. The people that I met are nice and friendly except for the public transport people but everything else is fine! On the plus side the canals and environment is just that nice and romantic. The best way is just simply to stroll around and get lost in all the canals and waterway!

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Chapter Wanderlust: Visit to Wind Mills and Historical Houses at Zaanse Schans

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This is another must do when you are in Amsterdam, after all you imagine all about windmills, cheese, nature scenery and the peaceful life in Netherlands right! Boo! You can’t find any of it in Amsterdam! All you see are crowd, smell of drugs and plenty of nightlife right in the heart of the city! Zaanse Schans is a neighbourhood a little out of the city centre of Amsterdam, roughly around a 20 mins train ride out from the Amsterdam Central Station. Given the fact that you are probably staying in the city centre, the central train station is only a short hop away. Grab the tickets from the ticket machine and off you go! It is easy peasy! A return ticket cost 7.20 Euros! The train station that you should be alighting at would be Zaandijk Zaanse Schans, from here it is a short walk to the main places where you can find all the windmills and stuff. Signs are plenty, if not, offline google map is also efficient. Just a little tip, I will advise you to do a search for the trains stopping here simply on google first before heading to the train station, because the words in dutch are so hard to read and the staff are so unfriendly here!

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