Tag: Expect The Unexpected

This is the moment! tonight is the night! the reason why I insist of having Innsbruck Card after all is due to the Innsbrucker Nordkettenbahnen / Top of Innsbruck. The cable car’s ride itself will cost us 47 Euro ~ or 40 Euro according to Ankita #Whatever. It is already included in our 72 hours = 79 Euro Innsbruck Card. Comprender?

Gave Joe some warning on this particular Thursday, we will do ‘overtime’ than yesterday since there are 2 Cable Cars we want to do. The Top of Innsbruck and the Evening Ride from Patscherkofelbahn.

Our AirBnB lady said there’s not needed to go to Patscherkofelbahn as Nordkettenbahn is already the best. Hell no to the o o o, we will go just because we can, on top of that we already paid for it, we are not going to your concert which located on the next city, read: are not included in the Innsbruck card #The math ain’t mathing.

We took the Ubahn at Hofburg, crossed the river, it will stop at Löwenhaus, #Stay on your seat. Almost drop Joe there to check before he got saved by the bell sounds of door closing. Passed through Alpine Zoo, final Cable Car Station: Hungerburgbahn. This is where you all got off.

Joe had his brief moment of enjoying the view while I got busy with my body lotion that spread around my bags to my power bank, his phone charger etc. I need help! he instruct to wipe it with tissues. On the contrary, I responded “noooo, we can still use it, moisture my skin!” He thought the body lotion was somehow ruin, it wasn’t, I didn’t close it properly. #Oh, there goes my sympathy! After the tissue solved the issue, we could walk around to see what Hungerburgbahn offer us. We enter the church, Joe pointed “why do we have Alien? her face is green?” feel a bit creeped out, let’s go to the next station.

I read the word “JETZT” with red, bold, capitalized. Enough to get my attention, it is time, now! whereas he read the info “STOP. Please take the next one”. Two “Germans” ~ not necessarily from Germany, might be from German speaking countries were also confused, he asked Joe about why the gate wasn’t open. Yeah, in the end, the non-German-speakers was the only one who could explain what’s going on 😉 We just need to wait, the sign will always be “JETZT” unless it wasn’t true.

Next station is Seegrubenbahn, we can see…. the same view with higher altitude haha. There are some playground, place to sit around, suspicious white parts ~ had to check if it is snow? be careful on the way there are many shits #Watch your steps. There is restaurants here, looks nice, we both agree no matter how good the view is, we will eat inside, if not the soup or whatever food we ordered will already be cold before entering our mouth!

Joe was distracted by a bunch of birds flew around us, he suspected it was because of me eating chocolate bar. Hey, the other Asian people next to us also eat something, except the birds ain’t coming to them! #I’m innocent

Running away from the flock of birds, we went to our last cable car to station Hafelekarbahn aka Top of Innsbruck! The sign say it themselves! While Joe soaking all the sun, I, on the other hand preserve my youth by reapplying my sunscreen. We saw the signs to go to Karspitze, Geo Trail, Klettersteig, Innsbruckblick or Karwendelblick. Let’s do 3 out of 5, then we satisfied. Walked to Karwandelblick + Innsbruckblick then Karspitze.

On the way to Karspitze we sat for a while, when down there was a fight against the birds, here on the top we have fight against the ‘smoke’ haha I meant clouds. There is no need to go up when the clouds are coming, we can see the skies passed us. Slowly but sure we went up. On the top, we saw a family eating chocolate, that’s a good idea! told Joe to look at the chocolate maybe they can feel our pressure #They didn’t. Joe ran away when he noticed this family would ask him for a picture, instead she asked me. Did it nicely, still getting no chocolate pffff now is their turn to take picture of us! Beautiful up here hey!

Some time ago, on site, Joe was “there is a balcony down there, do you want to go?” “Noooo”. Fast forward to when we were waiting for cable car to wrap this up, I watched the TV, tapped him “Joe, there is balcony on the TV, where is it? we didn’t see any or?” “Yes we did, I asked you, only for you to answer with ‘nooo’ ” ahhh ok! that question I remembered 😉

Now we are back on the ground! What do we doooo? Museum Tour! First is the Goldenes Dachl Museum. We were exactly on the roof, we can see people on the bottom or on the City Tower. Attempted to say hello, no one return his hello 🙁 let’s do some coloring shall we? haha

Second is Stadtmuseum & Stadtarchiv. We didn’t understand why the lady said ‘just go’ the archive section, not knowing is not part of the museum, the guy was working there. I was like “Hmm, is this part of the Museum?” “No, it’s the Archive, feel free to look around” We backed out, we are not a detective who wants to see city archive haha

Honestly speaking, none of us are a Museum Person, is it worthy to continue? or let’s sit somewhere? We do the later, sat down on Starbucks near the Goldenes Dachl, having ice chocolate + ice latte while judging 2 then 3 then 4 street performers before moving to our next Agenda.

What’s next? obviously the Evening Ride we were waiting for since Tuesday, Patscherkofelbahn! We were so happy when we saw a family from the other side of cable car saying hi to us, the father was “gluing” himself to the glass, his daughter on his left, didn’t see the son but Joe said he was on his right. The girl waving her hand, we both return her hi. We knew exactly how it felt when no one return our hi from the Dach! So happy that our thought got passed down to the next generation.

The suspected “German” guy said there was an easy path walk called Ziberweg, not so long #According to him. I’m smart enough to ask “how long will it takes?” 2,5 hours. Noooo, noooo, nooo, noo we can’t. I think he was surprise with our answer. Dude, our “not so long” is 30 minutes back and forth! Don’t you see how much white our shoes are, these ain’t made for hiking….. We will just look around here, you have fun!

Once we arrived, I read the info in German “Joe, look, it’s written we can enjoy the sunset”. “When? At 23:00? We are in the mountain” 😀

We were only sitting from one place to another, calculated how much money we saved by using the card. Then he casually asked “have we been there?” pointed on the fucking cover of the Innsbruck brochure I have been holding for the past 72 hours. Hmmm, I think so…. flipped it to the page where that picture located, fuck! no! we haven’t! shit! we missed it! let’s go now!

I’m telling you, this is where our second personality come out, I remembered we were quiet tired, nevertheless, the moment we knew, adrenaline rush kick in #You think you know someone, you don’t. Joe was a bit ragu ragu “no…. we need to come back once again to Innsbruck” being a very calculated Asian, “no! we still have time, use your 120 GB capacity! look for direction, we need to leave this mountain”

We were brought from our lowest low to our highest high within one second, were hyped up! move directly to our new mission like no others, even Justin Timberlake Intime is not comparable to us. Saw our bus leaving from our cable car cabin! aaaa, okay we take the next one. Got off on the correct station, find out we were in the middle of nowhere. Joe wonder what do people do, what is the purpose of this station? there is literally nothing here, we use his gigantic internet capacity to zoom in, do the 3D view, there is simply no road, it’s can’t be 6 minutes walking? there is a forest, river, stones, everything….. how can we cross it?

Decided it’s a no go, make a conclusion if you want to see this platform, do it from Bergisel, you just need to hike for 30-40 minutes. We took the next bus to Joe’s road: Maria-Theresien-Straße, I’m afraid at some point he will tattoo this road hahaha.

We had Thai food at Thai Li restaurant, it’s his first time trying Mango Sticky Rice, he assured me it won’t be his last. We had a very typical Innsbruck delicacies, Asian food! Wherever you are, top of mountain or on the ground.

Thank you so much Joe for accompanying me in Innsbruck, I always enjoy the time, everything seems funnier with you, whenever you’re around it’s just a different level of energy. Very grateful we knew each other back in 2016 and still somehow manage to be in contact from time to time. Wish you all luck as well as happiness! ‘Till we meet again, take care!

*we conquer Innsbruck within 72 hours* #Mic drop

The second day of our 24 hours Innsbruck card, we did very durchgetaktet! Zack Zack Los! Clocked in our Journey at 09:00 AM. All the rides for today sponsored by a Hop on Hop off aka Sightseer bus! before you get too excited of sitting on a double decker bus, it’s not, just a normal one level bus. Pay attention to the Bus Station, you need to see the red symbol S on it.

First stop was the Imperial Palace / Hofburg. They have a Maximilian 1 Exhibition, please be aware of this name, you’ll hear or read about him many times. Do we know who he is? Not the slightest hahaha our memory is limited to how incapable the guard were.

• So, Maximilian Exhibition is there, here is written “the office” do you know where is it? did we passed it?
• Oh I don’t know why it’s written there, do not pay attention to it.
• Do you know what is the stage outside the Hofburg for?
• Oh no I don’t know.

There is no photo as we weren’t allowed to take any of it in the Imperial Palace. I almost got busted, could be the reason why the lady kept following us. She seems smart, we decided to ask what is the relation between Maximillian and the imperial palace people to which she answered “I’m not a tour guide” well…. mother!$k3r hahaha

At some point, she told us that we can only walk on the carpet because the floor is lava! haha there installed an alarm where it could ring really loud. Tempted to drop my brochure to test it, yet backed it out #Calm down Marlyn.

Moving on to the other side of Innsbruck, Schloss Ambrass. It was the same Sightseer driver who drove us before. This Schloss Ambrass is very confusing, we didn’t find the entrance easily. Everytime we asked someone, they pointed somewhere else, one of them said “there is a Karte (map)” I know damn it! I just didn’t want to read it! #Lazy ass.

Arrived to the allegedly upper castle which according to Joe wasn’t really upper haha only to being told the entrance was from the down side. The arrow on each is very confusing hey!

We finally made it! welcomed by an armor room, painting room which reminded me of Mr. Beans movie ~The Whistler’s Mother, you know which one~ Joe wanted to go to woods area for a while, he got his wishes granted, even tried to make conversation with a peacock. We followed the map, the Castle is divided into many exhibitions on different places, don’t lose your entrance ticket, you will need to scanned it every time. There were also Chapel, temporary exhibitions ~ while we were there it was about human with special characteristics, like the one from This is The Greatest Show! ~ where we can’t take pics.

Being inspired from the Hofburg where they provided a mirror for a good selfie according to me but since we can’t take a photo we didn’t do it. We saw more or less the same mirror, attempted to take pictures of our zodiac. See us with Virgo and Libra, no right? because we weren’t successful haha.

Next destination is Bergisel Stadion & Sprungschanze for the ski jump. The station called Das Tirol Panorama, the name speaks for itself. Asked Joe to take me some pictures, right after he took some, he confess “I’m not a very good picture taken” well, you gotta learn yo! haha just kidding, it was good 🙂

Oh there was a Café! let’s have a snack break here, I had cake and radler, what a combination #Brain doesn’t work anymore. Checked on his phone, 4 mins walk to Bergisel. Right when we about to leave, it started to rain. Oh no! Let me think, there are two options, went into the Museum while wait until the rain slow down…. or…. just go while it’s still drizzling. We choose the later.

Didn’t regret it, when we arrived the rain getting smaller, at some point it stopped. The “funicular” or should I say “elevator” rides every 15 minutes. What we can see from here? Panorama again! 😉 only from a higher point.

On the brochure, I can see there is a seeing platform nearby called Drachenfelsen. Don’t be so optimistic about the weather, like our AirBnB Lady said “Austrian is always prepared” the drizzle comes back, enough to annoyed us hahaha we decided not to go there now, rather try to go tomorrow when the weather supposed to be good. Unbeknownst to us, there is no way to get it other than to “hike” for about 30-40 minutes from Bergisel #Oh well.

We past the Memorial Andreas where it’s written for God, King and Fatherland #So touching. Both of us directly placed our hand on our heart, began the choir of aaaaaaaaaaaa

Last, we were entering a Tirol Panorama mit Kaiserjägermuseum. Where Joe was confused about the so called “Panorama” it’s just a screen 😀

Then we catch the last Sightseer bus, went back to Joe’s favorite / haunted street, Maria-Theresien-Straße. It was still the same bus driver from morning, he recognizes us therefore commented “wow, very busy!” yes Sir! we were working the same shift as you! When you have an Asian planner, everything need to cross the box!

We wanted to try if we go to watch our AirBnB Lady’s show #We couldn’t. It was far away like 40 minutes, by the time we have to come back it will takes us 1 hour or so. On top of that, remember we just “work” for 8 hours. Having no more energy, we decided to just eat at Chinese Restaurant nearby 来来来.

*continue to our last 24 hours*

Can’t wait to spill the beans of a kind of roller-coaster adventure this week has brought me in, spoiler alert: it’s a fun one 😀

Thomas invited me to his wedding on 6th of July in South Tyrol, without a doubt I would like to be there. Planned started as in looking at the map, what is the city before South Tyrol? Hmm…. Innsbruck, Austria. Read good blog about it, decided it will be my Zwischenstopp. Next is gathering my crowd, texted Hanna whether she’s interested in my idea, think who could be the other person that we both knew? Joe!! I have meet him 2 years ago in Desenzano while Hannah hasn’t for like 7 years or so, let’s ganged up in Innsbruck #Shanghai connection! Sadly, one of the other reason Hanna was not able to join our small trip. Joe hasn’t really confirmed yet, however in the end he did! #Happy!

Do ground research, there are this things called Innsbruck Card for 72 hours cost 79 Euro, bought it in the train station. There were 2 counters with one old “German / Austrian” idk guy, spoke German to him, he said I need to go to the next (empty) counter, he was having 0 customer but it’s not his goddamn business, I wait…. wait… wait until Italian lady come out. Oh hello, Signora, where were you the whole damn time?!

One by one, let’s peel what did we do in those 72 hours, we maximize it to our use. That I can guarantee #Devil smile.

I arrived earlier than Joe, had Thai food as lunch near Hbf, checked in, strolled around the memorial to those who died for the freedom of Austria, Annasäule, Triumphforte etc. Wow! You always have a mountain view on the background, love it! Innsbruck gefällt mir 🙂

Joe arrived around 15:00, we went to our AirBnB before exploring the city. Every article I read written we need to take a “selfie” with the Goldenes Dachl, being an uncreative tourist, we didn’t even try to take photo of each other, if it’s written a selfie then a selfie it is! We did so many times from different angle, Joe tried to delete some people from background, yet the edited version was too obvious, better try another one, another one, another one and gave up haha

Almost all attraction closed at 17:00. So we gotta go to next one, Hofkirche where they have a Bronze Statue human sizes, before entering the church there was a multimedia show for 15 minutes. What is this multimedia? Voice and a bit of “laser” show. To me it was like kind of escape room where one door opened after explanation or more out of a sudden a couple come out from the closed door, wtf yo?! were you lost or something? Done with it, we enter the real church, I like it, it reminds me of Logo of Hogwarts what? hahaha When we were out of the church ~ still in the courtyard, saw a map with some legends & numbers…. orange squares, number 3…. the altar… hä? what it is? you mean that room is the altar? took us some few seconds to realize it was the map of the inside! the one we just stepped in! #Facepalm.

Right after, we go to the Stadtturm / City Tower. There we can also see the Goldenes Dachl, remember the instruction from all blog I read ~ selfie with the roof ~ not the building so here we got, nothing other than the roof view! Nailed it!

Then my Asian calculation don’t let me miss any opportunity, we wanted to go to the Patscherkofelbahn, since it’s written Evening Ride from 17-23:00. We took a wrong bus direction on the way there, getting off, redirect ourselves, spending 50 minutes up to Patscherkofelbahn Station only to be confused as to…. why it’s so quiet…. I was in the toilet when I found out the Evening Ride was only on Thursday while we were on Tuesday #Shouldn’t have ignored the sign.

Come out, directly run to Joe, we need to go now otherwise we have to wait for the bus for another 20 minutes! Hop on to the J Bus, another 50 minutes to reach City Center. Joe was having a bit seasick / cabin fever due to the way was a bit winding #Sorry!

After almost 2 hours on the bus haha feel so good to breath a fresh air. We see the “Dancing House” inspired from Amsterdam, at least that’s how I called it. There we met Ankita, she heard us speaking English, approached to asked for a photo. Little did we knew, she also lives in Germany! you never know who you will meet along the way, could be someone living close by, for sure we will meet again in Germany 🙂

We talked about our Innsbruck trip, where to go etc, continue to eat in an Imbiss while watching the Europe cup behind us to know who is playing against who. There she had the ‘nerves’ to ask if Innsbruck card worthy haha I am not a person who pour oil to fire. Girl! you will cry once I told you what we are going to go with this card, don’t ask any question you are not ready for the answer 😉

We closed the day by me searching on where to take the bus while Joe said proudly “for sure it will be from Maria-Theresien-Straße” not only he has a correct pronunciation for a German street name, he was also correct regarding the Bus Stop, boah! after 3 hours he is already a local!

*24 hours checked, continue to our next 48 hours!*