Day 10 Grossglockner to Innsbruck

We woke up this morning to discover it was a national Austrian bank holiday and it was nice to see the local population dressed in traditional clothing it may alsohave a religious conbection as they were making their way to church
So ignore yesterdays post, we have a new favourite - the Grossglockner pass.  We were a bit surprised to come across a pay booth at the beginning of this pass it costs €24 (about £17) to enter the Grossglockner National Park
We were a bit worried about visibilty as when we set off it was light rain and there was low cloud
We paid our €24 and entered the park after a short drive we came across a roundabout  and had to turn left or right, we chose left as it was signposted Grossglockner which took us to a dead end with a great view of a glacier

We took some pics then drove down to the roundabout thinking was that it but this time we took the other road and climbed up and up  and left the clouds far far below us.  The sight that met us at the top left us speechless, we were just over 8000 feet above sea level, the air was very thin and it was down to 3 degrees and snow surrounded us

 We could see at least 20 other mountains it was beautiful. We would recommend this pass over the Stelvio  (Stelvio was a challenging ride but ugly place Grossglockner was a good ride truly beautiful place to visit as you could stay all day, there were picnic tables and stopping points all along the pass and  cafes and museums at various points), you even get a sticker for your bike to say you have completed the Grossglockner pass. There are cute little animals called marmots around most of these passes, some are really friendly.

After the pass we headed for our next stop, Innsbruck and after arriving at the hotel and settling in we went out for a walk aroung the town. Unfortunately because it was a bank holiday a lot of places were closed but the bars and gift shops were open so we stopped and had a pizza .

We eventually returned to the hotel  and when we finally settled down for the night and turned out the light we were supprised to find that what we thought was a woodchip papered ceiling turned out to be a starry sky complete with milky way, we tried to photograph it but couldn't,  it was obviously very expertly done with luminous paint which absorbs the light - didn't want to close our eyes, it was a lovely way to fall asleep - very realistic.