Playground with a view

And who doesn't love a Trojan Pegasus with a slide? Our enemies don't have a chance. This little park is in the village (Dorf Tirol), just down the street from about 50 gelato shops. We will try them all.

Innsbruck is spectacular

We enjoyed our mini-vacation in Innsbruck. We took the local train from Meran to Bozen, then the DB Eurocity to Innsbruck. We stayed in the Old City, in a hotel that dates from the 1400s and claims that Mozart stayed there when he was 13. My skeptical psychologist father says that all those studies which suggest that listening to classical music will make smarter kids lack sufficient evidence, but I'm hoping that staying in a hotel where Mozart stayed will somehow expand J's already considerable musical talents (at least in the genre of "This Old Man," Old McDonald," and other such songs).

While I'd been to Innsbruck only on the way elsewhere, I understood that it was spectacularly situated in the middle of various ranges of the Alps, which explains why it has been the site of two winter Olympics (so far). We wouldn't have known this judging by our first day and a half, when we had a vague sense that there were mountains up there somewhere in the clouds and fog. On our second evening, however, the sky cleared and we were astounded by the mountains rising right from the edge of the city.

The old part of the city has a pedestrian area and, with the large University of Innsbruck and the surrounding mountains, it seemed to us to have the same kind of vibe as Burlington, VT (only several hundred years old, and with mountains several thousand feet higher, though no beautiful lakeshore). There were cafes all over the place, and with sunny afternoons in the 30s and 40s, everyone was sitting outside. Like in Vermont (in usual years, not this recent wimpy winter), people seem to consider sunny days in the 40s precursors to summer, after long cold and dark winters. In Innsbruck the cafes all had furry blankets on the outdoor chairs, which I think would go over well in Burlington! We also found a pretty good sushi place.

The only downside of our trip to Innsbruck is that we had to say goodbye to my folks who continued on to Munich and then home to California. J is keeping his chin up, but is certainly noting the tragic absence of his K-grandparents and is already looking forward to summer when he'll next see them. One of my friends says that anticipation is a parent's worst enemy, and I'm beginning to understand this. But, we're working hard to live in the present with all the fun to be had at a Medieval castle in the Italian Alps, which really isn't that hard to do.

Pigs are scarier than scorpions, and donkeys aren't scary at all

Internet access has been a little sketchy since we came back from Innsbruck, so I haven't been as loyal to blogging as I'd like. I'll post a test picture, and then try for a more extensive post with Innsbruck pictures later.

The weekend news from the castle included a scorpion found by one of the crofters. I do not consider scorpions delightful creatures, but apparently the kind found around here are mostly harmless. According to our hosts (and a few websites), the European black scorpion has a sting similar to a bee or wasp, which makes me feel better about the possibility of finding one in my bathroom. Stings are rare, as well, and it's probably less likely that one would get stung than, say, get knocked over by a pig, which is what happened to me yesterday. The damage was more moral than physical.

The top of our list of best-loved creatures here are certainly the donkeys. We took a brush down yesterday to the orchard where they spend their days, and brushed both Lila and Gina, which they seemed to enjoy. Gina, especially, seems to like (or tolerate) the toddler, and it's fun for him to have such a large and quiet animal to appreciate his attentions.

Strolling

It was a sunny, spring-like day in the Sudtirol, so J, his grandparents, and I wandered around the parks, cafes, and little streets of the old part of Meran (Merano--the city at the bottom of the hill from the castle). We strolled along the river through an arboretum (with interesting topiary), stopped at a cafe for coffee, strudel, and gelato (we like this one--it has dirt-digging toys and small bikes and trikes for kids to play with while their parents enjoy the cafe), found a decent sushi place for lunch, and otherwise got to know the city better.

Meran is a spa town with a long history (occupied by Romans in 15 BC), and is frequented now by tourists interested in thermal baths and fantastic hiking and mountaineering (Reinhold Messner is from this area). For us, with its history, beautiful streets, breathtaking views, and delicious gelato and espresso, it seems like a very nice place to spend the spring.

The ice, ice cream, and iceman, cometh

Ice was our theme today. Along with howling winds and rain, last night's storm left snow and ice on the mountains just above our elevation, making our view even more striking. The clouds gave way to sunshine by mid morning, though, so we took the folks to Bozen/Bolzano (all locations here have both German and Italian names), 40 minutes by train, to see Otzi, the "iceman."

Otzi, around 5000 years old, lives in his own archeology museum in Bozen. He died, possibly evading captors, on a glacier just above us. His body and gear is so well preserved (note that people don't find 5000 year old corpses just every day, even in this fairly-tale land) because of a serious string of coincidences, including the part of the glacier on which he died and the fact that a snowstorm was probably in process at the time of death. If you're interested, here's a nice article about recent DNA discoveries: http://news.yahoo.com/dna-data-helps-flesh-otzi-alpine-iceman-161516817.html

While the folks were at the museum, S, J, and I shopped at the market and ate gelato at a cafe (the third on a three-cafe-day). While the little guy will probably think seeing a frozen dead guy is the highlight of his life in a few years, we decided that eis (the German for gelato) would be of more interest than the iceman. S and I had already seen Otzi, anyway.

Bozen is a nice town--two major piazzas and about three cafes for every person. My kind of town.

Above is cafe #1, waiting for the train with Grandma.
Chestnut Horse likes pesto at cafe #2.
Me too, little kid.

A room without a view

I woke up in the middle of last night and thought that the world had ended and no one thought to post it on facebook. Where there are usually lights (of the neighboring castle and the large towns down the valley), there was just...nothing. All I could see was a solid gray mass of fog. I actually got vertigo when I got close to the windows to look. I'm not usually very fond of heights, but the gorgeous view keeps me looking out the windows here. When there's nothing but gray, though, it's a little creepy. In any case, it afforded me the opportunity to take some indoor pictures today, including of the library adjacent to our kitchen (which you can see through the window), and one of the many, many portraits of Ezra Pound .

My folks are visiting, and while my father gave a guest presentation on cross-cultural psychology to the Crofters, my mother and I (and little J on his short legs) walked (up, up, uphill) to the local market for some shopping. And then we walked back down the steep hill with five bags of supplies and a tired toddler. Now my arms will be as sore as my legs are at the end of each day on the side of this mountain.

After that excursion, we spent most of the rest of the day indoors listening to the wind howl, venturing out only for dinner at the folks' hotel/apartment up the hill, armed with two varieties of Brunnenburg wine straight from the cellar. We had a very nice muskatellar, followed by a vernatsch. Nik, the vintner here, values organic practices blended with good taste, resulting in very drinkable and sustainable wines.

Turkey/duck staredown

The castle has lots of fun animals.