What A Day!

Innsbruck, Austria

We have arrived in Innsbruck to a fabulous hotel in the ‘old town’. It is a wonderful end to a not so wonderful day.

It was too wet and miserable to venture far with the sight seeing this morning, so after a quick recce of the nearby streets and to work out how to get to our platform without using stairs, we set off to the railway station. We bought lunch at a bakery, packed it and the brollies into the backpack and headed up the escalator. We got separated on the escalator but both arrived at the platform together. I was aware of a guy who had pretended to help me on the escalator, hanging about, so was wary of him. Next thing he appears asking Gray for help to read a sign, just as another guy steals the backpack. I saw it all, so just yelled my head off – “Thief, thief!!!” You probably heard me.
The guy pretending to want help, then hung about hoping Gray would give chase. As if he would, leave me with all the luggage for a backpack. As the guy with the backpack ran down the stairs he was waving a wallet still trying to get Gray to chase him. By now the whole of Geneva knew what was happening and both guys disappeared, especially after Gray whipped out his iPhone and said he was phoning the police! (He didn’t even know the number!)
Next thing a security guy appears with the backpack, which had been dumped as soon as the hullabaloo started.
Little did they know the backpack contained my iPad, wallet with cards etc.

Very shakily we boarded the train and were glad to get out of Switzerland. In Italy, (Rome and Florence), we were aware of beggars and in Marseille we were aware of crowds of people milling about, but it was only when we arrived in Geneva that I felt uneasy. We ate very close to the hotel last night because I was not keen to walk down the ‘main street’ at night.

The first train took us to Zurich and we had 10 minutes to find the platform and board the train to Innsbruck. We were still finding our seats as the train slid away!! We climbed high into the alps and around St.Anton the snow was down quite low – in the streets.

However, now in Innsbruck, we can see snow on the high hills and it is cool, but not very cold. The streets around us a quite magical and we are looking forward to exploring them tomorrow.

Our hotel has a restaurant, but it is closed on Sundays, so we will try it tomorrow.