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08:31: I didn’t bother taking a shower this morning as I woke to a steady rain. I brushed my teeth and washed yesterday’s socks (which I’d had to wear for two days) thoroughly. I’m still feeling gloomy and want to get the hell out of here as quickly as possible. Salzburg has not redeemed itself to me. I’m about to have porridge for breakfast. For the first time, I was chilly in the new bag last night. I had it drawn around my head and fully zipped up and yet I woke up chilly a few times. There’s scope to put layers on me and put the bag in the bivvy bag, so I’m not concerned. I’m now wearing long pants, a t-shirt, long sleeved top and fleecy. The temperature on my bag is 14°C. The forecast for today is for no rain until midnight. It had been forecast yesterday to rain all day today, so that’s a relief. At least I can get a move on. Today’s walk is due south along the Salzach river.
09:55: Checked out. €46.50.
10:05: On my way; four litres of water, trouser leg soup spillage washed, in shorts and t-shirt in full sunshine. What a relief to be moving again. There was something horribly claustrophobia-inducing about Salzburg.
10:10:39
10:40: Take money from an ATM and buy AA batts before leaving town.
10:44: €8.00 for 4xAA batts is robbery. I left them on the shelf. It’s clouded over. I’m almost at the railway line, which I follow south for a few kilometres.
10:52:31
11:19: Angling into the city to find an ATM and batteries. I’m still hoping Salzburg can redeem itself. I wonder why I hate it so much. Perhaps it’s because it seems so poverty-stricken after Germany; perhaps it’s the ugly urban let-down after the beauty of Bavaria.
11:31: €3.99 for four Varta long-life batts in a Spar Express at a petrol station. There’s an ATM nearby, apparently.
11:44:58
11:47: Slight detour to find the ATM. It’s 470 metres away!
11:59: The way is blocked by the Freibad. I’ll have to walk around it. This is tedious.
12:12: OK, sorted. Leaving town!
12:15:40 
12:16:15 
12:41:52
13:03: Elsbethen town limit.
13:14: Stopping to put on some sunblock. I still feel weird. I know it’ll pass. I guess I’m frightened by the mountains, but all I have to do is plod on for a couple of days until I find folks with local knowledge.
13:22: I know what the feeling is — it’s a sense of impending mortality.
13:47: Stopping for lunch on a shaded bench with views through trees of the green river. My mood has not lifted, but I’m observing it.
14:38: That was pleasant and tasty. Listened to the rest of Jordan Peterson’s third lecture on old testament stories.
14:46: Leaving Elsbethen. My mood has lifted substantially.
14:50:37
14:58: Puch town limit.
15:14:12 
15:14:37
15:33: Exiting Puch. (I only skirted it, staying on the river instead of going into the town.)
15:36: At last I’m almost in amongst the hills.On the opposite bank, a steep, forested hill rises up.
15:38: Stopping to swap maps.
15:58: Moving again. I think I’m over an hour behind schedule today.
16:00:34
16:10: Thunder. Looks like the weather is closing in.
16:30: Light industrial. Feeling nervous.
16:35: This is Hallein.
16:57: OK, I’m back on track where I ought to be on the map. Looks like a shower is going to roll through.
17:00:19 
17:07:44
17:27: Exiting Hallein, thank fuck. (The shower missed me, mostly.)
17:27:58
17:33: Bad Vigaun
17:38:41 
17:38:56 
17:47:19 
18:23:43
18:36: Following a two-rut dirt track south with the river to my right. I’m aiming for the camping at Hellweng, south of Kuchl.
18:57:54 
18:58:04 
19:07:47 
19:13:15 
19:14:02 
20:17:16: The Menneweger family and friends. 
20:56:47: David and Gert sketch out a route to Slovenia. Karl Sr. and Else look on in the background. 
20:57:10: Petra looks on as the evening light catches the mountains.
The campsite didn’t exist. Instead I found myself looking at an open pasture, across the road from a row of suburban houses with large gardens. In one of these, a family were gathered around a table in the evening light, chatting animatedly and sharing drinks and food. I walked into their garden to ask where the campsite was. “There’s never been a campsite here, and we’ve lived here for twenty years!” one of the women said. I showed her the map. Some of the others crowded around. There was the symbol for the campsite, alright, just across the road, but everyone was adamant. “There’s no campsite!”
“Have you got a tent?” someone asked. “Yes”, I answered, “I have everything I need to sleep wild”. “You’ll find a place nearby”, the first woman answered. I thanked her and the others and began to walk away. “You could sleep in the garden!” the youngest woman shouted after me. I smiled and turned around and asked “Are you sure?” “Of course!” the other chimed in. “Come and join us! Would you like a drink? Some food?”
I said I’d be delighted to, shrugged off my rucksack and joined them at the table. I felt distinctly under-dressed in my fleecy and walking pants, but nobody minded. I was introduced to everyone; they shifted places a bit during the evening, and I may not have everyone’s name here, but around the table were Michi with her fab pink hair and her fella David, who is the son of Anita and (I think) Helmut, a slightly frazzled old hippy. Anita is the daughter of Karl Senior and Else. Her brother Karl Junior was also there, as were neighbours Gert, Christina, Martin and Petra. Kids Lea and Zoe spent most of their time indoors watching cartoons. The gathering was to celebrate the birthdays of two members of the family. “So where are you from?” “Where are you going?” they asked. Gerd was flabbergasted when I mentioned the length of the journey. “Vier tausand kilometer! Wahnsinn!” he repeated over and over. “Four thousand kilometres! Madness!”
I was treated to serving after serving of vegetables, salads and meats, and the home-made Elderflower cordial with sparkling water was a delicious and welcome thirst-quencher. Only Gert was disappointed that I wouldn’t take a drink; I told him I’d drunk enough during the first half of my life to last me for the rest of it.
The conversation shifted to my plans for the next few days. I told them I had a rough plan for a route across the Alps, but that I’d love to hear their recommendations. I pulled out my large scale overview map of this part of the Alps, spread it on the grass and pointed out my planned route into Slovenia. Gert, well tanked up by now, had a variety of suggestions and began calling out towns and passes along the way. “Wait!” I yelled, handing him a highlighter pen — “Draw what you think is the best route please!” Gert, David and I squatted on the ground while Gert drew a winding track over the mountains, sticking mainly to motor roads. I was relieved and delighted to get a local recommendation.
The evening turned to night, the conversation ranged freely. David gave me a tour of the house and told me I could sleep on the double couch bed in their basement bar, games room and climbing wall. These people know how to relax! I told him how grateful I was for the family’s hospitality. David and Michi were off on a tour of South America, beginning in October, and they were both really excited about it.
Back out in the garden, Karl Senior fired questions at me, but I couldn’t once make out a single word of his mountain dialect. Everyone got a laugh from that, demonstrating that they could all speak the dialect fluently, leaving me at sea for a few seconds. I played up my bafflement and confusion. Thankfully all but Karl Senior switched to High German when speaking to me, and David, sitting next to me, translated his grandfather’s questions into English for me. I directed my answers in German back to Karl Senior.
I went to bed at one o’clock, and sketched the following quick notes before turning in:
Gert firing the Buller, a crazy flint-lock, barrel-loaded wide-bore brass pistol. He let me fire it, insisting I did so only with ear plugs in. The mountains reverberated and I shook like a leaf afterwards. Later he set up a firework display but was too pissed to get the electronic firing mechanism to work, so he let off a single firework which leapt five metres in the air, landed in the garden and exploded, spraying all of us with burning sparks. Utter unconstrained madness. David and Michi canoodling, Karl Sr. almost expiring during a coughing fit, Helmut the wasted hippy muso who lives three months a year in Mahabalipuram. “Du hast mich heut’ noch nicht geküsst” (“You haven’t kissed me yet today”), oompah-band nationalist Austrian melodies.
