Sunday 24th May Opatija - Kufstein

I am picked up by the car park man at 07:00 and taken to the coach which is parked in a very full coach park.

I arrive at the hotel at 07:30 to load the cases and we are away by 08:00. Is hot already and I have a sweat on!

We have a short delay at the Croatian border where we have our passports checked and a longer delay at the Slovenian border as we are behind a coach group of Japenese and they all have to get off the coach and go through passport control. Our passports are checked on the coach and we are soon on our way. The next forty minutes driving is off the motorway on a pretty route through the villages of this part of Slovenia. Once we rejoin the motorway we have a short comfort stop before crossing the border into Austria.

As it is such a nice day I have decided to drive over the Grossglockner High Alpine Road. This road is one of the most spectaculer in the Alps and on a sunny clear day it would be criminal to go around it!

As we approach the Grossglockner road we stop at the Gastoff Post in the tiny village of Mortschach for lunch. I have never been here before but it is lunch time and tummies need filling! The lady of the restaurant is happy to accomodate our group and we all gladly make our way to the toilets and then our tables. There is one older lady behind the bar and in the kitchen and a young lady serving the group. When I walk in some have been served drinks but no menu's are about. I ask if anybody is serving and they reply the young lady is taking drinks orders first and then will do food orders. This may take a while!

I needn't have worried as the young lady was super efficient and had definitely served large groups before as she had her method and it was a successful way of doing things. The food was excellent as well and we all enjoyed our stop here.

An hour and a half after stopping we are back on the road to begin our climb up the Grossglockner.

I half wish I hadn't bothered as the coach is really struggling up these steep slopes although the views make up for it. We had a problem with contminated fuel recently and even though the tanks ahve been drained and cleaned there must still be some fungus in the system somewhere, either that or too many people had the apple strudel at lunch!

Hooray! We reach the top and just as we start to descend I stop for half an hour for a coffee, toilets and group photo. The sun has gone in and it is cloudy, windy, cold and about to rain!

The journey down is a a lot easier than the one up.

We by-pass Zell am See and are just approaching the town of Lofer where we take the Kufstein road when the traffic stops. Must be an accident as not much is coming the other way. It is an accident as two wreckers drive past with the remains of two cars, one of which is very badly crushed.

The sun is back out and the skies are once again blue as we reach the Andreas Hofer Hotel in Kufstein at 18:30.

We have a choice of dinner tonight between Weiner Schnitzel and Fish. I choose the Schnitzel and am very satisfied with my choice.