Water is the key to life and, of course, when you are up a mountain it is your fuel to climb.
Which is why my fellow climbers on my walk up to the Zugspitze, the highest peak in Germany https://zugspitze.de/en/summer, were sporting platypuses in their backpacks.
Which are little bags which you place inside the rucksack, fill with water which comes up through a tube to a valve.
From where you drink in God’s own spring water.
It looked all the life to me like my fellow walkers on my Topflight trip www.topflight.ie to the Ehrwald in Tirol in Austria were gulping in air.
I should have tested them beforehand.
But heck climbing isn’t an Olympic pursuit, it was all good clean fun and water and air is free. Right?
Wrong.
At the Knorr Hut, the only and last watering hole on the way up we stopped for some refreshing refills of water.
And some for ghoulash soup, German sausages, beer, and me some hot chocolate.
Now I’m a bit of an aficionado of hot chocolate from my travels.
And nothing can compare with the una ciocolatta de calda densa I had on the Via Francigena walk into Rome Small roads lead to Rome.
It was like dessert.
Knorr’s tasted like it was out of a machine at best. https://www.alpenverein-muenchen-oberland.de/knorrhuette
Noticing that our guide Reini was drinking a pint of water I asked too for some tap water.
Which was promptly served and I was then told that it would be €3.90.
I wish I’d had the comeback line Mick gave me in the sauna later when confronted with the same problem in Oberammergau.
‘Yes, it was still water, but it’s still bloody expensive.’
What made matters worse was that you could refill your bottles with water from the tap in the WC.
I would have stuck around to chat but I reckon they’d have charged me for the air.
You can stay at the Knorr Hut too when you’re walking between Austria and Germany.
I prefer Ehrwald though and the charming Daniella and her Topflight hotel Hotel Sonnenburg http://www.sonnenburghotel.com.
In fact I want to take her home only I reckon the Scary One might have something to say about that.
More Tirolian mirth later and tales of our very own Ehrwald Presley.
And here’s a recap of another Austrian adventure Soll Mates.
