Tyrolia

June 10 – 13, 2022

After Garmisch, our next stop is Kitzbuhel.  I change the car’s nav system to English, which I sense disappoints my wife.  But I can’t figure out how to disable the “lane departure warning,” which pairs a red dashboard flash with an air-raid siren any time the device senses lane variations due to: minor road construction, small cracks in the pavement, gusts of wind, or otherwise peaceful moments to test the driver’s heart condition.  We set up the cellphone GPS as a backup to the car’s nav, and the two disagree, fight, and sulk the entire trip.

As instructed, we alert our Airbnb host when we are 30-minutes from arrival so he can meet us at the flat.  Entering town, we grant exclusive authority to the car’s nav system, which promptly leads us in circles around old Kitzbühel. It desperately wants me to drive through an ancient stone archway blocked by a pair of retractable metal pylons. Unlike Milgram’s test subjects, I miraculously resist the authoritative command to ram the car into them and instead pull over into a no-parking zone. 

We reach our host by phone and only then learn that the old town is closed to unauthorized vehicles. Maybe this was in the reservation materials. Maybe it was written in invisible ink. But our kind host comes on foot to find us.  He suggests we carry our bags to the flat from here, and he conscripts Joanna and Elliott as porters, while I wait in the car with Emilie, who shows boredom how to chew on my arm, she says, “like a wild animal.” 

Our host returns to lead us to our surprise “offsite parking,” some 5-10 minute walk from the flat. Once parked, he leads us on foot on a twisted route through the lower part of town, up an elevator in a shopping mall and out the other side into the old town square, around the corner into a door at a hair salon, and into another elevator up two floors to the flat.  I imagine that Hanse and Grete, now grown out of their L, would applaud my desperate attempts to drop mental breadcrumbs to ever find the car again.

The next morning, Elliott and I split off for a day of alpine mountain biking while the girls luxuriate at a fancy public pool. We rent bikes and get a four-hour pass to ride the gondolas around Kitzbuhel.

Most exciting for the boy, we get to ride down the Hannenkahm, home to the most preposterously terrifying downhill ski race on the World Cup circuit. We ride the gondola to the start house and cringe at the steepest section of the downhill race, with the phonetically apt name of “the Streif.”

At the starting gate, two local codgers argue loudly about which of them would kick whose ass down the hill if there were snow. One even brought ski poles, just in case a blizzard materialized mid-June.

Gawking complete, we ride along the alpine ridge to our first downhill trail, which I think is called the Fleckalm. It’s supposed to be the longest singletrack trail in Tyrolia, and my screaming brake-muscles and chafed gloveless palms confirm the legend. Flowing dirt, slick roots, wet rocks, blind corners, small drops — all the ingredients of a surprise cardio workout disguised as a downhill coast.

We catch another gondola and ride the Hahnenkamm trail next. Less technical, but still requiring full attention, especially in the tree-lined sections where a single lapse could plant you in Austria.

The next day, we head to Mayrhof for our trek to an overnight stay at the Olpererehutte. The final stretch of road is one-lane, alternating 15-minute windows of uphill and downhill traffic, monitored by a park employee who also controls parking-lot capacity. She informs us that we are the last car allowed in today — had we arrived 15 minutes later, we’d be banished. Many cars settle for illegal parking in a narrow construction zone, but we luck into a legitimate spot.

We shoulder light packs and begin the 2,000-foot climb up a steep, rocky trail.

It’s hot. It’s steep. But the kids crush it. Eventually Emilie bounds to the front, and I stick with her while the other two enjoy the scenery at saner speeds.

Even with a lunch break, we reach the hut in a respectable two hours. And the hut — the hut! — is the nicest I’ve ever seen: clean, not overcrowded, comfortable beds with thin mattresses rather than sleeping pads, nice bathrooms, flush toilets. Because we booked early, we scored a private family room instead of the communal bunker hall.

The kids fall in love with the hut’s residents: goats, chickens, rabbits, and especially one sheep that “loves to hug.” It comes up and leans against your leg until you hug it. If you stop, it leans against you again. The goats too demand a neck or belly scratch. Joanna steps in the path of sunbeams warming a black and white goat Emilie first dubs Oreo, which provokes an irritated nudge of its horns and earns a name change to Goreo.

A tired lull settles before dinner. “Thank you, Father, for planning every aspect of this wonderful Alpine holiday and finding this amazing hut,” the children’s scowls and my wife’s snarl unmistakably communicate. “You’re so welcome, dear family,” my eyes roll in response.

After dinner, we step outside for alpenglowing views and some mandatory photo-documentation.

It rains hard overnight, but softens to a misty drizzle by breakfast. We descend around 9am, carefully navigating the slippery rocks, which claim a few slip-and-falls but no real harm.

The boy and I reach the car first and begin to peel our wet outer layers under the raised hatchback. As usual, the hatch door attacks me when I least expect it. It closes automatically at the twitch of a moth’s wing near the rear bumper — presumably a brilliant invention to solve the age-old problem of opening a hatchback with an armful of groceries so heavy as to prevent a press of a button. I wonder aloud if a camera is transmitting footage of me to a Japanese game show audience.

We load up, and we’re castle bound.