Innsbruck (meaning bridge over the inn, referring to the Inn River) is situated in the Inn Valley between the Tux Alps (Austrian Central Alps) and the Karwendel Mountains (part of the Northern Limestone Alps).
After only a few days here, Innsbruck dethroned Salzburg as my new favorite city. Just barely. Innsbruck’s location in the Alps managed to overcome Salzburg’s Mount Mönchesberg and Augustiner Bräu. And it has nothing to do with the fact that our Airbnb is fantastic after the disaster in Salzburg.
We originally booked a different Airbnb, but the owner cancelled on us while we were in Scotland. Much to our frustration we had to find alternate accommodations. As a practical matter that meant paying about 40% more than we intended … but you get what you pay for.
Our Airbnb is in the Mariahilf-St. Nikolaus neighborhood, just across the river from old town. It has a great kitchen with modern appliances, a large bathroom, queen size bed, a couch and chair, and plenty of storage space. We easily overlooked the small television and lack of a bathtub.
We had no real plans upon arriving in Innsbruck. There were a few places we wanted to visit, but nothing set in concrete. Here for a week, we decided to take things one day at a time. On our first day we found the local grocery stores and learned the layout of the city.
At the center of old town is the appropriately named Goldenes Daschl, literally a large roof made of gold, constructed at the insistence of Emperor Maxmilian I to commemorate his marriage. Now it serves as a gathering place for tourists to stand, point, and take pictures.
Its location meant that we walked past it every day during our week in Innsbruck.
Also in old town, but slightly off the tourist path, is Fischerhäusl, a small restaurant Stephanie found on TripAdvisor. It is wedged in a space between Hofburg Innsbruck and Dom zu St. Jakob (St. Jacob’s Cathedral, unfortunately closed for renovations during our visit).
Our dinner at Fischerhäusl was one of the best meals we’ve had in Austria. We kept it simple with cordon bleu and wiener schnitzel, along with a couple of glasses of Zillertal Märzen, a wonderful local Tyrolean lager that was not available to us in Vienna.
Zillertal Märzen is definitely a tier one beer for us, rivaling both Stiegl Hell and Gösser Märzen as best in class Austrian lagers.
Just outside the city is Schloss Ambras, a former medieval fortress and Habsburg castle that became the oldest museum in the world. We ventured there one morning to see the collection.
The journey took us about an hour: a ten minute walk to the Innsbruck Museumstraße stop, then a short wait followed by about a twenty-five minute ride on Tram 3 to the Philippine-Welser-Straße stop, and lastly a one mile walk uphill on a one-way road.
On the long walk Stephanie got to pet a dog, so she was happy and did not complain about the steep hill.
The visit at Schloss Ambras starts in the lower castle buildings with a few large rooms devoted to armory. Next up is the Chamber of Art and Wonders, basically stuff collected by Archduke Ferdinand II, still housed in its original location. These are very similar to exhibits at KHM in Vienna.
From there we went to the upper castle, which includes, among other things: the Chamber of Emperors and Spanish Hall (large painted room); the Chapel of St. Nicholas (a nice, very small, chapel); Strasser glass collection (cut, etched, and painted glassware); and, the Habsburg Portrait Gallery (three floors of portrait paintings).
After about 90 minutes of looking at this stuff (and the two gift shops we had to pass through) we had had enough. Truthfully none of the exhibits were particularly interesting.
Before starting the long trip back, we stopped at Ferdinand Café in the upper castle courtyard for a couple of cokes and an apple strudel with vanilla cream sauce.
Leaving the café we walked through a small flower garden and heard a waterfall. Investigating further we found a small stream and waterfalls at the rear of the upper castle, with trails leading down the hill through the woods.
A quick look at Google Maps suggested that we could follow the trails out through the rear of Schloss Ambras, circling back to catch Tram 3 at the Innsbruck Ambras stop. A walk through the woods adjacent to a stream, followed by a short walk through a neighborhood, sounded better than going a mile downhill on a one-way road. Even after making a few wrong turns on the trails, this was definitely the right decision.
Notwithstanding our apathy towards the exhibits, the castle and grounds are worth the visit and we enjoyed it.
A couple of days later we broke down and bought a couple of Innsbruck City cards that are marketed to tourists. This is not something we would ordinarily do, and we will explain the circumstances in our next post.
Garrett and Stephanie
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