Skiing

Combloux Early days Ski Tickets Across the USA

  

  A Ski Tour of Europe, page 1.
Map
Retirement sometimes offers an opportunity to fulfill some of the ambitions that are impossible when you are employed. One such was a prolonged tour of Europe, taking in skiing, cities and galleries.Travelling by car across France, from an English Channel port, our first skiing took place in the Black Forest area of Southern Germany on the Feldberg which, at 1943 metres, is the highest mountain in the area. Driving on from there along the shores of Lake Constance it was possible to pay a visit to the spectacular castle built by King Ludwig II of Bavaria at Neuschwanstein before skiing at the nearby resort of Lermoos, in Austria. Afer this a route was taken via the pretty Bavarian village of Mittenwald, famous for the manufacture of violins, and the lake of Starnbergersee where a memorial commemorates the point at which King Ludwig drowned under suspicious circumstances.
Neuschwanstein.
Lermoos.
 King Ludwig II's castle at Neuschwanstein.
Sketch of the view from the hotel at Lermoos.
Travelling on towards Munich for a to visit to the Munich Pinakotek, a stop was made at Benediktbeuren in order to see the Benedictine Abbey, founded in 740 A.D. This is famous as the place where the songs of' 'Carmina Burana ', which were brought to a wider public by Carl Orff in 1936, were first written down, way back in the thirteenth century.
Starnbergersee.
Benediktbeuren.
Starnbergersee and the memorials to King Ludwig.
 The abbey at Benediktbeuren and the home of the music of 'Carmina Burana'.
South of Munich lie the the resorts of St Johann and Kitzbuhel, in the Austrian Tyrol, where in the midst of fresh snow ( in mid- March) we returned to skiing.
Munich.
Kitzbuhel.
A work by the British sculptor, Henry Moore, outside the Neue Pinakotech in Munich.
The top station of the Kitzbuhler Horn.And below, two sketches of a snowy morning in St Johann.
Snow at St Johann, 1.
Snow at St Johann, 2.

A route due south from St Johann takes you through the Felber-Tauern Tunnel into Eastern Tyrol and then to the border with Italy at Dobbiaco, after which a spectacular drive through the Dolomites leads to the well known ski resort of Cortina d'Ampezzo. After a short skiing interlude and a visit to the birthplace of the artist Titian at Pieve di Cadore it was but a day's journey to Venice. A sojurn here allowed for visits to the Accademia and the collection of modern art at the Peggy Guggenheim Museum on the Grand Canal as well as giving time to enjoy the ambiance of this unique city.Venice was our furthest point from home and from here the return journey westwards began, first with a visit to Lake Garda.
Venice in March.
Lake Garda in March.
Venice at Easter,when it is cooler and better for sight-seeing than in the mid-summer heat.
An interlude at Lake Garda.
Return to 'Skiing, Combloux'. Go to 'A Ski Tour of Europe', page2