Inga's segue in the hip-hop world | Hiking the Austrian Dachstien mountains above Filzmoos

Confusion about Inga's name when collecting the morning bread anointed her with the rap name 'Samples Moon' (look out for the album dropping soon!!!!!!) - with such a rad name it's a pity about how dorky the photo is. Must remember not to let Matt take a photo of Inga before she has had her morning cuppa...

After a soggy few days we lucked a day of lovely blue sky for a quick jaunt in the Dachstien mountains. An hour scramble straight up (at least it seemed almost vertical to our tired legs) to Hofpürglhütte (an Austrian Alpine Association hut) saw us eating lunch with a wonderful view over the mountains of central Austria. Following that, we had an easy few hours around the mountain side and down, with the last of the summer flowers and strains of accordion music wafting up from a wedding in the valley below (when we got back down we saw that all the guests were decked out in traditional lederhosen and dirndl!).

The sunny Saturday also seemed to be the day for big groups of local folk to hike up the mountain and stand in a circle on the mountain side for some praying (maybe?).
As we wandered our way downwards through a beautiful valley the were different activities taking place, a lady filming a trickling little stream, people humming and singing, quiet yoga sessions and a spattering of hippies, sitting and just enjoying the tranquillity of the place. This wasn't something we expected to find in the middle of the mountains... but on we trudged, happy to have seen another example of the world's beautiful strangeness and enjoying speculating about what they were doing and why.

(Matt attempts to spice things up by having Inga point at the view - 'Look over here! I found some mountains!')

(mmmm... cheese, banana and peanut butter... a Matt-classic hiking sammy) 

After a final hour of toe and knee punishing down hill we were back at Unterhof Alms house where we started the walk and we were ready for a Radler or two in the sun.

All in all a perfect combo of sights and sounds in the Austrian alps.

(ahhhh... rest those weary feet... safe and sound down the mountain, where the restorative, cold beer flows freely...)