Spending A Week in Mayrhofen
After a huge buffet breakfast with the usual Meusli (four different kinds), cereal, yoghurts, fresh fruit, nuts and grains, eggs, all kinds of luncheon meats (salami, ham, etc.), four kinds of cheeses, salads, breads, rolls, marble cake, juice, coffee, etc., we felt much better and ready to cope...fat, but ready to cope.
First stop? The Information Office with its varied information. Maps, bus schedules, information about a 6-day pass that covers all trains, buses, outdoor swimming pools and working cable cars/gondolas for 39 Euros. It is called the Zillertal Card and is good from June to October. There is even a family ticket, and if two parents purchase, children born between 1991-1999 travel free.
The Mayrhofen Tourist Board even has daily free guided walks and bike rides for their guests.
Mayrhofen is a pretty village, set in a valley with other valleys radiating off in all directions and a river running through it. ...View image...There are daily buses going into all the different valleys with hundreds of kilometers of trails to hike or walk. They even grade the trails as: flat (no inclines), moderate or difficult. It was sunny and hot and the streets were loaded with people. Families walking/hiking, people strolling with buggies and babies and most prepared to do the usual European method of hiking - take the cable car UP, make a short or long tour around the top (even with babies in strollers), stop and eat or drink at one of the many mountain lodges all over the mountains and ride or walk down. Tourists of all sizes and shapes, dressed in every which way, are all up there is the mountains with us. It's not necessary to be a Reinhold Messner or Sir Edmund Hillary to enjoy the outdoors as these people prove.
At the top (about an altitude) of 6,000', there are plateaus, easy walks through pine trees, forests and meadows with good footpaths. We happen to like hiking up (burn off some of those calories) and met this family, with an obviously handicapped little girl, walking down. She was unsteady on her feet (with some sort of muscular disease) but there she was, coming on down the mountain. It was very heartwarming to see.
proof that you don't have to be in perfect physical condition
Up on the mountain top, families break out sandwiches, fruit, deserts...sit on rocks and enjoy the grandeur of the Alps. How very beautiful it is.
One of the most picturesque aspects of the Tirol are the old signs hanging from hotels, ...View image...and almost every house intensively gardens (and hangs) colorful flowers everywhere...extremely colorful and immaculate.
But there was even more to see and do....
