Day 06 – Linz

Saturday started off with a trip down to Bauhaus to show off the super shower. We ran through Bauhaus, then hit Interspar to get a wristwatch. Things were going well – but then we ran into a time crunch. See, they give tours of the spire of the new cathedral Saturdays at 2:00PM. It was about 1:35 and we were on the other side of town. We made the decision to walk over there at a brisk pace – this “brisk pace” had become known as the Death March.

We arrived almost exactly at 2, out of breath, and ready to collapse. We met with our tour guide. She didn’t speak English, which is surprising because we had to reserve spots on the tour, and I did that in English… and got a confirmation in English! Anyway, Joni translated. We found a few other people, then went into the tower. We climbed a few steps, then saw the area behind the organ.

Behind Organ

The little area we were in had some wire spools with large pieces of foam on them. I guess they were some sort of art project about tranquility or some such.  They even seem to have a stack of blankets on the one on the left.

Chairs

It was pretty nice up there actually. It had a good view.

Window

And after the Death March, those chairs looked preeeeettttttyyyyyyy nice.

MJ in Chair

Parents in Chair

After our brief rest, we continued up the very tiny, windy, spiral, stone stairs and arrived in part of the bell area of the tower. The church is only 86 years old, so that’s all original metal in there still.

Bell

We stayed just long enough to get a little history on the church, then we continued up another set of spiral stairs.

Stairs

We got up that set of steps and found ourselves in the larger bell chamber. They had 4 bells in there. It was pretty neat. The next set of stairs though… was less than thrilling. I don’t like wiggly things when I’m up high. Stone stairs are fine. Metal wiggly stairs are not. Guess which kind we got to use for the last climb? Yeah. I was more than a little freaked out, as you can probably tell from this terrifying video of the whole ordeal:

I’m not very good at taking video when I’m terrified. I’m also very vocal about how terrifying things are. I’m also not very excited when I’m on wiggly metal steps and I see large chunks of rusted joints! *shudder* Still, I made it up. Once we were up there I was fine… since we were back on solid stone. At least the view made it worth it!

View 1

View 2

View 3

View 4

From up there you can even see the old cathedral.

Old Cathedral

You can even see the robotic mowers of Linz going at their duty!

Even though it’s terrifying getting up there, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.

MJ and Dad

Even if they are a little confused by what they see.

Confused

Confused 2

Normally part of the tour involves hearing the bells ring from ground zero, but since it was Easter Saturday, that wasn’t going to happen until much later in the day. We went back down the wiggly metal steps (TWICE! GAH!) and went back to ground level. I’d say the whopping 3.50 Euro per person was worth it!

Being very tired, we headed back to the dorm. I managed to get a post game wrap up from the group.

We got back to the dorm, made a little food, rested, then got dressed for church. Since it was Easter Vigil, we decided to go to the New Cathedral for their evening Mass. It was a nice ceremony; better than Christmas even.   They had a nice choir and the pipe organ was neat. That got done about 11, we went back to the dorm and hotel, then had a good night’s sleep.

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