Hiking with Bee

Tuesday was mostly a catch-up day with getting some basic stuff done that I had been putting off. Later in the afternoon Sabine took me on a hike with her friend Silvia and her dog, "Bee". The hike was all up hill and "Bee" was having a grand time climbing up the side of the trails and sniffing around. She was a very happy and well trained tan lab. When she got too far Silvia would yell, "Bee" and the dog would return. Silvia also had a whistle that the dog would respond to as well. Silvia would toot the whistle and the dog would return. Bee would also search and sit based on the whistle blows. A very smart puppy at 2-years old.

Bee

We got to a point where we reach the most confusingly placed hut:

Hut

We hiked further. A while later a woman came running down the hill frantically. In perfect English she yells, "Have you seen an iPhone on the trail?". "No" we replied. She continued to run down the mountain. A while later she came back up with iPod in hand. We thought that would be the last we would see of her. It wasn't. A few turns later, about where the ice began to cover the trail we saw her again. This time she had strapped several tires and a full Nalgene bottle to a harness that was tied around her waist. She began to walk up the hill with tires dragging behind her.

Tire Lady

A while later, the tire woman was still behind us. Out of nowhere and without warning comes another woman who was running up the hill with her two walking sticks. She brushes me hard and swift and continues up the mountain. I have no idea where she came from! Several feet in front of us she did the most disgusting thing: She holds her right index finder against her right nostril and blows as hard as she could. She does the same with the left one. No aid of a Kleenex was used. She begins to walk toward us and she is out of breath still. The moment she walks behind me she spits on the ground. Classy!

We reach a sign that indicates that we are 10-minutes from our destination. All I was told was that we were hiking to a cabin. Well, when we reach our destination it was more than a Cabin. It was a restaurant/bar in the middle of the woods called, "Arzler Alm"!!!! It was closed when we got there, but they had an open cooler where you could grab a beer if you left some money in a box. It was all on the honor system and the cooler was FULL of beer. I said, "If this was in the US then High School kids would have cleared this out before anyone else got here". We sat, had a drink, and enjoyed the view of Innsbruck below. Fantastic!!! Bee and I played for a while, she was a hoot!

Beer

As it started to get dark we worked our way down the mountain and headed back home. I had to say "Good-bye" to Bee. I later found out that "Bee" is short for Sabine. I'd been hiking all afternoon with "Sabine #3" and didn't even know it.

Sabine #1 showed me how farmers dry corn on the way down the mountain as we drove through a few hillside farms. We arrived home and got ready for our next adventure.....A Traditional Austrian Carnival Folk Night in a Giant Beer Tent.