Austria 2008 - A Stroll through Grado

Another early start rattled us out of bed on May 5, 2008. My brother, sister-in-law and I decided to embark on a day trip to Italy from our local home region of Styria in Eastern Austria. We first drove south from Austria into Slovenia where we were greeted with rain and a fair amount of traffic. We made our way west towards the Italian border and drove past the city of Trieste to stop at the famous white limestone Castle of Miramare, a 19th century castle built for Austrian Archduke Maximilian and his wife, Charlotte of Belgium. The location of the castle on a promontory of the northern Adriatic Sea is stunning, and the castle is surrounded by 22 hectares of parkland.

We continued our drive to the historic northern Italian town of Grado, also located on the Adriatic Sea. This is where the rain caught up with us, but we took advantage of this break by having a leisurely lunch in a local seafood restaurant. From here we started our trip back to Austria, driving north through the Italian Province of Friuli Venezia Giulia past the City of Udine towards the high Julian Alps that rise up in the corner between Austria, Italy and Slovenia. The mountain vistas in the Val Canale (Canal Valley) were stunning, and we stopped off to pick up some Italian olive oil and prosciutto in the border town of Tarvisio. This is incidentally the area where 3 major Indo-European languages meet: the Romance languages (Italian), the Slavic language (Slovenian), and the German languages (Austria). This entire area was the site of major battles during World War I, and many of the mountain tops still bear witness to the High Alpine warfare of WWI.

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• Austria
• Styria
• Alps
• Hochschwab
• Massif
• Veitsch
• Birkfeld
• Bruck
• Castel
• Miramare
• Grado
• Udine
• Tarvisio