The town of Feldafing, which lies on the shores of the Starnberger See (Lake Starnberg), is the second-to-last bedroom community on the commuter train from Munich. It served as our next stop for a ten-day breather. Down by the lake, if you squint a bit, and catch a good day, you can see the Bavarian Alps. It really wasn’t close enough to the Alps for me (more on that later) so we headed to Mittenwald on the first day of promising weather.

Just getting to Mittenwald involved some mental acrobatics. We needed to translate what the signs were telling us. There was a train to Tutzing, which took five minutes. In Tutzing, we figured out that the train wasn’t going to take us to Mittenwald, it was only taking us to Murnau. Why? And then what? Between the two of us, and sort of going with the flow, we realized that we needed to get on an “ersatz” (replacement) bus to Mittenwald. For some reason, the train was down. So we rode the train for a half hour ride to Murnau and then we rode for on the bus trip to Mittenwald.

The fairy-tale town of Mittenwald would have to wait for later. A cable car up the mountain was our next step.

The cable car is the Karwendel Bahn, which took us to 7,362 feet elevation near the peak of Karwendel Mountain.

The peak was my destination, and we hiked over to it from here.

Passing the massive rock wall that you see on the left, we were treated to the magnificent view of the Alps that I love and had been looking for.

It was such a beautiful day that we could see deep into Austria, which wasn’t too difficult. We were at the border between the two countries.

The sign on the left is the border for the state of Bavaria, and the sign on the right is for the border of Tirol, Austria.

The way was steep and rocky and the air was thin, but we were up to the challenge, especially since we were being treated to such beautiful views.

A bit more climbing, and we were near the top. I needed to finish it off, so I climbed over the rocks to the peak. Success! The elevation at the peak is 9,019 feet.

From my perch on top of the mountain, I could see the cable car station far below, and sheep grazing in the Alpine meadows. Some of them are just barely discernable in the bottom right of the picture. We had to navigate through a lot of sheep poop at times on the trail.

We enjoyed the view for a long while, but finally it was time to come down off the mountain.

Mittenwald is a quaint little mountain village known, as several villages in Bavaria are, for its pretty paintings on their homes and businesses.

Flowers adorn the balconies and front steps of many homes, such as this typical Bavarian-style house.

Mittenwald is famous for the violin-making that began in the mid-17th century by a man named Matthias Klotz. It is said that Matthias crafted Mozart’s personal violin. I knew that the violin museum would, unfortunately, be closed on this day, but we passed by for a picture anyway.

The steeple of the Parish Church of St. Peter and Paul looks over the downtown area. The church was completed in 1740. The red marble for the church came from Italy and traveled over the Alps on the Roman “Via Claudia Augusta” trade route. Mittenwald was an important shipping point for marble and other goods in those days.

We stepped inside for a look.

Words fail me to describe the unexpected beauty of the frescoes, the gold work, and the crystal chandeliers. In a place like this, one can only take a pew to sit, enjoy the Baroque craftsmanship, and ponder life for just a while.

It is the mountains, however, that tower over everything and serve as the backdrop for this town.

We’d had a decent lunch after we’d come down off the mountain. After wandering through the village, a sign for “spaghetti eis” (spaghetti ice cream) caught my eye. This was one of my favorite treats when we lived in Germany and we surely couldn’t pass it by!

I have never seen such a huge serving of spaghetti eis. We should have shared one. The traditional version is on the left; Cal opted for the chocolate variety. What looks like spaghetti is in reality ice cream put through a noodle press; the red sauce on top is actually strawberry sauce. Grated white chocolate stands in for the parmesan. It’s always delicious, and this delectable bowl was no exception.

It had been an unforgettable day. As much as I wanted to return to the mountains, we were unable to for the rest of our stay in Feldafing. The weather became stormy and we would have encountered the train/bus combination again to get to any of the Alpine towns. The feeling of being in the Bavarian Alps is not anything I’ve encountered anywhere else. Other discoveries were in store for us while here, as I will post in my following blogs!

Next time – we visit Munich