Today I had planned to do the Canyon Hike of Tormäuer and the plan was to start out at Gösing. So I got up at 4 am. Took Gina for her morning walk. Then I did some last minute preparations. But the doggy packback on Gina. She wasn't quite sure what to make of it. I somhow had the feeling she was unsure if she would come along or if she thought the packback was some form of punishment. But as soon as I put the leash on her, she knew that she was coming alon and she was happy. We than headed out. But the tram just wasn't going to come. So we walked to Vienna's Central Station and we missed the train by 2 minutes. And that should become a recurring theme for the day.
So we had to wait for about 1 hour at the train station. And this was really boring. The train finally arrived and we went to St. Pölten with no further issues. Boarded a local train called the Himmelstreppe to Gösing. This is a very slow local train and usually it takes forever. But this time I thought that the 1 1/2 hours went by fairly quickly. It's always fun watching the landscape pass by. And eventually made it to Gösing.
We left the train and started or hike past the Hotel Gösing down to the bottom of the Canyon. Yes you do have to hike down about 200 meters in evlavation. But having Gina on leash and Gina being overly excited meant that I couldn't usy my hiking poles. So I was sweating like a pig when doing the steep descend into the cnayon. Didn't take too long though and within 1 hour we made it to
Erlaufboden. Form there the Canyon Hike would begin. At first it's a nice hike along a river and than the path gets more and more narrow and you've to hike on walkways, paths and over bridges. That wasn't too much of a challange for Gina and she actually did enjoy herself a lot. Yes, she did have to carry her drinking water, but oit didn't seem to bother her. Finally we reached that one bridge that I was afraid of. It's one of those bridges that's just mide up of metal grids and I know that Gina doesn't particularly like those. But I figured she would walk across if I put her on it and started walking beside her. Not so much. Gina just laid down on the bridge and wasn't doing any step. So I picked her up by the handle of the doggy backpack and carried her across the bridge. And than we continued on our way through the canyon. Between Stierwaschboden Reservoir and Ötscherhias there were quite a number of tourists, who didn't have any trail etiquette at all. It's un unspoken law among hikers that the slower ones pick the next possible chance to let faster hikers pass. But with these tourists it was almost as being in a race. But eventually we managed to pass them.
That was the reason why we didn't stop at Ötscherhias and hiked all the way to Mirafall. There we took our first real break. Gina to to relax and I got to drink something. And after we had cooled down and relaxed for a bit we continued on our hike towards the junction with the trail that leads up to Vorerötscher. Regardless how often I hike that canyon there are 2 things that are always amazing: On the one hand it's the natural beaty of the canyon itself and it's the fact that it seems to take much, much longer to get to the junction.
We finally made it and started the 200 meter elevation climb out of the canyon. After the first incline we sat down at the trail to cool down a little. Gina found herself a nice spot on a wet part of the trail. After we had cooled down, we continued with the climb, until we reached the point where the creek is easily accessible. I found myself a nice place on a log and Gina was cooling off and the creek and
quentched her thurst right from the creek. And she did enjoy that a lot. After that we started the last climb out of the canyon. And suddenly, with no prior warning at all, the muscles of my thighs just started to cramp. And this is no fun at all. But we finally made it to Vorderötscher. But ofcourse we had to pass through a pasture. But the cattle was on the opposite part of where we were hiking through and we were jsut hiking about 10 meters to the cattle fence. That was one of the reason I chose this hike. We relaxed at Vorderötscher. Gina got to drink and got a couple of doggy snacks. I had a very well tasting soup and something to drink. After about 1/2 hour we started the final part of our hike and I knew that it was about 2 1/2 to 3 hours. This hike was jsut a hike in a forest road.
But I did mention that Gina was slowing considerably down and she didn't seem to enjoy herself. First I thought she might have hurt her pads, since some of the rocks in the canyon can rather sharp. So I took a look at her pads, but they seemed to be fine. It wasn't really that hot either and lot's of the hiking on the forest road took place on the shade. So I decided to put the packback off Gina and put it into my packback and carry it for her. We did take a short break and Gina got something to drink. And without having to carry the weight of the drinking water Gina was back to her usual self in no time and was pretty much hiking right next to me.
We finally made it to Hagengut and shortly thereafter we approached the dam of Erlauf Reservoir. From there we heard the train, I had planned to take leave the station. So there was no need to get upset about that. We continued at our pace to the train station. There we relaxed. Gina got something to drink and she just chilled. I got out of my hiking boots and it felt amazing. And we did have about 1 1/2 till the next train and with that the last train of the day was going to arrive. On the positive side I did get the chance of taking a couple of pix and video of on train going in the wrong direction.
So all in all it was a great hike. And a very long hike actually. All in all we hiked for 9 hours and covered a distance of about 18 miles.
