Week 23: Traunkirchen

Spring Time

Remember all the snow we had from last week? It’s all melted now. Temperatures are rising, flowers are popping out of the ground, mountain cable cars are operating again, and while clocks sprung forward a few weeks ago in America, Austria’s time change happened this weekend.

Magnolia and Cherry blossom trees bloom in the final week of March/first week of April. Here’s to hoping we will be able to see them in person this year!

Traunkirchen

If you look out into the distance from our living room you can see a cluster of buildings extending over the water. These buildings make up the ‘skyline’ of Traunkirchen. Traunkirchen is a small peninsula village in the middle of the Traunsee between Gmunden and Ebensee and is easy to miss if you do not know about it. It is a hidden gem of the Salzkammergut region and few tourists stop here.

The Johannesberg Mountain and Chapel are what draw you into this picturesque place.

“Kirchen” means churches. Thus, Traunkirchen stands for Churches on Traunsee. Like everything in Europe, Traunkirchen has a long history and was founded in the 11th century. It was home to a Monastery in 1020. The Monastery burned down in 1327 and was later rebuilt in 1571 to only get burned down again in 1632. The 1632 version is the version we saw today, but is now home to the International Science Academy and the Summer Academy for Painting.

We stopped in to Cafe Johannsberg and ordered an “ApfelStrudel und Heiße Schokolade.” Then we sat outside and enjoyed our Sunday treat in the new spring time weather.

After we got home, we realized one of the photographs in the stairway of our house features a historic view of Traunkirchen!

This is one of our new favorite places and we can get here with bikes. In fact, there is a bike path that takes you up and down the entire lake which would take about 2 hours to complete. Dad, if you are reading this, feel free to figure out how to ship us those bikes you have been saving for us 😉