Day Trip, Innsbruck

For the second day we awoke to rain (not quite as heavy as yesterday), however this was forecast and we had determined that we should go and be tourists for a day. We had never visited Innsbruck as we had always travelled past on our visits to this area. This was also supported by the fact that we got had a card from the residence that gave us free train rides and car parking on the Brennerbahn.

A further reason was that I had noticed that the Boa tensioner on my ski boots had a piece of plastic missing. This piece was the separator for the two ends of the wire laces. I had araldited an extra piece over the hole, but was not convinced that it would last.
I had also seen that replacement parts for the BOA system can be received from the US (free of charge), however this seemed to only be the wire and the tensioner, and also seemed quite complex to replace - especially as it seemed the mount was riveted to the boot.

We drove down to Steinach to make use of the park & ride car park next to the station, however this was full. So we continued down the valley and arrived at Matrei. Here the park & Ride was in a building and we found a space on the top floor.

The clouds still down over the tops as we walked down to the platform and discovered the next train would be in 10 mins (good timing)

The first activity for me was to peruse the sports shops and see what options there were for boots.
First starting at Sportlier - seems like an Austrian "Go Outdoors" - DiY boot fitting.
Then Intersport where the options were rather limited and similar DiY approach.
Then Die Boerse - They did not have any boots, however made a recommendation for a good shop.
Finally Gramshammer - this was more traditional shop with personal service and lots of understanding and advice. There is no contest here and I am soon trying on boots and quickly settle on an updated version of my same boots, parting with an excessive amount of credit card balance.
Now I had to carry a large box for the rest of the visit.

With my retail therapy completed, we continued to wander around the city. However it had to wait until after our lunch - in the remembrance square.
We wandered all around the old town looking into many windows but nothing tempted us in.
Eventually we had covered most street and returned to the train station, hence back to the car.

As the day progressed the weather had improved and as evening drew in the sky cleared and promised a good day tomorrow.

In the Intersport shop we had bumped into Tim who we knew from teh AAC and had made arrangements to catch up tomorrow after our tour and to discuss doing something the following day (Saturday) together.