My First Trip Abroad

My first trip abroad was in the 1970s when I travelled with my father by coach to

Steinach im Tirol, Austria not far from the Italian border. We took the coach from Edinburgh to Dover and crossed the English channel by Hovercraft to Calais. From there we travelled through Belgium (Brussels) and West Germany (Mannheim).

I was not that much into trains at the time being only in my early twenties plus I didn't possess a very good camera although I did manage to take one or two reasonable pictures.

I remember the night we stayed in Mannheim, we both went down in the evening to the local Bahnhof (station) to watch the trains. Unbeknown to us the station gates were locked at 11am resulting in both of us having to scale a rather large wall so we could make our way back to our hotel. This was just the beginning of our Austrian adventure.

After travelling through Germany we eventually arrived at our destination.

Steinach im Tirol is situated in the southern part of Austria heading to the border with Italy at the Brenner/Brennero Pass.

The Sud Tirol was part of Austria but after the Treaty of Versailles in 1919 this area was given to Italy and has caused a lot controversy ever since.