6 miles – walking, 750 feet elevation gain

Since it was going to be another hot day we decided to start out by visiting the Church of the Seven Sorrows of the Virgin in Postlingberg.

The best way to access this Linz landmark is to take the Postlingbergbahn.

 

“This narrow-gauge electric railway has been making the 16-minute journey since 1898. This is Europe’s steepest non-cog mountain railway and gains 750 feet in elevation in a journey of roughly 2.5 miles with neither pulleys nor cables to prevent it from slipping, tackling a gradient of nearly 1:10.”

Once at the top

we toured the Church.

 

The view from up here is amazing and on a clear day you can see the Alps. In this photo you are looking down at Linz and see the Danube winding its way off into the distance.

We spent awhile walking around the grounds.

As we wandered we heard music, like a band coming closer.

Not only was it a band but following them were people making their pilgrimage to the church.

And after them came the church leaders.

Meanwhile, there were a few other interesting sites to see as well.

The entrance to the children’s petting zoo. Not real sure what the connection is.

Just to get some exercise, we walked back to town instead of taking the tram. And it was really steep downhill walking.

Here’s a very old cemetery we came upon along the way.

Back in town we headed for the Ars Electronica Museum where the focus is always on what’s emerging now. “Here, the themes and issues of the future become the exhibitions of today – specifically technological developments and their impact on society, art and each one of us.” (Justin, you would love this place.)

One of the first exhibits we saw covered the issues of internet privacy including facebook and what kinds and how much data is collected and it’s impact on us. How’s that for current and relevant? The presentation of data that is important to humans was pretty incredible including information on carbon emissions, climate change, ice cap melting and changes in the earth’s surface as a result, including earthquake data.

This structure was created by the drone robot you can see parked to the left.

We had lunch on the top floor and then waited for the only English speaking presentation called Deep Space 8K. This was “a one-of-a-kind experience with 16×9 meter surfaces on the wall and floor featuring visually stunning projections at 8k resolution!’ We wore 3-D glasses and could walk around in the images. Very cool and too hard to describe.

As we crossed the river back to our hotel we passed by these two massive riverboats.

Next stop is the Neuer Dom (New Cathedral).

“In 1862 the bishop of Linz engaged one of the architects of Cologne cathedral to develop a design for a grand cathedral in the French neo-Gothic style to accommodate 20,000 worshipers.” The interior was amazing.

Two levels of huge stained glass windows on either side.

The main altar.

And a smaller altar right behind the main alter.

 

A look to the back of the church you can see the pipe organ and if you can see the people in this photo you’ll get a sense of the scale here.

We had dinner at a place above the river where we could see the sights of today. Then off to another spot for dessert. We had decided that since we were in Linz we had to have Linzer Torte. – Right?

Now we’ve done Linz. It’s time to move on.