So the Obertraun story continued...

Thanks for the set-up Steph!

So we arrive back in Obertraun after our long day of hiking. I should mention we're a little on edge from the skulls in Halstatt (that was way creepy) and the walk back in the dark. We decide to hit the restaurant where we ate the night before. Since it's the only restaurant in town that we know is open at night, it seems a natural choice. Plus it's right next to our hotel, which equals less walking. We head on over, but lo and behold there's a wedding going on! Obertraun has about 700 full-time residents. Needless to say, a large percentage of them were in the restaurant. I was kind of still for going in, but Steph wisely said we should move on (she also got a better look at the dining room full of wedding guests).

So we still wanted a drink and some dessert (given our lack of success at the top of the cable car in Halstatt). Before we set out on our hike that morning, we'd walked across town to the grocery store and noticed that there were a couple of other restaurants and things there, so we figured maybe one of them would be open. It was a long shot, but hey, we'd already walked 18 km, what's another 1 or 2, right? We head off across town...

Now before I can properly tell you what happened next, you need a little background on some Austrian folklore. St. Nicholas, the original Santa Clause figure, is a big deal in Austria-his feast day, December 5th is widely celebrated, and actually resembles our Christmas Day a lot-there's presents and candy and decorations-we saw lots of displays in Vienna. This is fine, but for unknown reasons, Austrians also lump their All Saints Day in with this holiday (It's actually the day before-December 4th) which is kind of like Halloween. In Austria, though, instead of the children dressing up as monsters and going around for candy, young adults dress up as monsters/devils and walk through the streets scaring little kids-this is called krampus (I'm still a little fuzzy on whether the day or the devils themselves are called krampus, but moving on). The devils wear very elaborate wooden masks, which are handed down through generations, and carry wooden switches and whips. They look grotesque, but evidently it's all supposed to be in good fun and everything we heard about and everything in our guide books seemed to indicate it was really a holiday for children. Nothing to be worried about, really.

So back to us walking across Obertraun in the dark. Imagine the scene...quaint alpine chalets-warm yellow lights in the houses nearby, the moon overhead...absolutlely lovely. We're getting near the other restaurants we saw earlier in the day, when what should we hear but sleigh bells jingling...okaaaay...weird, but last night it was polka music, so we rolled with it. We go a little farther up the street and lo and behold, three krampus devils are walking up the middle of the road, ringing the sleigh bells as they come. My glasses were kind of fogged up, so I never actually saw them all that clearly, but Steph said they were definitely the real deal-grotesque wooden masks, furry bodies, the whole nine yards...including the switches and whips. They get near us and start to move past us, and we're commenting to each other "Cool" "Wow, I'm glad we got to see this" "Neat masks"...

and then the first devil hit me on the legs with his switch!

Okaaaaay, that's a little weird, but it must be the tradition Ha Ha, how quaint...

then the second, larger devil hits me with HIS switch

Okaaaaay, that kind of hurt, but oh well, they're moving on

then the third devil, who is the smallest by far (this kid couldn't have been more than 10) comes up and starts WALING on me with his switch

Okay-now this is getting ridiculous! And painful!

That's when the second devil comes back and decides his whip (read: cat-o-nine-tails) needed a little taste of the action too.

So now we're like "Whoa, whoa, WHOA! What the hell is going on here!" We make a big fuss, I'm trying to duck and cover and get out of range (all the while not being able to see anything real well) and Steph's yelling at them to cut it out!

Thankfully at that point they move on down the street, and we're left standing there about as stunned as you can get. I mean, THAT certainly wasn't in any of the guidebooks! And it really hurt! Especially that little guy wasn't pulling the punches! Thankfully, they were only hitting me (Steph said she'd probably have hit them back if they hit her-and I would have helped). I was really too surprised to even react in the moment.

So we keep going down the street, that's when we run into devil #4. Thankfully, this guy was the odd man out. He obviously wasn't part of the "in crowd" of krampus devils and actually seemed kind of bummed to have to be out there. He completely ignored us, even if we were watching him like he was some sort of potentially rabid dog.

We did find one restaurant that was open, but it was the definition of "local watering hole," so once again we didn't feel like we should really go in (who knows, maybe they had a whole backroom of krampus!), so we decided to go back to our hotel. Now remember Obertraun is just not that big, there's basically two roads through town, so there's a good chance we'd run into the devils on the way back to our hotel. We set off again, but this time, we're booking it, checking around corners, peering down streets, saying things like "Do you see 'em?" "Was that bells I heard? They have to ring the bells, right? They can't just pop out of nowhere, right? What was that?" and so on...

Thankfully, we did spot them down by the trainstation, which they seemed content to hang around (heaven help anyone who got off the train THAT night), and we were able to take road #2 and get back to our hotel, where, probably due to the wedding, the very nice Italian Innkeeper had opened up the bar and even the kitchen. We did manage to get our drink (which I for one, DEFINITELY needed) and our dessert anyway, but talk about a healthy dose of local color! The worst part is, we essentially walked 2 extra kilometers to get beaten and go back to our hotel.

So if you're ever in Austria around the start of November, be cautious about wandering around small towns after dark-and if you hear sleigh bells, run for your hotel as fast as your little legs can carry you!