On our final day at Austria, we decided to visit Zellamsee and Krimml waterfalls. We found later that it would have been a better idea to visit these places from salzburg en route innsbruck. Since we had reserved tickets between Salzburg & Innsbruck much in advance, we couldn't accomodate any changes to the plan. Below is a quick view of day 4,

Another realisation was that the train fare to visit these places was going to make considerable impact on the budget. With little bit of research and enquiries, we found that there is a Einfach-Raus ticket which is a group ticket for 2 to 5 people that lets you travel on specific(refer OBB sight for details) trains for just 28 Euros a day! This is a steal considering that 2 to 5 people can travel together on the same ticket but the catch is that the trains are almost always slow trains. But this can be made to work to your advantage with accurate planning and ofcourse sticking to the plan.

We decided to take the plunge and shortlisted comfortable train timings for the entire day. As in salzkammergut, we had to adhere very strictly to the plan to avoid unwelcome surprises. But the planning was worthwhile, infact we had a nice relaxing time at Zellamsee though we had to rush in Krimml. We first reached  Zellamsee and booked for a lake cruise that lasted about 45 minutes.

We enjoyed the cruise thoroughly though  after booking the tickets, we went in search of something to eat :-) but went quite far and got caught up in a railway signal(LOL!) on our way back with the cruise ship very much in our sight getting ready to leave. Phew! Those little idiotic things you do!!! And not to mention that the cruise itself had drinks and snacks :-) 

From Zellamsee, we started to Krimml by train. But the journey is not a direct one, we had to take a bus from the train station to reach the waterfalls and viceversa. Infact the return journey was not by a bus but a LokalBahn(Local train) and the route was very scenic to say the least. We spotted, at a distance, that few mountains still sported a snow cap :-) giving us little consolation of having seen snow on alps :-P We were equally excited to watch, from the train, para gliders landing.

Talking about Krimml, the waterfalls looked wonderful with walking trails set and maintained, unfortunately we couldn't go on the entire waterfall trail which extends to 4km. You can see the schematic of the waterfall trail here. It is highly recommended to go through this and plan accordingly (especially because the tickets were priced according to the distance you wish to go and it helps to plan beforehand). Also, we found that there is a taxi that you can take instead of walking (Ahh....found it on our way back!). Lesson learnt? You may need one full day at Krimml and going through all those links and pre-planning would be the best thing to do.

And yeah :-), we did end our day with dinner at a restaurant in zellamsee that served rice, dhal and some veg curry as the only option for vegetarians. I failed to take note of the name and other details :-( of the restaurant, but it was not an Indian restaurant! Could be pakistani? Turkish? A mix of both! Am not sure but all i can remember was a very enthusiastic person who suggested us the only veg option available and making sure everything was going right!!!

The next day, we started back to Eindhoven after brunch at an Indian restaurant in Innsbruck named Shere punjab. I guess we were the only ones there at that time and were served freshly cooked lunch. It felt and tasted more like a lunch we would eat at a punjabi friend's home than like regular restaurant food considering the fact that the owner offered to drop us at the airport as she was going to receive one of her relatives :-)

That ends our 4 day trip to Salzburg and Innsbruck, and on looking back, it has been very satisfying inspite of all the constraints we had in terms of time, budget and transportation. :-)