“The world is so full of many things that I am sure we shall be all happy as kings. How happy are kings?” (1)
Mountain path to Kreuzjoch (2,450 m) near Schruns
This summer we have visited again the Montafon Valley for nice and real summerfreshness, this place to be found in the utmost Western part of Austria right to the border of Switzerland. In 1925 and 1926 the still unknown author Ernest Hemingway spent also quite some time here and in fact left lasting personal impressions with the local people.
Hotel Taube at Schruns around 1920 (2)
The budding writer had come to Montafon Valley with his wife and son from Paris, because he had little money and good friends had told him that in Schruns there would be the nice Hotel Taube, that the Montafon was cheap and the mountains just ravishing. Hemingway liked it so much that he spent two winters here in 1924/25 and 1925/26, six months amidst the dazzling white snow world and surrounded by the tranquility he needed to rewrite his first novel “The Sun also rises”. The local people called him the “black Kirsch drinking Christ”, because he liked to stay in the diverse taverns of the valley.
Ernest Hemingway, John Dos Passos, Gerald Murphy at Silvretta, 1925 (3)
The young author with his wife Hudley and son at Schruns, 1926 (3)
Wiesbadener Hütte at Silvretta in the 1920s, here Hemingway stayed for ski tours (3)
Hemingway, then in his mid-20s, was very fine, on wooden skis and sealskins he climbed up into the Ochsental, climbed the glaciers on the Piz Buin at Silvretta, he loved the mountains, and in Schruns he sipped the homemade schnapps of the peasants, plus lots of Fohrenburger beer, and he beat them all down in the bar of Hotel Taube: the host, his ski instructor Walter Lent, even the local gendarmerie captain participated in the evening poker rounds. Quite how influential those visits to Montafon were for Hemingway gets clear in his last book “A Moveable Feast” because therein he left a memorial to Montafon. So the very last chapter of this book is devoted to this Austrian region, his private paradise, he describes the valley enthusiastically as a real romance.
Löwen Tavern founded 1500 at Tschagguns where Hemingway often accompanied hunters and woodcutters





- Ernest Hemingway in a letter to his colleague F. Scott Fitzgerald, September 1926
- photo from an old marketing flyer of ‘Hotel Taube’
- photos from the archive of ‘Montafon Tourismus’
That beautiful post about Ernest Hemingway, one of my favorite writers. Together, in one of the photos I believe to be the writer John dos Passos, also much appreciated. I really like posts like this, they preserve the memory of a time that doesn’t come back anymore and helps those who read to better understand the life of then and their protagonists. Again, congratulations for the beautiful post.
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Thank you so much for your kind words. And on the 4th photo you see in fact also John Dos Passos who spent also quite some time here together with Hemingway. When walking at the river Litz in Schruns a few days ago, we even found a small memorial sign for John Dos Passos at this nice flaneur’s path. I like this kind of discrete approaching and unobtrusive looking back in time. 🙂
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Hemingway… Hemingway… Hemingway…
Ich hab gezittert vor Aufregung, als ich vor der Closerie des Lilas stand und versuchte etwas Nostalgie zu schnuppern. Was für ein Schriftsteller…
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Sehr schöne Ergänzung, vielen Dank, er hat an sehr vielen Orten seine Spuren hinterlassen! Diese Region in Österreich war damals touristisch so unbekannt wie der Literat selber, heuer treten sich dort die Leute im Winter überall doch eher auf die Füsse. 🙂
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So adventurous
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👣 Mille grazie 🙂
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prego! … buona passeggiata !
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Would love to visit this beautiful place. 😊
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The Alps are in many parts a cultivated landscape, but above 2,000 m usually wild and original mountains with trails connecting the diverse huts and lodges run by the “Alpenverein” normally from mid of June till end of September. 🙂
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Very interesting facts about Ernest Hemingway. I enjoyed reading this post very much. I have read several books of Hemingway. Your photos are gorgeous and this looks like a beautiful, magical place.
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Thank you! In summer a real nice place and not overcrowded, but no longer so cheap as in the 1920s when Hemingway visited the region. Times are changing 🙂
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What a beautiful place, Ulli, and I love how you tied in Hemingway’s visits with your current travels. I love Hemingway, and I didn’t know this part of his history, that he stayed in these parts while revising The Sun Also Rises. I also love how the locals know him as “black Kirsch drinking Christ” because he was quite the drinker. It’s been so many years since I read A Moveable Feast, so I didn’t realize there was a tribute to Montafon. How interesting. Thanks for sharing, Ulli. I’ll link this to tomorrow’s photography post!
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Oh great to know, Cathy, that this post has delivered some new aspects to you regarding the famous author. Besides the drinking, he was also a big gambler, so the money he paid to his Montafon mountain guide during the day, found a way back to Hemingway in the evening or night via games of luck, and he really deserved the money those days, quite funny. 🙂
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That’s so funny that he was a gambler, paid his guide, then won the money back again. Many writers never fully reap the payoff to their writings during their lifetimes, so I’m glad he made some of it back in gambling. And thank you for sharing this piece. 🙂
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Your photos and narrative are beautiful.
I should love Hemingway, since I am an American, and I do, sort of.
https://cindyknoke.com/2012/07/11/hemingways-fetishism-by-carl-eby/
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Thanks for the informative link, he is indeed a quite contradictional character. But I found it always interesting to see how some local legends were created by his visits in this part of the world. I can not remember when I first stumbled over these stories at Montafon valley, most certainly during our first visit of 2000 at the restaurant Kreuzkeller-Bar in Schruns where his great portrait hangs till today good visible for everybody coming in. Have a nice day!
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Beautiful post
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