Salzburg

At the beginning of April, after getting back the DSH results, I went to Salzburg for a couple of days. I had hoped to take a longer trip during this time since I had 6 or 7 days between getting the results and our program trip to Berlin. I acutally wanted to go visit Amanda in Geneva, but it was her spring break and she went hopping around Europe. So I organized a quick trip to Salzburg and since some people who were coming with us (there were 7 of us total) needed to still take some exams, we ended up going for only 3 days. The first night we got there was spent trying to find our hostel (the directions given, or lack thereof, were deceiving). The hostel plays the sound of music every night at some given time, which makes me wonder how much the people working there must hate that movie. After finally settling in, we went food hunting and found a place with some really great german/austrian food (Salzburg's pretty close to the German border) and stuffed ourselves on wurst, schnitzel and spätzle. Mmm.. At the end of all this it was about 11 pm and everything was closed, so we wandered a bit and then headed back to the hostel. At the hostel we were accosted by a group of 15 year old boys who were living down the hall, who kept on wandering over to our room and asking if we wanted to "make a party."

The second day, we headed up to the fortress first thing. I had been there during my first trip to Salzburg six years ago, but I only walked around the courtyards and outside for the view. This time we actually took the tour inside the fortress which was really interesting and the best part was that they take you up to one of the highest towers and there's a breathtaking view of the surrounding alps. It was unfortunately kinda hazy that day, so the pictures do it absolutely no justice. I'm sure there are places with much better views of the alps in Austria/Germany/Switzerland (friends who also went to Garmisch and Interlaken would testify) but this is the best i got while i was in Europe. We walked around the markt area around the Dom, which we also went into. The ceiling of the cathedral was gorgeous. There was a girls choir there that day for some reason, which added some atmosphere. It may or may not have been because it was right after the pope had died.

Anyway, afterwards, we wanted to go rent bikes and bike along the river, but we couldn't for the life of us find any of the bike places given in our guide books. Ah well, we ended up just walking around the city. Went to the Mirabell gardens; it was probably still a little too early on in the year to see the garden at its peak, but it still lovely. Plus there was a "dwarf garden" (Zwergerlgarten) that involved something like 10 statues of dwarves which were quite a lot of fun to pose with. Then we went and had ourselves some kaffee und kuchen, did a little souvenir shopping and walked around Getreidegasse, which is the super-touristy but very cute main street of Salzburg where all the stores have wrought iron signs. Okay so didnt describe that very well, but you'll have to deal with it since i didnt take any pictures of it (this might be more helpful). Ended up grabbing some dinner at a cheap chinese restaurant (mistake, mistake! for any future travellers to germany/austria/much of europe, chinese food hardly ever good and chinese buffets usually even worse). Well, i suppose i can forgive myself since we were all hungry and it was all you can eat. Ah well.

The last day we took one of those cheesy horse carriage rides. It was like 30-something euros per carriage but we squeezed six people in so it didnt turn out being too much per person. The best part of the ride is that from when we left the Markt at the Dom to Mozartplatz, there was a poopsmith! I also went to Mozarts Geburtshaus (the birthplace and childhood apt of Mozart's family) and got some ice cream. I wanted to go to Mozarts Wohnhaus (where his family moved to in 1773) because at least according to one guide book its more interesting than the childhood home, but there was no time. Well, i suppose one full day and two half days in Salzburg isnt enough.

I feel kinda bad that I didn't travel more while I was in Europe. For the first month or so of the semester I was just panicking about classes and then after things calmed down, it was hard to find people to travel with or there was some conflict or another. And then july rolled around and i really didnt have time.

Well i've decided this entry's gone on long enough already, I'll write a separate one for Berlin and the rest of April.

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