Salt mines and soccer

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This morning I embarked on my final tour in Salzburg - the salt mine tour. Salzburg rose in size and stature to a city-state hundreds of years ago when salt was discovered deep below the earth’s surface. Salzburg and its main river were even named based upon the salt extraction and trade.

The salt deposits were the result of a salt lake having evaporated and then covered by land over thousands of years. The salt mine tour took us through the extraction process.

The trip down was with a host of people going on the Eagle’s Nest tour I did the other day. The weather was good again so they would certainly have great views. Meanwhile, I joined a group that put on miners suits and rode a railcar into the earth.

After our initial ride through a long, dark tunnel, where the claustrophobic guests apparently had a bit of trouble, we arrived at our first stop where we were apprised of the history of the salt formation. Then, in groups of three and four, we rode down a slide to get to the level below. The slide was a lot of fun. I felt like a kid again.

We learned more about the drilling process, filling of the hole with water, extraction of the salt, shipping of the salt and the history of the process. We then rode down another slide, this one even longer, to the final level where we rode in a boat across fully saturated salt brine. We had a taste of the brine at the end and, naturally, it tasted quite salty.

The tour wrapped up with a train ride back out. It was interesting and fun (especially the slides).

I had some time to kill before the others got back so I hiked on my own around the immediate area. I took a trail up and through a tunnel, arriving in front of some Bavarian homes and a farm with sheep and cows kept in a barn. Their loud mooing gave them away. I also went through some of the thick forest behind the salt mine tour facility.

After a brief stop to take some pictures in the Bavarian Alps, we arrived back in the center of Salzburg. I walked around the city again as I gradually made my way back to the hostel. On the way I picked up another pretzel (this time a nut pretzel) from the market and found one of the two sellers of the blue Mozartkugel balls nearby. I tried one of the blue balls and there was a huge difference - these were great! The dark chocolate melts in your mouth and leaves some sort of chewy goodness.

Finally, I made one last stop at my kebab guy. I went for one last kebab and the guy started pointing at the rotisserie chicken he had cooking. He recommended I try it so I went with it. Very good but it wasn’t a kebab. I’ll have to find a way to get a kebab tomorrow morning.

I hung out at the hostel early this evening and eventually ran into Chris after he finished his busy day of touring. He mentioned that there was a soccer game in town tonight and asked if I wanted to go. Of course. I’ve wanted to catch a game over here. This would be a first soccer match for us both.

We rode the bus out and caught a cab the rest of the way. The game started at 7:00 and we got there about 15 minutes late. On our way in we could hear the crowd roaring as the Salzburg team scored a goal. When we made it through the gates we saw Salzburg was winning 1-0 over Villereal.

We had opted for the cheapest seats available and when we tried to find them, one of the stadium workers told us to just sit anywhere. There were a whole bunch of seats in the first few rows at the home end of the field and we took a couple of those.

The stadium holds about 20,000 people and was maybe half full. But the fans were so intense that it sounded like there were 30-40,000. Two men that looked like rappers held microphones and guided the rowdiest section of the crowd in chants, cheers and clapping. One of the fans had a giant flag that he waved back and forth in the front rows.

At one point, the crowd started to whistle loudly. Chris told me this is the European boo. It’s a bit annoying and really doesn’t have the same effect as the Philly belly boo.

Late in the game, Salzburg scored to make it 2-0. The crowd erupted as this would pretty much ensure a victory. It did and after the game the team celebrated as if it had just won a major championship. The coach acknowledged the support of the fans and the players bowed to the loud section of the crowd. Then the players started heading our way. I figured it was to sign autographs. Nope. They started running around the perimeter and giving high fives to all the fans who had come to support them.

This spectacle was pretty amazing. While this was certainly very fan friendly, I couldn’t imagine this happening in American professional sports even if the players wanted to. The mentality that the team hasn’t won anything important yet is too pervasive.

My first soccer game was a lot of fun. I would love to go see what a big game is like. Or at least one featuring one or two of the premier teams.

Tomorrow I leave Salzburg to go to Cesky Krumlov in the Bohemian region of the Czech Republic.

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Photos

Miner outfit
Me with my miner outfit on.

Sheep
Sheep laying on a Bavarian hill.

Bavarian home
A Bavarian home behind the salt mine tour facility.

Hiking trail
One of the trails I hiked on behind the salt mine tour facility.