the hills are alive

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so we made it through austria. austria, for starters, has great sausage. the kasekrainer is amazing. like a footlong brat with mozzarella all in the middle. i ate many.

we landed in salzburg, home of "the sound of music", and it was easy to see flying into the smallish town that the area was beautiful. it sits just north of the alps, and it was a beautiful city with great countryside feeling all around it. there is an imposing castle on top of a hill on the edge of the city and a nice old town. we found a hotel and since julie was meeting us in an hour or two after that, we decided to let mom rest (me too) and then just start seeing the city after she got there. she did, on a train from munich after flying over from salt lake. we went out to mirabelli gardens, where the kids dance and sign around a statue of pegasus in the movie. it was very nice. we walked around some of the old town, including the house where mozart was born. we ended up eating dinner in a very nice little italian restaurant built into a cliff. it was a very nice little city at night. the next day we saw more of the sights, took a tour of the house mozart grew up in until he was 17 years old and saw some of his letters, music, his piano, etc. we also took a little rive cruise, saw the nonnberg abbey where they filmed maria in the movie going to worship. they don't let you inside though, because it is still a working nunnery. finally we went up to the castle i mentioned to see the town.

we then took a train to vienna. vienna was pretty too. mom and julie went sightseeing while i was finding out how to get to the airport we were flying out of in slovakia that night. one thing about vienna is their subway is superb. it is all modern and many escalators and elevators. but more interesting is that it is such an honor system. there are no turnstalls, ticket takers, card readers. you are expected to buy a ticket and if u get caught without, u have a large fine. but there is no one to check at any station. pretty surprising to me.

that night was pretty long. we had to ride a bus to slovakia an hour or so away, then a short flight to frankfurt. we had a bed and breakfast aranged and the lady was late coming to get us and she spoke no english. but we made it. a nice little house in the countryside.

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