The Hills are alive with the Sound of Music

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Our first journey alone

Double click on pictures to enlarge them

With a four day weekend in sight and eagerness to see other parts of Austria, all of the Drake students, minus one, joined forces and decided to conquer Salzburg. It just so happened that we all had Monday and Tuesday off, which made for perfect Sunday-Tuesday adventure. After booking our hostel, which only cost 15 euro per night, we decided that we better figure out the how the train system in Austria truly works. We have had our fair share of Wiener Neustadt-Vienna trips and manage not to pay for the subway system at all costs (not adviseable...only if your on a budget) Since we all could not speak or read German, we have to memorize long subway stops like Tscherttegasse, and used our small vocabulary of small words like "bitte" (please) "enchuligung" (excuse me) "zentrum" (town center) and "ich habe eine frage" (I have a question). That seemed to get us the attention and respect we needed to keep us in the right direction. After our 11:00 departure on Sunday, we had a 30 minute train ride to Vienna, and then our connection to Salzburg, which was another 3 hours. It was a gentle train ride, which lots of green countryside and some vineyards. From Vienna to Linz and most of the way to Salzburg, the land consists of gentle rolling hills, not like the high rising Alps that dominate middle and western Austria. Nonetheless, it was a nice train ride, and very relaxing....but still no snow! (I won’t complain) Once we rolled into the district of Salzburg, the landscape was dotted with Church steeples and towering Mountains. The city itself is very flat and sits on the banks Salzach River with the Fortress rising in the background. It is one of the most beautiful cities, and blew my breath away. Although it was cloudy, and is notoriously known for its rainy days, (rained off an on both days) the architecture and river scene is great in any weather. Shortly after dark we finally managed to find out hostel, after asking bus drivers and calling the reception office a few times. It was a nicely remodeled hostel nestled back in the woods, along with many loud scary black crows. (It was almost a scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Birds”) We met some interesting characters at during the night; a university student from Bulgaria, and an older couple from Linz, Austria. We also attempted to watch a VHS of the Sound of Music that didn’t turn out to work that well.


Our free breakfast was a nice start to our early morning. We wanted to get the most out of our day since it was our only full day in the city. We walked from our hostel to the center of town, which was a 25 minute walk. Our next journey up the stairs to the fortress began shortly after. The different views on the way up were absolutely great, and the fortress held lots of history from wars in the middle ages. Salzburg was famous for its Salt deposits, and acted as a trading stop for many European explorers, and of course being the town where Mozart was born. Everything throughout the city is dedicated to Mozart, and every store sells the Mozart chocolates. Eager to get to the other side of the river, we jumped on a few different hiking trails that led us up other hills that offered a great view of the city and the fortress. After a long day of hiking, we treated ourselves to Italian style pizza and nice cold Stiegl beers (Stiegl is Salzburgs famous beer). The rest of the night was spent laughing and enjoying each other company. It was a nice short trip, but we were all glad to make it back to Wiener Neustadt, because it is always chaotic to travel. After a nice jaunt to the Hofer (Aldi’s) for some groceries and a complete meal, I am very content with calling it a night!

Links to More Photos http://new.photos.yahoo.com/tyleroswood/#page1

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Photos

Clouds above
A nice shot with sun and dark clouds

Fortress view
A black and white shot with part of a lookout tower

Enhanced green
With enhanced green on the old camera

Mozarts Birthplace
Mozart was born here

Mountain Man
A nice shot of me and my hiking stick

Fortress
The fortress with the mountains in the background

Our hostel
Our six person hostel...one side of it

From town sqaure
A view from the bottom of the fortress

Comments

[b-ma]

freezing rain
there is awful weather in Iowa this last week. there are bad tornados in alabama now. all this bad stuff is happening because you arent here in the US. naw, im just kidding. I like your new pics. I hope you are able to get new Anna Nicole news.