The hills are alive....and just as beautiful as I expected!

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Salzburg

I arrived in Salzburg with my friends from Grunau, Jedda and Ebonee. Although it was raining, we decided to make the most of the time we had and head into the old town to see the sights. As we atarted walking into town it poured with rain and we all considered whether it really was a good idea, but luckily the sights of Salzburg town out weighed us getting drenched. Jedda and Eb had not yet tried the sachetorte cake, which is a traditionally Austrian dessert so we began by looking through all of the cafe's for a place to try it. I was almost immediately distracted by a clothes shop which sold almlst exclusively, the beautiful traditional gowns, dirndls. The dresses and corset-like tops are made with intricately embroidered details and the bright colours! I was overawed and completely in love! We had a mission for cake though so I put it on my list to come back to.

That was until we got distracted again...by eggs. Yes although this sounds crazy, there was a whole store (a big one) dedicated to painted and decorated eggs. If you had a childhood anything like mine, you and your mum poked tiny holes in the top and bottom of a fresh egg and blew out all the inside yolk and egg white and then decorated it for Easter. Well this particular shop in Austria took this idea to a whole new level. It was incredible. I was speechless at how ornate and beautiful the eggs had been painted, decorated and put together. While we were walking around the store gushing in amazement, we ran into an American lady who told us that Easter is a bigger celebration here than Christmas and people collect a dead branch and then hang their eggs up on the branches. There was even a whole section near the back of the shop dedicated to Christmas eggs. I would have loved to purchase some as souvineers but the likelihood of me getting them home in one piece was far too small for me to risk damaging something so delicate. So I took an inordinate amount of photos instead. Hopefully by my photos you can appreciate the delicate hand painted work on each of these eggs.

Just up the road it was still spitting so we found a cafe which had sachetorte and also Mozart cake, which looked very similar but had layers of sponge instead of chocolate and half a Mozart ball on top. Mozart balls are all over Salzburg, as this was where he was born and there is like size posters and Mozart souvineers and chocolates absolutely everywhere! Jedda ordered the traditional and I got a slice of Mozart and we swapped to experience both. Best Cake Ever. I already loved Mozart for his music, but the cake and the chocolate....divine. Haha Definately what we needed after plodding around in the rain.

When we left it had stopped raining so we went to check out the sights. We saw the fountain featured in The Sound of Music, Mozart's statue, museums, churches (galore), and a massive square which looked like it would be full of markets if it wasn't raining. The fort which sits on the biggest hill and vantage point of Salzburg was our next destination but we wandered the wrong way and instead found the Salzburg waterwheel which is still in its original working condition and is used, as it was whenit was first built, to provide energy for a bakery! Jedda and I were quite excited to try the product and tried to ask the baker (in very bad German) if we could buy a small roll. We ended up sharing a sweet loaf which was kind of like a sweet crossaint but with saltanas, and it was amazingly good eating! Salzburg was proving to be an excellent town to eat.

We gave up looking for the entrancd to the fort and instead wandered through the cemetary. It was decorated in the same way as the cemetary at Grunau, so I must guess that Austrians simply know how to make beautiful, peaceful cemetary's. It was very enjoyable to walk through and admire the flowers. We even found some tombs built into the wall of the mountain in front of us that we decided we would return to the following day. We wandered through more of the town, admiring the many, many churches and old buildings. Salzburg is another town which looks to be straight out of a fairytale. Amazing, and definately a favourite from my trip so far.

We found a salt shop next, Salzburg, comes from the German word for salt. So I bought some interesting cooking salt as a gift and we moved on to the markets. Wow. Now some of you are no doubt thinking, yes Amanda, another market, we already know you love markets. But these markets had donuts in the shape of a giant pretzel...I'm talking huge! Like the size of my head. Oh my goodness, I love donuts, but I love giant sugary donuts the size of my head that I bought from a market in a town out of a fairy tale EVEN MORE! Definately best donut so far (and I've tried at least one or two in most cities). A fellow traveller did tell me that eating one donu is equal to eating a whole loaf of bread, but I am still trying to block their voices out of my head. :-)

There was also cheese, ham, fruit and a million other yummies, and often the stall would have a taster before you bought anything. Markets with tasters are by far my favourite. Eb and Jedda eventually dragged me away from the markets only to be distracted by more and more dirndl stores which were so amazing, and expensive! We wandered without a map (my favourite kind of town exploration) and discovered a church and a huge horse mural which was stunning. We also discovered a chocolate shop which was super awesome as it also had taste testers! Tired and happy we decided to have dinner at a vegetarian restaurant before returning to the hostel. Jedda is a vego and Eb and I are not so it was definately a new experience for us, not finding meat anywhere on the menu. However, I must say it was very tastey and delicious! I am definately not converted though.

The following day I had booked a morming tour of Eagles Nest, Hitler's birthday present from Austria which was a giant house / lookout up on a mountain peak. The weather was still a little grey and my fellow busabouters, two brothers from Australia, were also a little worried about what kind of view we would get. I was positive! But mistaken. Haha We caught a tour bus with a crazy Austrian guide who kept yelling at us to "geet on zee bus, geet on zee bus, hurry, hurry......hurry, hurry" he did tell us various interesting historical facts but there was definately no gap in conversation....he ould talk under water. He also gave us instructions for about 5 mins on how to exit the bus, talking in great detail about steps, then how to cross the road and enter the new bus via the doors that would open for us. I lost interest at this point, being talked to like I am 4 really doesn't do it for me!

Eagles nest entrance was cool, a long and very cold tunnel with snow all around on the outside, which led to the brass elevator which took us up to Eagle's nest. From there we could see miles and miles of......wait for it.......mist. Just mist, nothing but mist, for miles and bl***y miles. We laughed, as it was either laugh or cry as we had just paid a ridiculous sum of money for a tour where we saw absolutely nothing of the view. We did have the pleasue of crunching through the snow up to the slightly higher peak where there is a giant Chrisitian cross with an edelweiss flower on it. Where we could see more mist, and infact the building had disappeared in a shrowed of more mist. But the inside of the building was nice. Had a bustling restaurant inside (which sold delicious but way too rich sachetorte, don't ask why I know this...my food baby is 2 months in the making and growing by the day). Also had a giant fireplace inside which was made from Italian marble and there was another section of the building which had pictures of how it was all made and photos from Hitler's first entry. In fact he didn't use the building much, his partner used it more than he did, but I could imagine the views would have been amazing.

From there we picked up the people who had done the salt mines in the morning and headed into the local town of Berchdesgarten to have lunch at a cafe and explore the shops. I found yet another dirndl shop and drooled some more over the dresses. In the afternoon I headed off to the salt mines on my own as my fellow busabouter's had finished their tour. We got dressed up in crazy traditional miners gear, which was very unflattering and unfashionable. Haha But when hopping on the tiny mine train that would take us into the mines I met Jack and Carol, an American couple. Jack has been living in Switzerland for many years and Carol is an art teacher in the US. Both were very well travelled and very interesting to speak to, so I immediately felt at home having new friends. Our tour was on audio guide and it was quite interesting the way they got the salt out of the mines. We got to go on a traditional miner's slide down to the lower levels, which was super fast because I had Carol and then Jack behind me. Nothing like a bit of adrenalin! j you are not allowed to take any photos in the mines, I managed a very sneaky one of the lake which I included but mostly the guide was watching us too closely. Unfortnately my audio guide died about half way through the tour and I had to wait behind after the other people had heard the tour in German, to then hear it in English so that was a little annoying for the other tour members.

I really enjoyed the information that they gave us on the salt mines tour but their delivery was very touristy with light shows and an almost child-friendly approach to the delivery. I would have liked something a little more intellectual, but it was interesting, all the same. Our next stop was a giant lake not too far away called Kings Lake. I past a number of dirndl shops but we were on a mission to get to "artists point" which apparently had amazing views of the lake. Unfortnately the sky was not on our side today and it began to rain, quite seriously. I got my photo of the lake and then Jack and I followed sensible Carol who headed off before the rain set in, to look at the tourist shops before we had to be back on the bus. At this point, the calls of the pretty dirndl's had become too much for me to bear. I followed the cries of a particually beautiful dress into a shop full of pretties and proceeded to, not very convincingly, tell myself I didn't need one. Of course that pretty little fashion angel that whispers in my ear every time I visit cue, had had nothing to say for a LONG time, so her screams to "Buy that Dirndl!" were unbearable, and I accidently slipped and walked into the store. Where of course I found a red checked dress with an aqua blue apron, 3.... Yes not 2 but 3 very practical pockets...AND....deer embroidered as decoration! Deer! It was meant to be! It was a SIGN! My family used to run our own deer farm, for those who don't know.

Carol said she also used to wear hers to school for fun, so I figured I could get away with it to! :-) My credit card was in a little bit of pain at this point so I double bagged my new friend and headed out to the torrential downpour...I had an umbrella but due to the rain and wind hitting me sideways from every direction, I got to the bus completely drenched and 2 mins late. Luckily Carol was gallant enough to hold the bus for me (she said she would even act out the "Oh I have fallen up the stairs" scenario if need be for me! Our final stop was back to the town we had lunch in and Carol and I headed off to see the shops. We found an amazing old lady who hand painted tiny tooth fairy boxes (boxes for teeth, not the fairy's ;-)) her shop rent is paid for by the goverment as there is so few traditional shops making and painting decorations in this way. She even makes her own paints from scratch! She also has a 90 year old lady come in for 2-3 hours per day to paint the intricate work as she had done it since she was a child and is still the best. Apparently she likes talking to all the customers too, Carol and I were sad we missed her. I bought an egg and Carol got a tiny painted bird.

Tired but happy I wandered back to my hostel for dinner and a movie with Ebonee and Jedda. It was none other than..."The Sound of Music!" haha so fitting for Salzburg. It never gets old, I always find something new I haven't seen before. I also always forget how long it is. I was in study preparation for my following day tour - The Sound of Music Tour! Haha I was on my own for this one so I heartily enjoyed the sing-a-longs and made a new friend, Marie, from Canada who was also a solo traveller. We visited all the main sights from the film, the lake and "back" view of the Von Trapp family house (which is a different place from the front of the house!). The lake itself is completely man made, the original owner of the villa heard that all mansions worth their salt had lakes, so he cleared his land and put in a lake! Haha It was very picturesque and beautiful with swans and ducklings floating around acting like media tarts for our photos.

From there we visited the glass gazebo which is actually on a different property than it was originally filmed, due to way too many tourists trampling the grass around it singing "I am sixteen, going on seventeen..." and skipping and making puppy dog eyes at an imaginary Rolf. I of course was far too composed for this behaviour....I danced like a crazy person also. We had a dance doen the lane from the song "I have confidence" which does infact lead to the front of the VonTrapp house but it looks much smaller than I expected, also we saw it from quite a distance...and it is now a music conservatorium, so perhaps I could study in Salzburg?! Haha We took a long drive out into the lake districts of Salzburg and visited the church where Maria and Georg got married, it was chosen for the extreme height of the ceiling so that the camera angles could be seen from above. It was an impressive church, the vacuume cleaning lady did not quite see the romance of all of us trapsing through leaving her a mess though. Marie and I sat outside and ate our picnic lunch and then grabbed dessert at a local bakery. I got the most deliciously naughty strawberry butterfly cupcake and we went to a nearby park which overlooked the lake and surrounding mountains to enjoy our sweets.

When we returned to Salzburg Marie and I wandered through the Mirabell gardens which are also featured in the film and Marie had not yet seen Salzburg town so we went in to see the eggs, Dirndyls and of course Marie also had to experience the famous Sachdtorte! I obliged by eating another slice....how often am I going to be able to eat sachetorte really! The clouds by now had turned a rather disappointing green colour and were rolling in to surround the city. We had gotten caught previously so Marie needed to get back to the hostel and I wanted to see the view from the Fort and its museum so we split just in time for me to catch the venicular up to a spectacular view of the storm rolling in around me. I had about 3 minutes to take photos before jt started to pour cats and dogs. It was a serious cacophony of rain, hail, thunder and lightening so I was glad to be indoors in the Fort, which had already been resisting this kind if weather for a few 100 years.

Inside there was a maionette museum, Roman ruins, and 3 floors of history to absorb while the rain and hail continued outside. I do not often choose art galleries or museums over the outside world but during a thunder storm is a perfect place to relax and read up on the interesting histories. Inside the many floors of the museum there were rooms for royalty, kitchens, armouries, the treasury, torture devices, royal robes, royal bedroom furniture and even a musical museum. After 2-3 hours of rain, history was getting old (pun intended). So I left the museum for a quick rain dash to the cafe for a quiet sit down and a cup of tea. The view of Salzburg and its surrounding mountains after the rain was glorious. The 360 degree view from the top didn't hurt either! It truely looked like something out of a story book or doll's house. The eagle's nest was still enschrouded in cloud so I hope that not too many tourists had take the tour during the storm.

My last evening was spent with the lovley Jack and Carol who invited me to dinner at their local eating hole, the Golden Duck. The food was amazing, and it was nice to sit and chat with world travellers, as botb Jack and Carol have been many places around the globe. We had a scrumptious dessert which was shaped like the 3 mountains surrounding Salzburg, covered in rasberry sauce. It was extremely sweet, so someting like a meringue but with the crispy edge. I made it through two of the mountains but couldn't make it to the third, I must not be much of a hiker! Haha (Daggy Dad joke...sorry) Jack and Carol's friend who looked after them in the hotel also came to see them to say hi, and none of us realised but she also paid for all of our dinners! Amazing hospitality! I had an incredible time in Salzburg and would love to return to see more of the musical side of this beautiful city.

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