Salzburg

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Last year for Christmas, I went to the markets in Vienna. Over the summer I spent one rainy and amazing day in Salzburg. I wanted to go back. On Friday afternoon, Kathleen and I left school and got on a train. On the way there we listened to and discussed the latest episode of Serial (obsessed). When we got to Salzburg it was dark because December in Europe is generally dark. After taking the wrong bus, taking the right bus, and wandering around a lot, we finally found our couch surfer Jojo (pronounced Yo-yo). We went back to his house, which felt like a ski lodge. There was a super nice Canadian couple, so we hung out with them that evening and went to bed early.

In the morning we got up and headed straight into the city. The goal was Christmas markets. All of the Christmas markets. But also to see Salzburg too. We had a map that laid out all the markets in the city, and we wanted to hit up as many as we could. Unfortunately, some of them were too far outside of town. We first went up to the castle because there's only so much daylight, and I hadn't been up there when I first went to Salzburg (or as we called it the whole time, Saltyburg). We had to pay a couple of euros to get in, but... Christmas market! And cool views. Everyone was super nice, there was great mulled wine, and I bought some whisky chocolate for dad. There was also a sled with a reindeer that was actually a unicorn that we named Bartholomew. Very successful first market. We went back down the hill so I could show Kathleen the do-re-mi gardens. But they were closed due to either a real wedding photoshoot, a fake wedding photoshoot, or not summer. The weird statue garden was closed too. Tragic.

As we walked away from the garden translating the Cupid Shuffle into Hungarian, we found another Christmas market! This one was on a little stretch of sidewalk, and it was beautiful. So many warm colors and hot wine and sheepskin things and coffee mugs. Kathleen and I bought a mug each and spent a while looking at wool socks and incense holders.

We made our way back to the main market, which was lovely, but CROWDED. We watched some people ice skate for a while, warmed our hands by a fire, and ate some unbelievable apple pancake mush creation. And, of course, more hot wine. When we got chilly, we stopped into a restaurant for soup, and then we went right back out into the world. We found one more market (this makes 4) that was more artsy than the others. But...expensive. On our way out of that one and on our way back to the big one, we stopped to listen to a brass quartet play under lit up trees. It was amazing. As we walked around the big market (which had gotten even MORE crowded), we started to hear music playing from somewhere. We looked around and realized that different people were playing from roofs and churches around the square. It was wicked cool. I went to a booth to buy mom a Christmas present, and when I went to ask the lady about it, I realized she was speaking Hungarian to a couple. I chimed in with my Hungarian to the utter amazement of everyone (not many blonde Hungarians), and ended up buying mom a teapot scent thing.

Kathleen and I went to bed early. 4 Christmas markets is a lot. So good.

Sunday morning we woke up, packed our bags, and headed into the city. We had a couple of hours before our train, so we found a great breakfast place with live music. Then we got on the train for the 6 hour journey home. We were seated in 2 of 4 seats surrounding a table and spent the first 3 hours of the journey reading our books quietly and chatting. Kathleen had her foot up on HER OWN SEAT and wasn't bothering anyone, and it was all pleasant. Then the train pulled into Vienna, and the hurricane arrived. Our RUDE awakening back into Hungarian society.

An old Hungarian woman got on the train with her 5-year-old grandson. Before she even sat down, she yelled at Kathleen to get her foot off the seat, saying, "you don't know where that's been." Then she and her grandson sat down across from us. She gave her grandson an iPad, and put a movie on for him. On full volume. With no headphones. A few minutes into the ride, her grandson was standing on his seat in his socks. NO PROBLEMS THERE. She ALSO took her giant suitcase off the rack and put it under our table with shared legroom. Welcome back to Hungary.

All in all it was a pleasant trip. Kind of sick of these coming back stories, though.

Cheers!

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