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Looking down on Hallstatt
A wee Austrian town with 760 permanent residentsGold with the extraordinary picturesque location on the shores of the Hallstatter See (lake) and white gold with the salt mine - another Unesco World Heritage site and one that provided great wealth to the Habsburgs. Mind blowing history that we literally delved right into going 400 metres underground into the 7000 year old salt mine that continues to produce salt today. Our journey included a few gotta close my eyes moments, the steep funicular railway ride up the outside of the mountain, the photo opportunity on the skywalk, hooning down two steep wooden miners slides - the sisters beating Tim by 0.8 of a kilometre reaching exactly 30k per hour, Karen's near suffocation event (did the older sister really hold on that tight?) and finally sitting on a wooden bench (a miners train) hurtling along at breakneck speed back to the surface, with minimal space top and sides. No safety equipment was provided and minimal instructions were given, other than miners uniforms to wear - prison style uniforms with extra padding on the pants for sliding down the slides and we would do it all again tomorrow if we had the chance. We recalled Pompeii blowing us away in Italy
Karen on tour guide duties
Taking us to board the funicular up to the salt mine on our 2014 trip and felt the same in Hallstatt, where hi-tech multimedia is used to great effect to help tell the history of the 30 kilometres of hand dug tunnels, that date back 3000 years. The grande finale being the new Bronze Age Theatre in a subterranean chamber 400 metres below the surface at a chilly 8 degrees. With salt being a great preserver, the artifacts are in amazing condition, including a prehistoric set of wooden stairs, the oldest in Europe. No surprise that rubbing you finger on the walls and then licking it resulted in a very salty taste.
We decided we were fine with just reading the history of the 1,045 ancient burials found on this site and didn't need to view the collection of 'elaborately decorated skulls with the individuals name, profession and date of birth inscribed on them'. Instead we opted to descend the mountain down the zigzag paths so we could really enjoy the endless spectacular views on the way down and our much anticipated lunch back down at the lakefront, from a cafe housed in a 700 year old building. We followed this up with a leisurely wander around the gorgeous resort
Coal miner pointing the way
The jackets have 29 buttons in memory of Patron Saint Barbara who was decapitated by her father at the age of 29 because she converted to Christianity. Top 3 buttons left undone in recognition of the 3 years she was a Christian. town where Kaiser Franz Joseph (the second to last emperor of the Habsburg's reign) preferred to holiday. The Kaiser particularly enjoyed 'hiking and hunting' in the area whilst being carried around in a sedan chair - a bit of a misnomer there!
Our Airbnb for the night was an apartment in a large ski resort hotel in a tiny ski village at Bad Goisern.
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