So long, farewell, auf wiedersehen, goodbye

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Usually my entries are plain on travel days - I left such and such a place to go here. I arrived. That’s it. Well, I won’t do that here. I dedicate this entry to Salzburg and the amazing time I had there.

When I left on this trip, I had highly doubted that any spot I would visit would ever come close to beating some of the cities in Italy I visited two years ago. I had enjoyed that trip immensely; probably some of it was due to it being my first trip abroad. But it’s still tough to beat Italy and that’s not just me talking. But, in Salzburg, I discovered a place that certainly rivals it.

Salzburg was a place that was only on my list due first to a recommendation from my Mom as she went there on a high school trip years ago and then reinforced by a couple backpackers along the way. They had all hyped up the beauty and fun to be found there and I was thinking there was no way the city could live up to the claims. They were right. I was wrong.

All the traveling stars aligned perfectly for my stay there. I met a bunch of great people, had a wonderful place to stay, experienced great weather and had so many options on things to do while in and around the city. There, I experienced my first soccer game, saw breathtaking views from the Eagle’s Nest, revisited several fun weeks in high school when I was in the pit when we performed The Sound of Music and met a lot of great people, including Chris, Cameron, Sean and Linus. I also loved the kebabs.

The people of the city were as nice as could be, too. They appreciated that their number one industry (by far) is tourism. They were very helpful and friendly to all the tourists, even those of us who knew very few German words.

Most of all, I was awe-inspired by the sheer beauty of the mix of lakes, fields and mountains and how they all blended together like a work of art. The area is clearly one of God’s masterpieces.

For those reasons, I had a bit of trouble leaving this morning. I arrived at the train station around 9:30, awaiting a series of trains that would eventually get me to Cesky Krumlov in the Bohemian region of the Czech Republic.

At the train station, I ran into Sean who was awaiting his train to Vienna. We chatted for a bit and, for the first time, discussed our travel plans rather than all the great things Salzburg has to offer. We pretty much have similar routes planned except we’re going in opposite directions. Maybe we’ll run into each other along the way.

I caught my first train to Linz without a problem. The next train was to Cesky Budejovice. Fortunately I knew the time I was scheduled to arrive or I would have gone right past it. All of the train stations thus far have actually looked like train stations. This one looked like a garage along the side of the railroad tracks. We had just passed another Cesky Budejovice station a few minutes before but it had different initials. I knew I must be close. I started gathering my things and before I knew it we had stopped. While looking out the window to see if this was the right stop and finally deciding it was I had almost missed getting off. It stopped for about 20 seconds. I had to hop off the slowly moving train as it pulled away.

I had some time to kill and since there wasn’t a real station, I had to walk into town to kill it. I figured I should get some local currency so I found a bank. The exchange rate for Czech Korunas is about 1 USD = 17 CHK. So I took out CHK2,000 thinking it would give me the equivalent of $120. Plenty to get me through a few days in a cheap country. Well, like a lot of European machines, I’m discovering, if you ask for a set amount and there is a bill for that amount, it will give you that bill. So now I’m walking around with only one piece of Czech currency and that piece is larger than a $100 bill.

I got back to the train station and waited about an hour outside for the next train. That train was more of a glorified bus than a train. I could hear the diesel train rev its engine to get moving.

Along the way we had numerous stops. These stops had stations that made the Cesky Budejovice one look like Grand Central. Some of them looked like tool sheds. I had no idea how I would find the one I was going to.

About 10 minutes before the scheduled arrival, two college aged girls took seats by me. They were wearing Minnesota Twins shirts and I thought I heard English. They were in fact from the US and were studying abroad in Prague. They were with a group that was heading to Cesky Krumlov for the weekend so I had no trouble finding my stop.

When we got there, I caught a bus, with another woman paying the equivalent of about 50 cents for the trip since all I had was my big bill. Eventually we made it into town and I found my hostel along the river.

I originally thought I’d arrive around 8:30 but actually got in at 7:00. No one was here to let me in. So I found a bar next door and had dinner and a few dark beers. The beers were Budweiser but were from Budvar, the Czech version. They were delicious. And the fact that they cost under $2 a piece made them even better.

I settled into the hostel tonight and now have Stars Wars IV (Krieg der Stern) on in some language I can’t understand. The place is nice but very quiet. And the town, from what I could tell, is beautiful. It is supposed to be the prettiest small town in the world. We’ll see about that tomorrow.

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Photos

Ceske Budejovice
This station looked more like a garage than an actual train station. There wasn't even an attendant.