The hills were alive!
In and around Salzburg, Austria
This weekend, the hills were indeed alive with the sound of music! Steven, Andrea, Bill, and I packed up our stuff and headed to Salzburg, Austria for the weekend. We left right after school on Friday in our big, silver, automatic, Chrysler minivan. Mapquest said it would be a little over five hours, but there was quite a bit of traffic on the autobahn right before Munich.
We got to Salzburg around 11:00 pm, and unfortunately our hostel had already closed its doors for the night. Our new location for the weekend was not quite as unfortunate! Andrea and I ended up sweet talking our way into this nice hotel, with all four of us staying in one room with a gourmet breakfast for 95 euro/night, cheaper than the hostel!
By the time we arrived and found a hotel after walking the streets, we were all very pooped, and Andrea and I went to bed. The boys returned a bit later after satisfying their hunger with some Austrian kebabs. Those dang kebab places are everywhere!
Saturday morning, Steven, Andrea, and I got up for a 9:30 Sound of Music Tour throughout Salzburg and a beautiful neighboring city. Steven was not nearly as excited as Andrea and I, but by the end, he was singing a different tune. The tour started in Salzburg a block down from our hotel. We made a couple stops, proceeded through the mountains and lakes area, then stopped at a gorgeous little town in the mountains where the church of the wedding scene was filmed. Overall, this trip was definitely worth the 35 euro we each paid, and needless to say, all of our camera batteries were dead by the time we returned to our hotel.
After that tour, we climbed the mountain to reach the large and impressive Festung Hohensalzburg, which is the largest medieval fortress remaining in Europe. Not only is the size breathtaking, but the history is unique, and the view is indescribable. We spent a couple hours just walking through the fortress, taking an audio tour, and enjoying the view. And the museum and stores inside were closed! I can only imagine how much time we would have spent in there had more been open.
After taking a leisurely walk back to the hotel, the whole gang went out for a delicious goodbye dinner! It was hard to avoid the plethora of kebab places, but somehow we did. There was a nice looking Pasta and Vino place less than a block down from our hotel that we stopped in. We were discouraged when we walked in because there were no seats available. At first, the main host, Alfonso, turned us away. But then his lively and colorful counterpart, Vincenzo, insisted that we stay and that I follow him. The four of us followed into the tiny kitchen where we got a VIP table with VIP treatment! It was a little weird at first eating privately in the kitchen, but it was so much fun, and the food and wine was SO delicious!
After dinner, we wanted to check out a biergarten, which I don’t think any of us have been to. We were misinformed by Alfonso and unfortunately arrived after it had already closed. We decided to climb a random large hill/small mountain instead. No view is a bad view in Salzburg, and like always, it was gorgeous, especially with the city lights below. After taking that in for a while, we walked back down, went home, and went to bed.
Sunday morning, we checked out, packed up, then headed to a church a block down from our hotel. (Are you starting to see why we loved this hotel so much?) It was a nice, big….cold….church. Apparently, they don’t heat their churches in Austria. Even though I couldn’t understand it, it was a very nice service, and I am glad that we went before we headed out.
The ride home was as beautiful as ever. We had blue skies speckled with fluffy white clouds, cascading across the snowy mountain tops during the entire ride home…until Germany, of course! We made it home much faster than we got there and are already missing it terribly.
Route taken and entries by Real Traveler Liz Hamilton
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