Salzburg

Comments by Lucy in italics
Day 1 – 24 December
Up and onto the train to Salzburg. Took about three and a half hours across snow covered hills and towns. We caught the bus to our accommodation which was a nice little B&B with a stout Frau as our hostess.

We walked the 20 minutes into town but didn’t realise that Christmas Eve is the big event in Europe, so most things were closed. In the end we found a nice little café for dinner – toasted sandwiches and pizza bread! After this simple meal (good wine however), discovered that the buildings are shadowed by strikingly menacing looking cliffs, that seem to hang over the village. Spooks in the dark. Stunning during the day.

Day 2 – 25 December
Over breakfast we met a nice Aussie couple who had got engaged the night before on a bridge over the town river – very romantic. We went to Christmas mass in the gorgeous Cathedral, it’s such a light and airy cathedral. Kinda boring outside, but the interior architecture and art is amazing. Anyway, the mass took over an hour and a half, entirely in German of course – with all the songs sung by a full choir and orchestra. The music was beautiful.

After a lunch of bratwurst mit sauerkraut we headed up to the Hohen Salzburg which is a massive fortress on a hill in the middle of the town. Breathtaking views, of which I have about 40 photos!



Dropped home to have a Christmas afternoon tea, make a snowman and open a few presents, then straight back into town for a Mozart dinner. A nice meal, with live music by a string quartet and a couple of opera singers. Very cultured. Was a nice evening, and we met a lovely English couple who have been living in Vienna for a few years. (They said we made their night…ohhhhhh).

My first white Christmas and Lucy’s second, apparently it only happens once every five years or so in Salzburg, so we were very lucky.

Day 3 – 26 December
Fell out of bed far too early to go on the Sound of Music tour with a great tour guide. We went to the back of the Captain’s house (the front is miles away on a different building), with the lake - which was frozen over. We saw the nun’s abbey, Leisel and Ralph’s gazebo, the church where Maria and the Captain got married, danced around the Pegasus fountain and sang Doe Rei Mi atop a mountain terrace. We also learnt a few Hollywood truth-benders, such as the real Von Trapp children have completely different names. But don’t want to ruin the movie for you completely. Best story was that Gretal got very chubby on Austrian pastries by the end of filming in Austria and Christopher Plummer refused to carry her, so the girl he’s carrying on his back in the escape scene is a completely different actress!

Finished off the day with a nice meal in a pub opposite our B&B.

Ralph and Leisel's gazebo

Day 4 – 27 December
Climbed (actually we used an elevator) to the top of Monk Mountain and enjoyed a bit more of the view, then walked around the beautiful park that’s up there. Had a few more snowball fights and took more photos. Dropped down into town to send a few postcards, then had some lunch before going to Mozart’s birth house and had a look at the museum there. Mostly only enthusiast’s stuff like locks of his hair, but there were some interesting displays on his life and the times he lived in.