A nearly-graduate's guide to Europe: The Rolling Hills of Salzburg

A few friends and I took a trip to Salzburg this past weekend, which turned out to be the best time I've had so far on this trip abroad. Of course, in order to prep for this little excursion, we watched The Sound of Music on Thursday. I forgot how awesome that movie was. Anywho, we jumped on a train right after class on Friday and made the journey through Austria's countryside.

Arriving in Salzburg, we dropped off our stuff at the Hostel (the Yoho if you're ever in Salzburg, it's an excellent place that's cheap, clean and very safe) and set off to wander around the city. And of course what's the first thing I do? Climb a tree of course.

Well now that that's out of the way, back to the city. How many scenes from The Sound of Music can you identify in this picture?

If you guessed 3, you're right! I think, unless I'm forgetting something. I probably am. The stairs in the foreground are where Maria and the kids were singing the Do Re Mi song and jumping up and down the stairs. The fountain in the middle is where they were running around in a circle, and in the back you can see the little tunnel the kids were running through at one point. Really pretty gardens too.

Life is good.

Continuing on, we meandered on over to the river and saw a great cityscape. Salzburg is everything I was expecting from this trip, a semi-small city with lots of character and history. You can walk across the entire city (the main part) in a little under an hour (we did, more than once).

As dusk settled in, we went to the foot of one of the two of Salzburg's "mountains" (I'm sorry Salzburg, but 650m does not make a mountain) and searched for Salzburg's famed Augustiner Bräu brewery and beer garden. A good idea, as it turned out to be heaven on earth.

Entire liters of really, really good beer as well as some extremely good food. My meal consisted of a mug and half of a grilled hen. On the way home when it was pretty late and very dark, we were treated to a lightning storm off in the distance. Warm, breezy night, no rain and a far off storm made for some great memories and awesome pictures.

Now on to the highlight of the trip: The Sound of Music bike tour. 3.5 hours through the city and outskirts of Salzburg, noting important locales and enjoying the unbelievable scenery.

Starting off

Some horse murals behind a fountain, there is a scene where Maria is leading the children through the city featuring this location

This is the graveyard that inspired the graveyard scene near the end of the movie where the von Trapps are hiding from the Nazis. Unfortunately they weren't allowed to film in this cemetery so they had to create a new one in a studio. Unfortunate, because the real one is really, really cool.

Now this is one of my favorite pictures I took on this trip. This, combined with the one with the field that I'll get to in a second, is why Salzburg is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been.

Amazing.

Linnea at the gate of the Monastery where Maria was staying in the movie

Me, Linnea, Nancy, Robert. Dream Team.

The field picture I mentioned earlier. Amazing

Our whole bike tour group

You may recognize this as the back of the von Trapp house. This was where Maria and the kids fell into the lake from the canoe, while the Captain and Baroness looked on from the patio

Munching on a pear

The famous gazebo. Closed now because too many stupid people tried to recreate the dancing scene with Liesl and Rolfe and ended up breaking their legs. Yeah.

And that concludes the bike tour. So much fun. But fear not! There is still plenty of Salzburg to see. But first, some down time resting at the hostel.

Then a little play time with the horse statue where Maria splashes water back at the fountain on her way to the von Trapp's.

Town square with a view of the fortress, our next destination

Halfway up, taking a break on the wall overlooking the city

Top of the fortress, looking out over the city and countryside

Unfortunately we didn't get much time up at the fortress. We saw a storm brewing on the horizon that sped toward us at a ridiculous speed, so we got out of there quick. Where to go to wait out the storm? Better go back to the beer garden!

My kind of place

The next day we decided to climb one of the mountains in the city. We wandered through the back roads rarely explored by tourists and saw some really nice houses. Where I will be moving someday. Also found this excellent car, very reminiscent of some of the cars in the movie: