Day 31-32 – The Beautiful Salzburg

Well we might have a new favourite location so far with Salzburg being the perfect combo of beautiful, happening but not overcrowded, lots to see and do plus delicious food.

Sights

• We began our exploration of Salzburg with a ‘Sound of Music’ tour. This had the double benefit of showing you some of the prettiest places in Salzburg as well as seeing where lots of key scenes from the Julie Andrews classic were filmed. It was fantastic, we had a great host and a bus sing a long (we were the most into it), the sights were beautiful and having the Sound of Music fresh in our memory from watching it the day before made it even better.
• We then explored the ‘Old Town’ including ‘The Fortress’ (after a break for pretzels) the buildings were amazing and the views were so good from high above the town. A perfect afternoon. Kirsten declared that she likes Salzburg even more than Vienna and she loved Vienna! That’s just how good Salzburg is. We also had excellent weather on both days, it rains in Salzburg nearly half the year and so the locals were very happy to see the bright sun in December.
• The second day we walked around the lake near our house which was lovely, we then explored Salzburg further, soaking in all the amazing views before it was time to head to Munich.
• On the way to Munich we had one incredible stop at Jennerbahn cable car, we caught the cable car to the top. The snowy mountains were perfect and we got to climb to the very top of one of them (about 2,000m altitude). The views from there almost seemed fake they were so good. A great recommendation from Michael. One of the top experiences of the trip so far
• Once in Munich we had a very authentic German dinner with the locals at a Bavarian restaurant (schnitzel of course) to cap off a very memorable New Years Eve, there was lots of singing and music involved

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Sound of Music real facts

Our host gave us some fun ‘true history facts’ as he liked to call them about the real Von Trapp family including:

• Maria was actually 25 years younger than the Captain (22 to his 47) and was far closer in age to his oldest son who was 17. Therefore, they made the actors playing Maria and the Captain closer in age and made the oldest child a daughter (Leisel) to make it more palatable for audiences
• The Von Trapp’s did actually win a singing competition in 1935. Very impressive
• The mountain they climbed over at the end would not have been a safe move but actually a ‘death trap’. Apparently the mountain they climbed over would take them to Hitler’s summer residence in real life. But saying it took them to Switzerland was a nicer ending.

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Risk Takers

To soak in the amazing view at Jennerbahn we had to climb up some steep and icy parts of the mountain, with pretty steep cliff edges either side. But when you are desperate for the perfect shot you take that risk. The climb down was particularly stressful but luckily we could hold on to a little railing and go down on our bottoms. Also, other people were doing it so what could possibly go wrong? (warning too many photos from this section, we just absolutely loved it)

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Germans are Firework Crazy

For New Year’s Eve there are very few restrictions on fireworks in Germany (hotel receptionist proudly said- “There used to be restrictions on where you could set them off but now it is everywhere”) and the locals were taking full advantage of that, setting off fireworks in carparks, normal parks, busy streets, main roads and just about any outdoor location you can think of. Walking to dinner we encountered many often right next to us or in front of us. It took some adjusting to get used to as it sounds like constant gun fire going off at first which seems a bit scary. At midnight the fireworks were deafening. It was a pyrotechnic’s dream. Click on the video below.

https://vimeo.com/user105822180/review/382320284/f5ba3e64ff

Happy New Year to everyone 🙂