Salzburg

We hadn't been allowed to travel a lot during our time in Germany but we got short timer's syndrome and felt the itch to get out and see some place new. On top of that, the weather started improving which provided additional motivation. Five of us crammed into our VW Golf and headed south. Griggs is geographically challenged and thought we were going to Strassbourg, France. As we approached the mountains we kept commenting on how impressive the French Alps were. When he asked why all the signs were still in German we said there was a strong German influence and that this border town was historically linked more to Germany than to France. We kept the joke up all the way until we got to a restaurant where the waiter said "Hallo, Gruss Gott" followed by "this is the traditional greeting in Austria." Griggs was honestly surprised we weren't in France which provided much entertainment.

As soon as we parked at the hotel we began walking around town to find lunch. Salzburg is situated in a valley surrounded by picturesque hills and I wanted to get pictures from all the best angles. One of the guys booked the hotel in the "City Center" instead of the Aldstadt (Old Town) which is a little surprising they didn't know the difference after how much we've walked around Stuttgart. It was a pretty long walk just to get to the nice area of town. Walking along the Salzach River...



We walked up the western hill towards the Festung Hohensalzburg.

View of the Altstadt from the north side of the castle


And view of the Alps from the south side. We at lunch in the castle with a view of the Alps and it was beautiful. What made it even better was the cordon bleu I had with cranberry sauce.


We walked down the hill into the Aldstadt where they had some interesting things...




View of the Altstadt from across the river



Gardens of the Mirabell Palace. The fountain statue is apparently in The Sound of Music but I don't think I've ever seen it.



The birthplace of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. We paid the 10 euro to tour the museum but it wasn't that interesting since none of us knew a whole lot about classical music.


Another view of the Altstadt from the western hill. This time we paid the 3.50 euro to take an elevator up instead of walking.


Buildings built into the side of the cliffs.


On our way out of town we stopped by Hanger 7, which is a Red Bull museum that had some interesting things in it.


This F1 car had thousands of small photos on it that made up the paint scheme





I don't think this was actually a working vehicle, but rather some kind of F1 prototype


Isn't that the Predator?


Might be the coolest mechanical bull I've ever seen


The walkway leads up to a bar at the top of the museum with a glass floor. Unfortunately it wasn't open while we were there (probably because it was a Sunday).


It was a short trip at just 24 hours but it was better than sitting in Stuttgart for another weekend. If we had more time it would have been nice to visit the salt mines, Berchtesgaden (Hitler's Eagle's Nest), and other sites around the area.