EUROTRIP !: salzburg day 1...

mirabell garden

salzach river

Eellooo all !

Today was a really really nice day…I bet you have gotten bored of hearing that…J I set the alarm for 7 but somehow it did not work ! I woke up at 9.15…then took a hot shower packed and dressed up for the day and went downstairs…they provide an all you can eat breakfast for 3.5 euro diff varieties of cornflakes toast spreads..juices..coffee..tea…and I was famished..

Beside the dining room is the hostel tv room…so we all assembled there to watch the sound of music as we ate…JJ it was good fun ! a bunch of us fans laughing and commenting..

This was the prelude to the sound of music tours that we were all going to take at diff points of time….so to those who don’t know what im talking about “the sound of music “ is an extremely popular old movie. It’s a musical and is set in Austria Salzburg..all the scenes filmed here…

Till then I was contemplating on if I should or not take the tours being offered…I thought it might be cheaper to go to the places myself..but then when I asked around the places they were taking us to are outside the city and a in the wilderness amongst the mountains…

So I decided to opt for 2 tours..the sound of music + the salt mines tour.

Individually they would come upto 37+46 euro but if I take the package of both its 67 and then my hostel provided a 10% discount so I got it for like 62…

So tomoro morning the bus comes to pick me up from my hostel at 8.15…

The salt mine tour takes us deep into the Bavarian mountains Germany. Im not very sure what it entails..ill know tomoro and then tell u all ! :D( there was another ice caves tour which unfortunately shut down just yesterday ! the 26^th was the last date for this year. It is unsafe after this .)

After that we go on the sound of music tour…it is the most sold tour package here and ive got the best reviews for it!

So I got my pass for tomoro from the front desk and then left to walk around the city….salzburg is a pretty small city and we can walk to almost anywhere …..plus the weather was really good! A lil cold..but that was set off by the sun…J it felt so good to stand under the hot sun…wien was cold and cloudy all the time…

I had a great map in hand which marked out all the must see spots..and I went along with it..

First stop Mirabell palace and gardens..this is where a song from the movie was filmed..ill probably get a more extensive tour tomoro…it was very pretty…there I met another girl, lone traveller…we decided to walk around together. Monika from bulivia I think.

Then we saw the church of holy trinity…nothing important..and beside it was the place where Mozart lived…with his family.:) it was cool..

Then we came to the river salzac…which is really beautiful..i goes through Salzburg dividing the city into the old and new half…the older half has these really ancient Baroc architecture buildings..and has all the main must see destinations..the birthplace of Mozart,the collegiate church,the franchiscan church,the Salzburg museum…and throught the city there are musicians ..not amateur but professional ones who sell their CD s too…playing classical music..it is truly blissfull…and each time I stop for 15 mins and just listen..there was the violin, a 4 piece orchestra, and the celtic harp…

Personally I like the celtic harp a lot…there is just something that draws me to irish music…

I drank a peppermint tea in the morning at the hostel…which I loved…so I looked for the same brand at the market and got me a box ! then I got 1 Mozartkugeln ..the chocolate I described earlie…yet to eat it ! ill tell u how it was…and I got some souvenirs ( Mozart liquor to put in icecreams and in coffees ) for victorine and her family.got postcards to send out….

Then I said bye to monika and decided to walk up the hill to the hohensalzburg fortress…because I probably wont have time tomoro. It was a 20 min walk up and it has the most beautiful views ..i walked and talked with this old couple coming from California. They are professors are California Berkely and they told me their very romantic story of how they were both students there and met at university and got married..:D

I am meeting the most interesting people these days…! Like today in my hostel I was talking to this young girl from Australia who has just finished school and has taken a year off to travel around Europe before starting university…she and her friend have been travelling for the past 5 months and this was their 20^th country….nxt they are headed to czech republic ..then Italy…and so and so…but I don know how they fund for all this…..this other girl I was talking to was telling me how apart from worrying about the fact that she is a lone traveller she has to worry about which country has been hot by floods or earthquake and decide accordingly…she was talking to a friend and I could not overhear her statement went something like this “ I need to be beside a river..somewhere in the countryside..holland, Poland, Sweden were freezing …all of Europe is really cold right now…and I need to be under the sun..so im headed next to Italy…and im going to stay there for 2 weeks..”

And another girl in the hostel was talking to her mother on skype..she is also a student doing a eurotour before university…telling her mother about Italy and spain…the Vatican city and the statue of david..the cute guy in the bar she saw..the volcano spewing smoke…it was so cute…

It just made me smile….they are leading such a different life….very unlike the ideal indian student..

I think it is amazing…..they gave me tips for my tour to Italy too!

Well its like 11 right now…and that s all for today..:) I cant wait for tomoro! Its going to be a really fun day !

Loads of love

aishu