EUROTRIP !: Salzburg Day 2 -salt mines and sound of music tour..

salt lake inside a cave inside a mountain

in the miner costume

Hey you all !

Today was a pretty amazing day….im exhausted..cuz of lack of sleep…ive been getting about 5 hours a day..thats it….well..i can always sleep when im back in france …is what I say to myself..

So I got picked up from the hostel at 8.30 and got dropped to the bigger tour bus..we were about 30 in the bus..going on different tours is the Bavarian mountains. We had a great tour guide..an old man but with a great sense of humour…he told us lil anecdotes all along the tour….made it all the better. Going into the mountains was amazing…very beautiful….we had a view of the eagle’s nest which is basically the vacation home of Hitler…he and his nazi buddies partied there…Mussoline was a frequent guest…this is like 2500mts high…but I dint take the eagles nest tour..i have altitude sickness…severe nausea…so not for me..they dropped me and 3 other girls at the salt mine tour area and the rest of the group was going on the other tours being offered..

The salt mines are high up in the mountain. Inside which there are large deposits of salt.We 4 entered the place…put on our traditional miner costumes…and there are these lil trams that take us into the mountain…200ft under…fabulous ! also its commercialized so they take photos of us at each point which we can buy later..which I of course did…we reached a chamber where the history of the salt mines was explained…how water dried up leaving a whole valley of crystallized salt and over the years the alps came up and the valley of salt was pushed under..folded further down ….way into the mountains how the government made the extraction projects…then from that chamber there are these huge slides which take us down into another chamber…its like a ride almost..

There..they explained the process of extraction…how they drill bore holes and make huge caverns..fill it with water…and this melts the salt..creating brine which is then flushed out every 2 years…and from this brine salt is extracted…..to completely empty a cavern it takes about 30 years…

From this cavern we entered another cave…really big cave…like in harry potter when he and Dumbledore find the first horcrux…the cave was basically a lake of brine….we sat on boats and went acccross the lake…and in between the boats stopped and ther was a lazer show..it was amazing ! a dark cave and beautiful lights….the cave was not to high..like maybe 13 ft..but very wide…

On the other side of the lake was a room which showed us the machinery and the suits used for mine rescues…from that chamber we went up on the mine elevators to the next level….more information…and machinery ..we even got to taste the water..it was really salty ! they said you could try licking the walls if u want..but just remember “ you might not be the first one “ ..lol :P of course none of us tried it after that…

This lasted about an hour…then we got back on the trams and went to the upper levels through the many tunnels…

It was extremely memorable..:)

They even gave us lil bottles of salt extracted in the mines there. Bavarian table salt souvenier…lol :P

Then we got back on the bus..picked up the others who had finished various tours by then and started down the mountains….we stopped for lunch at a little town in between the mountains called Berchtesgaden…I ate an Apple Strudle…J it was nice…but I am sick of sweet things so din enjoy very much….and we walked around the town a lil…it was nice…

Then got back on the bus and back to Salzburg..it was 2 by then…so I got down from this bus and got into the next tour bus…I was very very sleepy….on the way back from the town I could not even open my eyes to see the Bavarian mountains views…so had napped for a half hour..which prob did me a lil good…but now im super tired..

Then the sound of music tour started…which was not as fun as I expected…maybe because the tour guide had a terrible sense of humour or because after my first tour I had reached saturation point for amount of beauty to be taken in…

We visited all the places that the sound of music was filmed…very famous areas some inside and others outside Salzburg..:) the do re mi song in the mirabell gardens…the gazebo where u are 16 going on 17 was filmed…the von trap family house…the lake where the children and maria go boating where she and the captain get married…etc etc…it was good fun . they played songs from the movie and we sang along…told us stories about the filming and the famous areas…

Most austrians have not watched the sound of music. It was first released in german and then English. But here in Salzburg the population is 150,000 people. And because of the sound of music the number of tourists coming in is 300,000 per year…so this movie really put it on the map…

Our tour guide even took Samantha Ronson from TLC Passport to Europe up the Huntersberg mountain here where the Do re mi was filmed…

there is the mozart bridge featured in the movie…the children running across in their curtain dresses…

Well enough of movie blah…it gets to you you know..staying in a town that is living off the memory of Mozart and the sound of music…

Also we got to see the red bull international headquarter. The red bull dude is an Austrian apparently from salzburg. He went to Taiwan…used their brewing method…but a lil gas into it and marketed…became the richest man in Austria.and the Austrians like him because he spreads his wealth..he buys mountains around for like 3 billion dollars or 30 billion dollars…so that way there is more money going around….most of salzburg belongs to him…the many mansions the hockey team some of the mountains..blah blah…

One of the shooting sites is in a little town called Mondsee…which is in the lakes district..this is where 70 lakes are found….lake mondsee, lake wolfgang lake fuschal….this was the most beautiful area ever…there is a lot to do here ..during winter the lakes torn to ice and every one is ice skating across…in summers…everyone swims in the lakes..there is paragliding hot balloon sailing rafting…skiing…im in the between season when everything is unsafe and not functional unfortunately.

There are soo many farmhouses and beautiful mansions in the mountains which let rooms out for travellers so they can live with and experience how a real Austrian family is like…I would definitely like to come back to Salzburg someday again…and do all the stuff I dint this time…there is a lot left undiscovered …it looks so good I wanna live here…! :D

Salzburg is a small city very unlike Vienna which was way crowded…I think im a small city kinda girl..

Well tomoro my train to Innsbruck is at 8…so have to wake up early…

So im going to sleep now..super tired…

Long day ahead…

All my days are so packed..each day feels like 3…france feels like a long time ago now…

Okay…more tomoro from Innsbruck !

Love

Aishu