SALZBURG II

SALZBURG, AUSTRIA
September 14

The Ballwein Family Bed and Breakfast is a comfortable family farm on the edge of Salzburg. Bus 21 runs along the street, giving easy access into old downtown. The morning breakfast consisted of cereals, yogurts, tomatoes, cold cuts, fresh farm boiled eggs, breads, juice, real whole milk, coffee and condiments. It was very tasty!

We caught the bus and got off in the old town and began our self-guided tour of Salzburg (with the help of Nancy's hours of study time)! We visited many places including castles, palaces, churches and more churches, restaurants, cafes, shops and many famous places! This day was FULL!

This town is the birthplace of Mozart so one can hear his music, see where he was baptized and went to church, not to mention all of his souvenir shops!

We visited the big fortress on the hill that magnificently stands high above Salzburg. It was a steep walk up the hill (yes, Debby, too!), but it was worth it! The fortress itself was not that impressive once we got inside. It was not much more than a shell. Apparently, when Napolean arrived, sometime before we got here, his army took all the furnishings with him!

Once we left the fortress we took a ridge walk for a couple of K's to several awesome vista points in every direction. At the end, we took the elevator down to ground level and treated ourselves to more awesome food!

The huge Catholic churches were magnificent to see; huge structures with rich furnishings, typical of many others we've seen. The Catholics gained control of the vast salt mines a few centuries ago so they had lots of money at their disposal.

We took a local tour of the old clock tower and got a birds eye view of the inner workings of a 16th century mechanical musical clock. It stands several stories above the city so it's very visible. We were fortunate to have been able to get tickets to see all the gears, levers, ropes, pulleys, drums, bells and hammers! It was like being inside of a giant music box, except more!

We enjoyed Salzburg cuisine, probably eating more than we should, buy, hey! We're on vacation! Austrian coffee is very rich and flavorful, and even though we didn't find a Starbucks in Salzburg, we didn't miss it either!

Our B&B was very nice! We would recommend this as a great, yet simple place to stay. The grounds were nicely kept, green, lush, lots of flowers and very pleasant. They had a couple of white Geese and several goats and sheep. We didn't try the swimming pool but it looked inviting! Our hosts were very helpful and showed us much kindness.

Tomorrow morning we leave Salzburg and head for Gimmelwald. Thus far this has been our favorite, yet they are hard to compare because they all offer different experiences! It's all good!