The Lake Nestled in the Mountains - Day Five

We took a trip to the amazingly picturesque lakeside mountain town of Hallstatt. It's easy enough to get to. At the train station, take the 150 Post Bus (long distance bus) to Bad Ischl. The ride is an hour and a half to the Bad Ischl train station, the last stop. From there, you get out and get on the train, getting off at Hallstatt. It wasn't the quickest trip (it ended up taking us about 3 hrs. one-way), but the journey was filled with rolling green hills and ends in the mountains.

When we got off at Hallstatt, we were greeted with a lake surrounded by snow-capped mountains. You need to take a ferry to cross the lake to get to the town.

We wandered around town trying to find the best spots for photo ops. It wasn't terribly difficult.

I had a snack in the form of a mohn (poppy seed) ice cream cone. It seems like an odd choice, but I was immediately drawn to it because one of my favorite salad dressings was poppy seed (sadly, that restaurant is now defunct). The ice cream was as delicious as I'd anticipated.

We ate doner kebabs on the lawn near where the ferry dropped us off. This was our view.

After lunch, we walked up the hill to the cathedral. It had a small cemetery, in the same style as the beautiful one under the Salzburg Castle.

Off the cemetery, there was a room filled with skulls. I didn't go in because it freaked me out. Hubs took some photos. Since the cemetery was so small, it would fill up and then the skeletons would be removed to make more space for the newly deceased. The skulls were memorialized with paint. It's strangely beautiful, but it still creeps me out a little.

Feeling like we'd had the complete Hallstatt experience, we headed back to Salzburg. We got off at Mirabellplatz and walked across the river. It was a gorgeous, warm, sunny day.

We walked back over to the Salzburg Dom and enjoyed the plaza near sunset. Lots of families were out and about.

We ate dinner at Zwettler's, which had been recommended to us by a couple at Barenwirt, and it didn't disappoint. I ordered the special of chilli knodeln, dumplings stuffed with spicy sausage served over saurkraut.

Really rich and filling.

Hubs had goulash with an egg and a dumpling. The meat was fall-apart tender.

And some good beer.

Beware, if you eat from the bread basket, it will end up on your bill. Lesson learned.

2 beers + 2 specials + 1 pretzel + tip = 31 euro.

After this long, journey-filled day, we headed back to the hotel early to try to get a full night's sleep.

A Sunny Day in Salzburg - Day Four

Hubs and I were both wide awake at 3am. Silly jet lag. So, at 4:30am, we gave up on the trying-to-sleep thing and got up, got ready. We left the hotel before 7am. Turns out, early morning is a great time to explore Salzburg since you avoid the masses of tourists. The only people around were locals heading to work or school.

The weather was glorious, all sun and blue sky. We walked to the Salzburg Dom, but didn't take any photos because a giant stage was set up in front of it for a concert.

Next to the Dom was Dom Platz, a large square directly under the Salzburg Castle. There was a giant chess board and empty food stands that I'm sure are humming during the summer. There was also a sculpture of a man standing on a large, golden sphere. I like when modern art pieces accompany baroque settings.

We walked up to Mozart Square, a little square with a statue of the great composer. It was fairly unremarkable for a city so devoted to the man. But the pastries at the bakeries across the street did him a fair amount of justice.

We backtracked to Dom Platz and found St. Peter's Monastery tucked behind it. The cemetery was gorgeous and unlike any cemetery I'd seen (though I learned from this trip that this style of cemetery is popular through the region).

Instead of headstones, there were wrought iron designs. Each grave was covered with planted flowers.

Even the roses in vases were fresh, and it was clear that the relatives of the deceased took great pride in making sure the graves looked their best. Though we were there early in the morning, a candle on a grave had been lit.

It make for an upbeat, colorful experience in what could have been a silent, somber place.

After the cemetery, we walked up the stairs to a trail that lead to the Hohensalzburg Fortress/Salzburg Castle. It was before 9am, the gates were open. We followed a German woman in front of us and walked past the ticket counter and no one stopped us. I guess if you go early you might get in for free? Or you might just be breaking the law.

The fortress was well-preserved. We didn't pay for the museum, so we just wandered around. There aren't many attractions, but we did stumble into a room that had a CG model of how the castle evolved throughout the ages. It started as a small tower on the hill and, over centuries, was structured and restructured to become a stronghold. It was hard to imagine anyone climbing up the hill and getting over those walls.

On one side of the castle, you have the beautiful view overlooking the city.

On the other side, there are gorgeous snow-capped mountains. Win-win.

As we descended, we mistakenly took a detour, but we ended up near a nunnery and the domed University Church overlooking the University.

We trudged back up the hill and made it to the wooded trail we missed the first time around. The trail was over a mile, but wooded and shady and downhill, so it wasn't difficult. The trail basically on top of the wall of the old town, so there were some nice views overlooking the city along the way.

The trail ended near Barenwirt, and we were starving. We wandered out to the patio, overlooking the river, and took a seat.

I ordered one lunch special on the board: Barlaudknodel auf gorganzola. It was dumplings with spinach in an uber rich gorganzola sauce.

Hubs ordered another special: Bauemschmaus wit bratknodel and sauerkraut which was ham, roast pork, dumplings, and sauerkraut. The meat was perfect, tender and juicy and flavorful.

We'd read that their apple strudel was outstanding, so we decided to over-stuff ourselves.

It was worth it. The strudel was delicious, though I thought it had to much vanilla sauce that it was floating in. The strudel itself tasted so good, there was no need to hide it in so much sauce.

I can't recommend Barenwirt highly enough. It was maybe the best meal on our whole trip, and the patio was so lovely. If you're in Salzburg, it's a must, and very affordable, especially at lunch. If we would've had another day in Salzburg, we probably would've come back here for lunch.

2 lunch specials + 2 waters + dessert + tip = 30 euro.

Bellies filled to the brim, we walked slowly back towards out hotel along the river. The weather was gorgeous, and all the walkers and bikers around us were enjoying the spring weather. It had been cold and raining a lot in the weeks before we arrived.

We took a nap at the hotel, mostly to rest our feet. We'd logged quite a few miles this day.

In the early evening we walked to the river and had dinner on the beautiful overlook on top of Hotel Stein. We had a tower of antipasto which felt perfect for the setting.

We noshed and watched the sun set against the castle and had a drink. It was beautiful.

On the apartments in back of us, young people were drinking on the actual rooftops, rooftops that didn't have a flat top designed for people to stand on. It looked fun. Antipasto platter + glass of red wine + a scotch + tip = 35 euro.

We walked to Steingasse, right next to Hotel Stein. As the sun had set, all the cute bars on the street opened. This would be a great street to do a bar crawl. But we were only in the mood for a glass of wine and we settled on Fridrich, a tiny bar with exposed brick and cool posters on the walls. 2 glasses of wine = 11 euro.

After the wine, we explored the actual street of Steingasse, a narrow medieval street next to the river. Every entry way had a beautiful old wooden door.

It's quite a romantic street at night. And I think we were the only tourists. Everyone else seemed to be having dinner and drinks with friends. We were searching for marked doors and the scars from where a G.I. tried to drive a tank down the road to get to a brothel during WWII. We weren't having much luck in the dark, but we liked the street so much we decided to come back during the day, so I took more photos on a later date.

Fussen to Salzburg - Day Three

The jet lag was not helping us out, we were both wide awake at 6am. So we got up, got ready, and took our time checking out. The rain had stopped. This was our view from our balcony, a fresh layer of snow on the mountains.

Gasthaus Kopf also gave us some candy. I love how little things differ from country to country. Instead of gummy bears, Germany has gummy sheep.

For breakfast, we went to Markthalle, a market with different stations that's been around since the 1400's. We had some delicious pastries. It would definitely be fun to eat dinner here and kick back some beers. But, alas, we didn't have another night to spend in Fussen. It was time to get to Austria.

We couldn't figure out how to get the Bayern Ticket through the kiosk, so we went to a teller. Don't be afraid to ask, it pays off, even if you have to pay an extra 2 euro for the teller. So this time we paid 28 Euro to go all the way from Fussen to Salzburg. The cheapest fare we were offered on the kiosk was 106 euro. Big difference.

Fussen train stop and station

The train ride back to Munich was filled with mountains and green fields full of cows.

Back in Munich we bought lunch at the train station for the ride from Munich to Salzburg: salami and cheese sandwiches, a Belgian waffle, and a cappuccino. The Munich station has a bunch of good options, all very affordable. Yorma's was my favorite.

Two hours and many cows later, we pulled into rainy Salzburg. We bought bus tickets at a tabacco shop (they're cheaper there than from the machine, 1.60 instead of 1.80) and took the #1 bus to get to our hotel. We got on going the wrong direction, so we got to see a little more of Salzburg than we intended, but it was fine. The bus was dry and warm and outside was not.

We stayed at the Star Inn Hotel Zentrum. The room was fairly large, the bathroom was nice, but they loved to run the heat. It was very, very warm. We finally figured out how to open the window because it was insufferable.

But the phenomenal location made up for all of the heating shortcomings. Besides being right in front of a bus stop for easy access to the train station, the hotel was just outside of the old city. We just had to walk outside, cross the street, and walk through a tunnel cut into the wall separating the old from the new. We were within walking distance to all the major sights. But the sightseeing was for our future days.

By this time, it was dark and still raining. We walked down Getreidegasse, the alley where Mozart was born, which is now filled with trendy shops. Down one of the little alleys off of it, we ate at Wilder Mann, a restaurant filled with communal tables and decorated with antlers and skulls. We each had a Konig Ludwig dunkles.

I had a reduced portion of croquettes with sauce.

Hubs had the smaller portion fried pork with fries. Lots and lots of fried food in Austria.

We also each had a bowl of cream of asparagus soup.

It was good food in a fun setting. By the time we left the place was completely full.

2 beers + 2 soups + 2 small entrees + tip = 31 euro.

We wandered around a little bit after we left, taking in a glimpse of the fog surrounding the castle on the hill. It had been an exhausting travel day, but we were left with the excitement and anticipation of seeing Salzburg in the coming days.

Neuschwanstein Castle, Rain or Shine - Day Two

In high school, one of my English teachers had a poster of the Neuschwanstein Castle hanging on the wall. It looked like a magical place, a castle in the sky. She pointed out that the Disney castle had been modeled after it, and all of my desire to travel to Disney World faded; I wanted to see the real thing.

As the years passed, and my list of travel destinations grew, the Neuschwanstein Castle was nowhere near the top of my wish list. But it just seemed to work with the places we wanted to go in Austria for this trip, so there you go.

Warning: everything is closed in Fussen on Sunday. We were able to find a single bakery that was open and had a muffin. Second warning: the buses run very infrequently on Sundays. Fussen is only a couple miles down the road from the castle, but it was supposed to rain so we didn't want to walk. We ended up taking a cab for a couple euro more.

You purchase a ticket at the bottom of the hill and get a tour time. Ask your hotel if they have a discount form. We just had to fill out a form and it knocked a couple euros off our admission, every little bit helps. Our tour time was at 10:25am, not a long wait, so we waited in the shuttle line and went up. By the time we climbed up the rest of the hill from the shuttle, we only had about a ten minute wait for our tour to begin.

The countryside surrounding the castle is stunning and we were looking out the castle windows at every opportunity.

The entire interior of the castle is a tribute to Wagner's operas, so it was interesting to be in a castle that didn't have family portraits or religious paintings everywhere. Instead, there were a lot of swans. King Ludwig's bedroom was small but the woodwork was amazing. The top of his bed reminded me of La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona.

After the castle tour, we walked over to the bridge to get a good view of the castle. When we got there, the bridge was very crowded and the wooden boards were creaking and moving and I became paralyzed with fear. I'm not good with heights to begin with, but when there's movement and noise, I go into panic mode. I had to get off. Once some of the people left, I was able to go back and take photos.

When had taken our fill of photos, we walked back down to the bottom along a wooded trail that followed a creak. There was a small waterfall and rapids, and all the beautiful water noises that came with them.

You can see the bridge way up there.

Someone took the time to pile stacks of rocks.

We separated from the creek and walked back toward the little town area. We passed this gorgeous old house that looked straight out of a movie.

Back at the bottom, we ate at the first restaurant we walked by because we were starving. Hubs had some kind of sausage with sauerkraut.

I had currywurst with fries.

2 entrees + 2 waters = 25.50 euro.

At the bottom of the hill is King Ludwig's "old" castle, the one he grew up in. The one from which he dreamed about creating another castle on top of the hill that he looked upon during his childhood. Oh to be a young, rich king in Bavaria. But things didn't turn out so well for him, so perhaps I'm lucky.

We took the bus back to Fussen. The temperature dropped and the rain came back. We were trying to find take-out sandwiches so we wouldn't have to go back out in the rainy cold later, but no luck. We did stumble upon a shop that sold "snowballs."

It tasted like a ball of animal crackers coated with chocolate and frosting, and filled with frosting. 2.90 euro.

By late afternoon it was raining pretty heavily, so we trudged back to the guesthouse and lounged for awhile with some German TV. The rain was still coming down when we reluctantly walked back into town for dinner. We used Rick Steve's recommendations since I didn't research any restaurants in Fussen before the trip. We decided to go to the first one we came across, which happened to be La Perla, an Italian restaurant.









We ordered two large beers. Hubs had an artichoke pizza.

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I had mushroom.

They were good, like in Italy. Light and crispy with a flavorful sauce.

How come everyone in the world can make a good pizza except for LA?

2 beers + 2 pizzas + tip = 25 euro.

When we left the restaurant, the rain had stopped. We wandered around the old town for a little bit and got lost in the wet and empty streets. That's the way to do it.