July 5, Salzburg

Church bells from the little nearby town of Wals could be heard in the room of the gasthaus we are staying in on this beautiful Sunday morning. We got dressed and went down stairs to sit on the terrace while we were served breakfast. The family that owns this gasthouse has two beautiful little girls, both younger than Emma and they watched us eat breakfast. The breakfast was served to us at our table instead of the continental buffet style that we’re used to, but it felt like there were as many choices before us (and better food) than we’d had before, while we looked on the scene of enormous Alpine mountains rising before us.

We’re on the outskirts of the beautiful city of Salzburg, which was our only goal for the day. We started by finding our way to the Altstadt-- the old town. Our first stop was the visitor’s center, to see if we could sign up for the tour we wanted. In fact, we had just missed the first bus that day, but the next was at 2:00, so we had the morning to explore. Our second stop was the Internet café next door so we could post the last three days of blogs. We write the pages each night while things are still fresh in our minds, and we’re carrying the pages on a thumb drive for when we have chances to post. We also got an answer to Julie’s e-mail to her cousin in Stuttgart. It seems that her daughter is getting married the day after we were hoping to have lunch with her, so it seems like we won’t be able to see her this visit. She sounded disappointed that we wouldn’t be able to meet because she remembered Julie’s Uncle David visiting back in 1959.

We then searched around for the funicular to take us to the Hohensalzbug Fortress which literally dominates the town’s skyline. The views of the domes and buildings of Salzburg from above are quite impressive Julie had been wanting to just romp around and explore an old castle, and this one is good for that. There are lots of different exhibits inside the castle. Some are about the history of the castle and the history of its site which date back over a thousand years, easily. One of the first exhibits is about the marionettes that are used in the nearby puppet theater. (Think: “High on a hill lives a lonely goatherd…”). They freaked Emma out a little bit because most of them were a little creepy looking and a large group of skeleton puppets were a bit much for her. Other exhibits included a history of a local regiment which traced back to the 1600s and into the twentieth century. Scott had fun examining the wide variety of uniforms and weapons that they used, and considering their World War I fight in the Tyrolean Alps. There were lots of nooks and corners, and each one seemed interesting. We had to catch lunch before our tour though, so we took the funicular back down to the old town.

By then, the square at the foot of the mountain was bustling with a festival. We had seen it on the way up, earlier, but couldn’t yet tell what was going to happen. Now, there were dozens of stone carvers set up and chiseling away, apparently in a competition. Emma and Anna got a chance to tap at a stone to see what it was like. We grabbed a quick but appropriate lunch (hot dogs for the girls, bratwurst for Dad and schnitzel for Mom), and crashed the party under the tent where a small oomph band was playing traditional music.

We also had time to shop in some of the tourist gift shops around Mozart square, where his statue stands. Emma bought a pink strawberry-smelling teddy bear, and Julie bought a t-shirt. Anna’s souvenir might have been the most appropriate. She got a miniature violin and bow, with Mozart’s silhouette on the outside of the case.

Then, it was the time for… dah-dah-DAAH! --- The Sound of Music tour! We have been looking forward to this for a long time. We started in a small van which took us to Mirabell Gardens. Not only are these filled with beautiful flowers and interesting statues, but they are also the place where many of the “Do-Re-Mi” scenes were filmed. We had a short time to explore as the rest of our group gathered and the big tour bus came.

Our guide was an English woman named Susan, and she took us to many of the major sites where the film was made in Salzburg and in the beautiful “Lake District” east of the city. We saw the train station where the real Von Trapps left for Switzerland. (They didn’t walk over the mountain like they did in the end of the movie, because that would have taken them right into Germany. There‘s no use fleeing from the Nazis in that direction.) There were a few places that Susan directed our attention to that seemed a bit… questionable, but most were immediately recognizable. We saw the famous gazebo from the “I Am Sixteen, Going on Seventeen” scene, though it’s been moved from its original spot. We saw one of two locations that was used for the back of the house. This one included the water that the children fall into while wearing the new clothes that Maria made them. We saw the abbey on the hillside where the real Maria lived and the entryway where some filming was done. You can’t go inside unless you are a nun, but none of the interiors of any of the main buildings were done here. They were all on sound stages in Hollywood. The bus took us east of the city into the small towns of the Lake District. We stopped at Mondseeland for a dinner break, but it also happens to be the spot where the interior of the church of the wedding scene was filmed. We were allowed to peek in, and we stood in the back as politely as we could because there was actually a service going on at the time. We returned to Salzburg and learned more details about the filming spots in the Mirabell Gardens. The three girls ended up trying to bounce up the “Do-Re-Mi” steps in Mirabell Gardens as Dad taped them. There were lots of other people doing the same silly thing and getting the same pictures.

The weather was really going our way today. It rained hard twice, but each time we were somewhere that it really didn’t matter-- inside the castle, or in the bus on the tour. The rest of the time, the sun seemed to be shining. It was funny how lucky we were.

When we finally got back to our room, the girls spent some time on the trampoline outside, but than we all settled down to watch, what else? The Sound of Music. We only got about halfway through it tonight, but we were able to see many of the places where we were. Anna says its her favorite movie. That could change, but I think it’s the favorite of all of ours right now.