Vienna to Salzburg

Yes, we had another early morning wake up call at 6:15 AM, seems to be a theme on this trip, so far.  We needed to dress, finish packing, check-out, and walk about 15 minutes to the Stephenplatz Underground Station to take the U3 to the Westbahnhoff Train Station.  We were trying to make the 8:20 RailJet train to Salzburg.  This train is newer, faster, and makes less stops than some of the others we could take to Salzburg.

It was still raining slightly this morning, although a lot less windy, and it seemed a little warmer.  We made it to the Underground station without incident, same for the Westbahnhof Train Station.  We had about 40 minutes until our train departed, so we grabbed a quick bite to eat inside the train station, and then went out and boarded our train.  We were a little nervous about the seats on the train, most trains that are faster require a seat reservation, and our ticket purchase from the machine yesterday gave no seat assignment choices.  However, once we boarded, it was clearly evident that no one had any seat assignments, it was just first come, first served.

The train seemed new, and was very comfortable.  It was about a 2 hour and 30 minute ride to Salzburg.  As we went westward, the skies cleared and the sun finally appeared once again after three cloudy days in Vienna.

The train ride was quiet and fairly fast, we saw speeds on the train information monitor of about 200 kilometers per hour, not super fast, but faster then a normal regional train.  I was able to catch up on the blog pictures and reduce some of the other photos that we have taken so that I can try to post them into a photo gallery, as soon as we have a decent internet connection again.  The hotel in Salzburg does not have Wi-Fi, and I think the hotel in Munich, our next stop, also does not have Wi-Fi , so it could be a few days.

After departing the train in Salzburg at about 11:15 AM, we visited the information office to get some instructions on using the city buses, mainly to see if we need to purchase a ticket before we board, or from the driver.  It seems that there is no consistency on that in Europe.  For Salzburg, you can purchase a ticket from the driver when you get on, possibly at a slight premium, but much easier than trying to find a machine at a tobacco stand where you normally purchase a public transportation ticket in many areas.

We found our bus at the main bus station located  in the train station area, and off we went.  It was only about five stops before we were to get off the bus near our hotel.  We had fairly good directions for the streets to follow, and it was less than a 5 minute walk to the hotel once we got off of the bus.

The hotel shares the building with a restaurant, so we were told to take the lift to the first floor (the bottom is floor zero or sometimes ground), and the nicest lady met us to check in.  Because we were a little early, she changed our room so that we could get into it right away.  We got a room on the third floor, with a window overlooking the narrow, pedestrian only street.  The hotel is very quaint, the building is about 700 years old.  All of the furnishings are in wood, and we got two twin sized beds, which is typical for Germany.  Today is our second wedding anniversary, so that was a little funny to us, but not a big deal.

After dropping off the luggage in the room, and freshening up a little, we headed out to see the sights.  We wandered past the Salzburg Cathedral,  and went over to the Funicular (cable car lift on tracks), which takes you up to the Hohensalzburg Castle.  The castle  sits atop a hill overlooking the town.

There were some old military museum exhibits there, it was also used as a military barracks for a time, and also exhibits showing some of the early rooms from the period that it served as a royal palace.  The best part of the visit to the Castle was the views over Salzburg from about 400 ft. above the city.  After heading down, we went back into the old city to find a bite to eat for lunch.

After lunch we visited a shop specializing in Christmas ornaments, and they literally had thousands of real egg shell ornaments.  The egg internals had been removed, and the shells were hand decorated in all types of Christmas patterns.

They had real egg crates holding the ornaments, by the dozens, and they were stacked in displays everywhere.  We ended up buying one of them, we hope it makes it back home unscathed.

Then we headed over to the Salzburg Cathedral to walk around inside.  It was quite impressive, but it is mostly new inside after having been restored from a bombing during WWII.

We walked around inside the Cathedral and took some pictures before heading to the crypts under the church, where one of the past Bishops and possibly some Cardinals are laid to rest.  There was also some of the old ruins exposed from the earlier church that was built on this site prior to the current church.  These ruins dated back to the early 1200’s, and the older church sat a little skewed to the current church’s orientation.

Stephanie then wanted to visit the Mozart Residence, so we headed across the river to take that tour.  It was somewhat interesting, they talked some about his family and his life.  It was sad to hear that his life was cut short by a plague, and to learn that he was buried in a mass grave with other plague victims.  It was amazing to learn what he was able to do with his music starting at about 6 years old.

We then wandered around the old town streets looking at stores, and at possible places to eat dinner later on.  We visited the grocery store for a few items, and then headed back to the room to get ready for dinner.

We just dropped off some of the extra stuff we normally carry around in the backpacks, and talked to the receptionist about some recommendations for dinner. She recommended three places, but we went to the one she described as having the best beer, it was called Sternbrau.  They did have good beer, and they also  had very good food.  It was a little funny, they served large soft pretzels with the dinner instead of any type of bread, and we were unaware that they charged for each one you ate (Euro 1.50 apiece), similar to the bread charges in Italy. They were very good pretzels, we even asked for another one after dinner instead of a dessert, thinking they were like the bread we get in the USA.  We still were unaware that there was a charge for them, we only discovered it when the bill came.  We had a good laugh about that.  We headed back to the hotel for the night, we have a 7:50 AM train tomorrow to Munich and Oktoberfest, so we have to get up early again, probably about 6:00 AM.