Velcommen to Salzburg, Austria:
The ancient city of Salzburg, built by the Celts on the back of salt mining, is so much more than Maria and seven kids pouncing about singing Do Re Me.
It’s a city of churches with rigorously peeling bells and elaborate frescoes, ghostly graveyards, expansive plazas, immaculate gardens and a myriad of alleyways. It is divided in two by the River Salzach: the north side (New Town) dominated by Mirabell Palace and Kapuzinerberg hill, and the south side (Old Town) overlooked by the Hohensalzberg Fortress atop the imposing Mönchsberg rock.
River Salzach
The New Town
A light rain is falling as I stroll from my hotel in New Town to Mirabell Palace and Gardens, built in 1606 by Archbishop Wolf Dietrich for his mistress Salome Alt and their tribe of children. Didn’t seem to be much praying and tending the flock going on.
I meander through the baroque palace with its marble staircase adorned with acrobatic cherubs. Outside the geometrically pampered flowerbeds, fountains and mythological elf sculptures confirm an army of gardeners.
I later walk up Kapuzinerburg, Salzburg’s highest point 636m, visiting the Capuchin Monastery, originally a military tower, overlooking the expanse of the city and surrounding forest covered mountains.
Mozart
Mozart is everywhere. This the city where the man was born, raised and wrote his music. My induction to Mozart started when I landed at the Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Airport. This was followed by Mozart’s birthplace, residence, statues and plaza. And one cannot forget the Mozart marzipan chocolates.
Plazas
A great number of cobblestones, some hiding the wagon tracks of the Romans, were laid on the streets and in the many plazas dotted around Salzburg. Each plaza has its own intricately detailed cathedral, palace fountain or statue.
Alstadt (the Old Town)
Although short, it’s a buzz taking the steep funicular up Mönchberg to Hohensalzberg Fortress.
Funicular
Once inside the fortress you can follow its construction and renovation over the centuries, starting in 1077, through a very innovative time lapse video. From the fortress parapets I look out over the Salzburg Basin lying under the watchful eye of the craggy Mt Untersberg (1972m).
I figure it’s ok to hum ‘Climb Every Mountain’ as I descend from Nonnberg Benedictine Convent to wander in the alleyways of the Old Town.
Nockerl and Strudel
One must take a cooking class and learn how to make traditional Salzburger Nockerl (a sweet soufflé type dessert piled high to look like mountains) and apfelstrudel.
I take a class with the not surprising name of Edelweiss Cooking School where the well equipped kitchen is located in the old tollgate, the Kaverne, a cave room hacked into the solid rock of the hill. It was good fun and everyone’s strudel is a success.
Cafés
I easily keep my sugar levels high by visiting the multitude of cafés dotting the city proffering a wide array of pastries. I complement each pastry with a coffee, but I find that the cappuccino’s are very strong so I stick with the more milky latte.
Lots of pastry choices
Hellbrunn Palace
I walk through manicured parkland, open fields and gated chateaus for about four kilometres outside Salzburg to Schloss Hellbrunn, a hunting lodge built between 1613 and 1615. I greatly enjoy the folly trick fountains of turtles, grottos, spitting reindeer and levitating cones pondering the gravity mechanics of each while trying not to get wet.
I’m off for further wandering and to revitalise in a restaurant offering goulash with polenta dumplings followed by an artery slamming gooey pastry.
Traditional goulash
This featured blog entry was written by IvaS from the blog A Postcard from Salzburg.
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