After breakfast at our hotel we were met by our tour bus, covered with a colorful mural, to take us on The Sound of Music tour! As many of you know, the 1965 movie with Julie Andews takes place in Salzburg. Some of the filming was done here and the rest of it was done in a studio in California. We took a four hour tour of the places in the movie and got a behind the scenes look at this remarkable place. The landscape is very beautiful! Mountains always speak to me and the Alps are no exception! Lush green valleys topped by craggy outcroppings are everywhere. The VonTrapp family sure did have a great place to call home before they had to flee from the Nazis!
The bus tour started with a drive through the city center. There was a market going on and as we drove by I could see foods of all kinds and also some wares such as linens for sale. This town takes biking seriously, and I even saw a bicycle repair shop set up under a tent in the town square. He had customers too!
One of the first things they showed us was the lake where the children fell in the water and the palace were the VonTrapps lived. There were swans floating in the lake and townspeople were fishing. Then we got to remember being "Sixteen Going on Seventeen" and viewed the gazebo where Liesl and Rolphe sang to each other and she danced along from one bench to another. Sandy and I had our photo taken in front of that very gazebo which the VonTrapp family donated to the city of Salzburg. Our guide shared that Liesl fell on the slick bench and fell through a pane of glass cutting her ankle badly. They wrapped it up and filming continued.
The long walk that Maria made while walking to the Von Trapp residense for the first time and singing "I Have Confidence" was lined with trees and we could stroll down its path. Again, beautiful flowers were everywhere but soon, back on the bus we went and headed out of town and pulled over in an area where we looked out over a town in the mountains. You seemed to be able to see forever and it was gorgeous! We rode quite a distance to a nearby town where the church that the wedding took place in was filmed. It was another elaborately decorated church that was several stories tall and filled with statues and gold gilt and paintings. We were able to walk around in this town and explore on our own and we both tested the ice cream here. It was very good!
From there we headed back into Salzburg. Our guide was a perky little gal with a long blonde braid, and she knew how to get everyone involved. As we rode along, they played songs from the movie and many of us sang along! It was quite fun! Do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do!!
From there we viewed a very large palace garden in the middle of town. This garden was flanked by two of the statues that were used in The Sound of Music movie. Flowers of every color and kind were used in the garden, as well as intricately carved shapes, like a paisley print, in the grass lawn. The contrast of green lawn and black dirt, which we guessed were going to be filled with fall bulbs for spring color, was very striking to the eye.
Back down the elevator we went and back into the city. There were several horse drawn carriages and the clip clop of the horses hooves was nice to hear amid the hustle and bustle of city noises.We wandered from store to store but finally decided to head to the nearby town of Anif to hit a certain store Sandy had looked up on the internet. We grabbed a taxi and off we went, (first we told Jens and Judy what our plans were, we aren't stupid ya know) We did our shopping and had asked the cab driver about the city bus back into Salzburg. We figured out where the bus stop was and waited there. A few minutes later the bus came by and we headed back. When we got into familiar territory we bailed out and headed to meet our group. Quite a successful outing! We were pretty happy with ourselves for figuring out how to manage getting around Austria public transit without speaking the language!
Our group decided to eat supper at the street fair that was being held and so again we scattered our separate ways agreeing to meet at 8pm. We were sure that we could find some good food at a street fair and we were right! First we found a giant pretzel vendor and tried pretzels. Then we wanted something with meat in it and decided on Toast Langos which were ham and cheese covered in a pastry dough, deep fried and when it comes out all hot and melty and bubbly, it is slathered with a garlic and butter mixture and sprinkled with salt. Pretty darn good! We watced some of the activities at the fair. There was a whip cracking demonstration with the whips cracking in time with music, OomPah bands playing, carnival rides, and a type of bowling done with a heavy wooden ball on a wooden course which was very noisy! The little kids we saw doing it were having a blast!
We paid to use the loo a couple of times today. Half a Euro seems to be the going rate whether it is in a permanent restroom with a coin slot to open the door or a plastic porta pottie at the street fair. We actually questioned in our minds if the guy sitting at the porta potties was supposed to be charging or not. We found ourselves wondering if the city hadn't brought in the potties and the guy saw an opportunity to charge half a Euro each and plunked down and started charging! Oh well, they were relatively clean and had toilet paper which is a big plus. We carry a small package with us in case of a "no paper situation!"
At 8 pm we met at the big church in the center of the square with the big green dome and discussed what to do next. Some folks had already gone back to the hotel but the city was doing a fireworks display and we wanted to see it. So we waited and chatted and waited. After awhile we started walking and sure enough, as soon as we get out of good viewing range, they start! We stood and watched what we could see and when they finished we headed to the vans. We rode home girls in one van and guys in the other. The girls van I am sure was much more fun because we sang all the way back to the hotel! Do re me and Edilweiss were in our repertoire! We were still singing as we got out of the van and a child was on the other side of the fence where we could not see him. We finished our song and this little voice shouted, "That's enough" and we laughed and laughed. I gues we didn't sound as good as we thought we did! What a fun day!
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