Adventure Six: Salzburg, Austria

The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music ...

After a six hour train ride, we finally arrived in Salzburg, Austria. Salzburg is known mostly because it is the city in which the Sound of Music was filmed. Needless to say, we were very excited to see all these places from the movie. When we arrived we headed straight to our "Couch Surfer" home for the night. For those of you who don't know, Lindsey, Steph, and I used a thing called couch surfing to find a place to stay for several of the cities we went. It is safe I promise! We were able to find people to stay with, communicate and talk with them ahead of time, and make sure that is who we wanted to stay with. I look back now and find that couch surfing was one of the best experiences of my travel abroad! In Salzurg, we stayed with a precious lady, Andrea, and her husband, Frederick. They are both probably in their early 60's, and they were such sweet, gracious people to open their home to us. We had a nice bed and couch to sleep on as well as delicious hot tea that night, and a wonderful breakfast the next morning. Such kind people. The whole experience at their home brought a smile to my face.

That night we headed out into the town, which even at night was absolutely beautiful. We walked around, took many pictures, then stopped at a quaint little restaurant for dinner. Delicious. Our first real dinner since we had been abroad. Then we headed back to Andrea's, drank some tea, chatted with Andrea and Frederick about everything under the sun, then headed to bed.

The next morning, Andrea was gracious enough to drive us around the city so we didn't have to pay for public transport. So great. We headed first to the house used as The Von Trappe home in the movie. It is now a University. We were so excited to see it! Then we walked to a garden near a big castle where the gazebo in which they sing "I am Sixteen Going on Seventeen" is placed. Then we drove back into the city and explored. Andrea knew so much about the city; basically we were given a personal tour for free. We saw beautiful Cathedrals (one which is in the movie - the graveyard scene at the end), buildings, parks, and fountains. We also stopped for our daily pastry which was a pastry similar to an apple strudel.

After our walk around the city, Andrea dropped us off at the train station where we felt like we were saying goodbye to our mom. She was so great, and we were really sad to leave! But we were on to our next adventure ..... Esslingen, Germany which is a small town outside of Stuttgart, Germany. Salzburg was beautiful, and I would love to go back again one day!

Goodbye Austria, and Hello Germany!