Day 11 Thursday 11th June 2009 in Salzburg.We stayed at the Europa, a modern 15 story Hotel made up of the ground floor reception and cafe, 13 accommodation floors and the breakfast room on the 15th. The hotel is 8 rooms wide with three elevators on one end and is the width one room and wide corridor. Marvellous views of the city and the hills beyond can be had from the glassed in corridors and the view from our window was more than marvellous; it was magnificent. The near ground was not so good so we lifted our eyes to behold a grand castle on a hill with a backdrop of mountains lightly shrouded with wispy cloud and remnants of the winter snow. We broke our nights fast on the fifteen floor where we could gaze out the window at the beautiful view as we ate delicious food. Our room was large with a desk and two comfortable chairs; I was able to enjoy fast complimentary Wi-Fi. Before we retired for the night I booked two tours with the receptionist; one Sound of Music (hereon SoM) tour and a tour of Berchtesgaden. Firstly on the SoM tour we were shown where the von Trapp family lived and then from a distance, the convent where Maria stayed; continuing on we next stopped a public park and were shown the gazebo (shifted there for display purposes) where the eldest daughter met the telegram boy. Just around the corner was the avenue of trees the children were perched in as the captain and the baroness together with uncle Max drove by on their way home. This avenue traverses all the way back to the city ( a long way). By this time the weather was deteriorating as a few raindrops began to fall. By the time we got arrived at the next stop the rain was quite heavy. Never mind most of the brave souls including me (I advised Fay to stay on the bus and she did) followed the guide along a lakeside to where the sequence of the children and Maria falling out of the boat was filmed, on the lake and in from a large square shaped, four story house. The guide was very knowledgeable about the way the whole film was made; at this spot she spent about five minutes telling about the problems they had with the boat and actors. In the mean time we were getting drenched! Along the lakeside a lot of people and children with fishing rods were trying to catch a meal; some were sheltering under large umbrellas; most were not and were wet. One young fellow hauled in a fish as I passed; it was about 100mm long and 20mm wide. The next stop was a little way from a small village; we had to walk 500metres to shelter; Fay shared an umbrella with Peggy. Here we saw the abbey where Captain Von trap and Maria were married. The inside offered shelter from the rain and solace for the mind. The interior was as with most of the churches we have seen, very beautiful. You may have deduced by now the mansion in the film and the lake and gazebo were not as in the film but all over Salzburg. The true story of the Von Trapp Family was not as portrayed in the film. If you want to read about their life Maria Von Trapp has written two books.
Maria's book, The Story of the Trapp Family Singers, published in 1949, was a best-seller. It was made into two successful German/Austrian films:
The Trapp Family (1956)
The Trapp Family in America (1958
She and the Baron had three more children in America. We next had refreshment in a small cafe. I bought a CD of Austrian yodelling and an umbrella ( I dried out soon after and did not need it) at a shop nearby before trekking back to the bus which took us back to the City through nice countryside with many small dairy farms. The farmers farmed a maximum of twenty cows. Our guide said that the farmer received €0.25 for the milk which sold in the supermarket for €1.00c. I reasoned that if a cow produced 20 litres a day then the farmer would receive €80.00 per day with 20 cows; €24,000.00c for a ten month year. The weather had cleared when we arrived back at the bus depot; we had ¾ hour to wait for our next tour. The tour guide talked us out of the Berchtesgaden tour because of the possibility of rain in the mountains and suggested a lake tour which would be mostly under cover. While we waited for 1pm to arrive we explored a nearby garden; it was well laid out and the flowers were colourful. From one end I took a photo of the garden with the same castle we could see from our hotel as a backdrop. On the Lakes tour there were only six of us, two Aussies, we two NZers and an elderly Swiss couple, so we were driven in a minibus by our guide who could speak four languages. After driving through nice small farm country side again we arrived at a large lake. We drove past a large mainly glass mansion which looked like it was sitting in the middle of an artificial lake; it belonged to a very rich man who had made his money from royalties from the Red Bull energy drink. We boarded a boat at St. Gilgen. Our tour driver left us there to drive the minivan around the head of the lake to St Wolfgang where she would pick us up again when our boat docked. The boat ride was a pleasant relaxation as we sipped hot chocolate and cruised past small villages and pretty tourist resorts some of whom were in hot pools; there were high mountains all around the lake. At St Wolfgang our driver led us on a walking tour through the narrow streets full of souvenir shops and cafes. The buildings were pretty with all their window boxes full of bright flowers. She stopped outside a hotel painted red with a picture of a white horse prominently displayed and explained that this was the hotel that inspired the operetta White Horse Inn for which Robert Stolz wrote the music. After our tour we hurried back to our hotel to get ready for our evening entertainment. John had booked a dinner and show for twenty of us called The Sound of Music Show, would you believe. The dinner, well, it satisfied the inner being and nothing else; the show, yes it was entertaining and interesting. It started with a pianist thumping (descriptive) away at the piano as a prelude to a short black and white film picturing an elderly Maria von Trapp telling us in English about the von Trapp children and how the Captain asked her to marry him. Then four actor/singers continued to tells us more with song and dance. They sang songs from the film as well as tunes from light opera. After a short interlude we were shown another short film, this time Maria von Trapp narrated their escape from Austria in 1938. This was followed by more song and dance this time with audience participation. We caught the tram back to our hotel and retired for the night at 11pm. We had had a big day. Again! Our stay in Salzburg has been good.
Pictures show:- View from our room at the Europa Hotel, Sound of Music Gazebo and The White horse Inn.
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