Salzburg

After having spent a few days in the Allgau Mountain Bavarain postcard land, Whitney and I took the long way through Austria en route to Salzburg. By way of Lindau, and Innsbruck, the road tucked itself beneath towering snowclad cliffs, all the while rolling through the inescapable bavarian pasture-scape. Normally quite an attentive, safe right lane driver, the views had me pointing at this cabin or that ruin, wouldn't that be a nice ski tour, wow look at that... swerving all havoc like and scaring the passenger.

Salzburg was where Wolfgang A. Mozart was born, and you won't forget it. His birth house is on main street in old town, the house he lived in his adolecence is right across the river, and his balls are for sale in every store in town. Mozart Chocolate Balls. Click on the link for this blog entry.

Apparently this is what happens to you if you become famous in Austria. They use your name to market chocoballs and then build a goat-legged, leprositic, too much lipstick wearin' statue of you. What will they do with the guy that invented Red Bull?

Old town is compact and beautiful, medieval and civilized all at once. Cliffs backdrop 700 year old buildings, spirous chuches ubiquitous as Starbucks, and a never-conquered castle looms atop the city. Castles are cool.

Our first night in Salzburg, we got tickets to see a string quartet in the castle above town. The main course of course was Mozart, including Ein kleine Nachtmusik, with a Vivaldi piece thrown in to mix things up. A far more intimate musical experience than a full orchestra, or say, a Springsteen concert, we both left feeling... whatever you would have said late 18th century in place of "groovy".