September 19 - Trip Day 37 - Salzburg
Our day in Salzburg was a lot of fun. I think this was my fourth trip to Salzburg, but I like it a lot, and we saw some things I'd never been to before, so it was still good.
After breakfast at the hotel, we walked to the old town, wandered around the narrow twisty streets, and bought a Salzburg Card, which lets you into a bunch of museums and attractions for free. I think the calculation was that if we did Fortress Salzburg and one other expensive thing, it would come out even, and then anything else we did would just be bonus.
We rode the funicular up to the fortress, which I'd never done before. Quick but fun! The castle/fortress was awesome as always. There was a museum which I hadn't seen before, either - not sure if it's new, or if it used to be a separate entry fee but now it's included. I think it may have been new, or at least newly renovated. Maybe it was under construction last time I visited? Anyway, it was very good. The marionette museum was strange and slightly creepy. The tour of the main building is the same as it was the last two or three times I took it but it hasn't gotten old for me yet.
When you take the funicular down, you exit through an odd little exhibit about the history of waterworks in Salzburg: canals dug by monks, globes of rock polished in a water-run apparatus, that kind of thing. There was also a drinking fountain where you could theoretically try the water, but it was out of service.
We went into the Salzburg cathedral, of course. That was nice. Outside, they were setting up a festival for the saint's day of Salzburg's patron saint. We bought some candied nuts and peeked in to the beer tent but it was kind of early for a beer.
We also rode the Mönchbergs lift, which is just an elevator up to the top of a hill where there's an art museum. Not that exciting. We didn't actually even go to the art museum. We just rode the elevator because it costs a couple bucks but was free with the Salzburg Card and there was a nice view of Salzburg from the top.
We did go into the catacombs, which I guess aren't real catacombs. They're a couple little church service and meditation rooms carved into the rock, as well as a room where they'd store bodies or bones until they could be buried. Not much to see, but interesting and historical.
Finally, to get the most out of our Salzburg Card, we went to Stiegl Brewery, which is a mile or two outside of the old town.
We only had an hour at the museum because it was getting toward closing time. A shame, in hindsight - the museum was very good! We both agreed that the best part was the exhibit on barrel making. Making a barrel takes a lot of work, it turns out! A large brewery like Stiegl needed so many barrels that they actually had their own in-house coopers to produce the barrels. It was so interesting to learn how this element of the beer trade that I'd never even thought about was actually very important, not so very long ago, and a skilled trade all to itself.
The exhibits on the history of Stiegl were also very interesting. They've been brewing beer for hundreds of years. It was neat to see how many women's names were on the list of brewmasters, even way back in the 1600s. The exhibit about how sad and weak the beer was during the wars, on account of rationing and all, was also fascinating.
Our museum entry also came with a "Bierverkostung," beer tasting. That was cool because you got a certain number of samples but you could pick which ones you wanted from their extensive menu. Jonathan and I teamed up to try the maximum possible variety, of course. Some of the beer was so-so but some it was excellent.
After the beer adventure, we went and had dinner at an Indian restaurant we'd spotted earlier in the Old Town. It was great to have Indian food again after so long. The food was pretty good.
Finally, maybe around 8ish, we got on the train to Munich. We were able to use the Bavaria Ticket so it wasn't expensive to get back, plus we could take any of the RE trains so there was no stress about missing the train. The two-hour ride back was perfectly fine. We changed trains at Ostbahnhof to get to Höhenkirchen-Siegertsbrunn, and finally settled back in to the bedroom we had briefly occupied some 36 days prior!
(Sorry for the lack of pictures. Like I said, I've been to Salzburg a bunch, so I didn't feel a need to take lots of photos.)
After breakfast at the hotel, we walked to the old town, wandered around the narrow twisty streets, and bought a Salzburg Card, which lets you into a bunch of museums and attractions for free. I think the calculation was that if we did Fortress Salzburg and one other expensive thing, it would come out even, and then anything else we did would just be bonus.
We rode the funicular up to the fortress, which I'd never done before. Quick but fun! The castle/fortress was awesome as always. There was a museum which I hadn't seen before, either - not sure if it's new, or if it used to be a separate entry fee but now it's included. I think it may have been new, or at least newly renovated. Maybe it was under construction last time I visited? Anyway, it was very good. The marionette museum was strange and slightly creepy. The tour of the main building is the same as it was the last two or three times I took it but it hasn't gotten old for me yet.
When you take the funicular down, you exit through an odd little exhibit about the history of waterworks in Salzburg: canals dug by monks, globes of rock polished in a water-run apparatus, that kind of thing. There was also a drinking fountain where you could theoretically try the water, but it was out of service.
We went into the Salzburg cathedral, of course. That was nice. Outside, they were setting up a festival for the saint's day of Salzburg's patron saint. We bought some candied nuts and peeked in to the beer tent but it was kind of early for a beer.
We also rode the Mönchbergs lift, which is just an elevator up to the top of a hill where there's an art museum. Not that exciting. We didn't actually even go to the art museum. We just rode the elevator because it costs a couple bucks but was free with the Salzburg Card and there was a nice view of Salzburg from the top.
We did go into the catacombs, which I guess aren't real catacombs. They're a couple little church service and meditation rooms carved into the rock, as well as a room where they'd store bodies or bones until they could be buried. Not much to see, but interesting and historical.
Finally, to get the most out of our Salzburg Card, we went to Stiegl Brewery, which is a mile or two outside of the old town.
We only had an hour at the museum because it was getting toward closing time. A shame, in hindsight - the museum was very good! We both agreed that the best part was the exhibit on barrel making. Making a barrel takes a lot of work, it turns out! A large brewery like Stiegl needed so many barrels that they actually had their own in-house coopers to produce the barrels. It was so interesting to learn how this element of the beer trade that I'd never even thought about was actually very important, not so very long ago, and a skilled trade all to itself.
The exhibits on the history of Stiegl were also very interesting. They've been brewing beer for hundreds of years. It was neat to see how many women's names were on the list of brewmasters, even way back in the 1600s. The exhibit about how sad and weak the beer was during the wars, on account of rationing and all, was also fascinating.
Our museum entry also came with a "Bierverkostung," beer tasting. That was cool because you got a certain number of samples but you could pick which ones you wanted from their extensive menu. Jonathan and I teamed up to try the maximum possible variety, of course. Some of the beer was so-so but some it was excellent.
After the beer adventure, we went and had dinner at an Indian restaurant we'd spotted earlier in the Old Town. It was great to have Indian food again after so long. The food was pretty good.
Finally, maybe around 8ish, we got on the train to Munich. We were able to use the Bavaria Ticket so it wasn't expensive to get back, plus we could take any of the RE trains so there was no stress about missing the train. The two-hour ride back was perfectly fine. We changed trains at Ostbahnhof to get to Höhenkirchen-Siegertsbrunn, and finally settled back in to the bedroom we had briefly occupied some 36 days prior!
(Sorry for the lack of pictures. Like I said, I've been to Salzburg a bunch, so I didn't feel a need to take lots of photos.)