A Musical Encounter with Salzburg

Salzburg, Austria 

Once we landed in Munich, our expectations for the day were borderline explosive. Welled up inside of us was the ridiculous excitement of seeing all that we expected Austria to be:  full of mountains to dance on, musical cow bells, Salzburg and the singing fountain, and the tucked away fairy-tale village of Hallstatt. Surely enough, once our friend Phillip picked us up from the airport we drove past picturesque German homes with the Austrian Alps etched in the distant horizon. They sang to us then, and our day was destined to be Austria in a nutshell.

Salzburg was quaint in most respects. The only thing booming was a street market full of sweet breads and cheeses, not the typical tourist hub I expected it to be. We fluttered around the iconic fountain from Sound of Music like little fairy nymphs (it was Sound of Music's 50th anniversary!), and toured the Hohensalzburg fortress that stood above the city like a stone gargoyle perched on top its home. This cliff-top fortress is 900 years old, which is one of the biggest and best preserved in Europe. It gave a breath-taking chest-squeezing view of the city it guarded. On our ascent to it, we happily took refuge at a beirgarten for beer, schnitzel, and spaetzle. We stopped at the Salzburg Cathedral, a 17th century Borque cathedral with the right about of painted buttresses and awe inspiring echoes. It was the same place where Mozart himself was baptized.

Music seemed to infuse the stone cobbled streets, whether it was your own shoes against them or the excited voices that bounced off them. Down the small street where Mozart was born we munched on Mozart Ball, a foiled chocolate and nutty ball with Mozart's silhouette printed on it. It was delicious! We were charmed like a snake, almost drugged with Salzburg's tunes and melodies.