Day 28

One of the perks of this SAMO program here, is a free bus ride into Salzburg. How awesome is that?! So we got up and readied ourselves for the trip. As we were getting ready, we realized Abby has forgotten her camera in the electric car from yesterday....classic Abby. So her and I hustle down to the car park and see that the car is already gone for the day and the rental shop isn't open yet. So we walked to the info centre to get on the bus. The bus ride to Salzburg was actually quite quick and only took about 45 minutes. The landscaped changed drastically as we exited Werfen. The tall mountains shrank into lower hills and by the time we reached Salzburg there were only a couple of mountains in the distance. Salzburg was in a fairly flat area despite

the three main hills that poked up in Salzburg.

We didn't really have a plan as what we were going to do today. Mostly just wander and see some of the things mentioned in the Rick Steves' travel videos. We were dropped of near the Hohensalzburg fortress which was quite majestic. It was the largest fortress we had come across on our trip so far. We made our way up to the entrance but decided against going inside because we thought it would eat up most of our day. We had to be back at the bus at 4pm and none of us were that interested in spending all our time walking around the fortress. We have the basic gist from all the other museums, castles, and fortresses we've seen.

So we continued on walking on top of the hill that this fortress was on. It was like a large park with a trail passing through it, that brought you along some spectacular views of the city. At one such lookout, we

found a cleverly placed geocache that was made to look like it was tied to the end of Rapunzel's hair hanging out of a tower. As we neared the end of the park, we realized that at the end was the famed monastery/beer garden. We were hungry and stopped in for lunch. We ordered sausages, hoping for something amazing, but were disappointed when we brought hot dogs. That's the second time in Austria that has happened. I really need to learn how to ask for farmer sausage in German. We also tried a beer because that's what they are known for. As with every other beer I've tried, it was awful. Josiah and Jen as tried the beer and disliked it as well. Between the three of us we couldn't even finish one beer. So lunch was a bit of bust.

We continued on, crossing over the river that runs through the middle of town, to find Mirabel gardens. This is was where parts of the

famed Sound of Music was filmed. It was a beautiful garden but I was hot and still a little bummed about lunch to truly enjoy it. Plus it's mostly just flowers. Jen was pretty ecstatic though, humming tunes form the movie as she walked around. From there we headed back over the bridge to find Mozart's birthplace and childhood home. Once again, we really didn't have time to go in. So we slowly made our way back to the bus, not before finding another cleverly hidden geocache.

When we arrived back in Werfenweng, we went and picked up some groceries, finally. We took the slowest golf cart in history up to our place and then returned to town for dinner. The kids weren't that interested in anything so we sent them home. Jen and I found a buffet of meat! Kebabs, chicken wings, and sausages (good ones) that we gorged ourselves with. They also had unlimited drinks, including beer and wine, which we have already discovered we didn't really like, so it was a waste on us. For dessert, donuts that weren't dried

out and Bavarian cream.....mmmmmmmm. After finding some free wi-fi and surfing the net for a bit, I took the kids down to the park where they played for awhile. Jen was able to finished up a blog post in the dark with that wi-fi connection.