Thursday, Sept. 16 – Today was an interesting day. Jay gave me two challenges for today. He wanted me to pick up some gummy bears from a certain store and to pick up some pastries from a bakery that we visited when we had our intercultural training. These gummy bears are softer than what you can buy in the stores. We only remembered the general area that we visited. Amazingly enough I managed to find them both. It only took me about 2 hours. If I knew where I was going this would normally only take about 45 minutes to do. It is amazing what you see when you are just out walking. I managed to come across two gay male prostitutes. People were gathering and snapping pictures as they approached a car. I only wished I could have gotten my camera out quicker. They were definitely a site. They were wearing high heels and very short shorts, which one can only imagine how everything was covered.
Friday, Sept. 17 – Jay has been telling me for a week that we were going to go away for the weekend, but he wouldn’t tell me where we were going. Jay took the day off and told me that we were going to the Salzburg, Austria area. Salzburg is only a two hour drive on the Autobahn from Munich. This is the place that the Sound of Music was filmed. We arrived at the hotel around noon in the city of Fuschlsee. The weather was cool and rainy, but that was OK – we were in the mountains (Brian calls the mountains “My Happy Place”). The hotel that we are staying at is in the mountain and lake area of Austria called Salzkammergut. The side of the hotel that we are on has a creek running right next to it. Friday afternoon we went on a city tour of Salzburg. We saw where Mozart was born and the house he lived in.
Our breakfast and dinner were included in the package. Friday night when we went to dinner, they had a table reserved for us with our name on the table. We were told that this was our table for our entire stay. Dinner Friday was a buffet and they called it “The Farmers Buffet”. They had pork, of course, ham, two types of sausage (white and red), spetzel (which are a type of noodle), dumplings, (too many starchy foods) a salad bar and a dessert bar. The apple struddle was really good.
Saturday, Sept. 18 – Breakfast was your typical Bavarian breakfast – several different meats and cheeses, and always sausage, bread, tomatoes. They also had scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage and cereal. On our table they had the evening dinner menu which we had to choose our main entrée of the four course meal. Jay ordered fish and I had turkey cordon blue. They also had their version of the Morning Post which listed ideas what to do in the area and the weather report for the weekend.
This morning we went on a “Sound of Music” tour. The weather was cool and sunny. The tour stopped at several of the locations where the Sound of Music was filmed. On the way to the different locations we listened to the soundtrack of the Sound of Music. We stopped at a small lake where one of the scenes was filmed. This was the Von Trappe home in the movie. We also stopped at St. Michael’s church in Mondsee, where the wedding took place. St. Michael’s was absolutely amazing. St. Michael’s was built in 748. There was a wedding going on, but we were still able to go inside and take pictures. We walked around the town and stopped at the Cafe’ Braun for some apple strudel, sitting at a table outside in the sun. We met three girls from California who were going to school in Rome. They were on a week break from classes.
When we return to Salzburg, we went on a walking tour of the Hohensalzburg Fortress, which sits on a hill overlooking Salzburg. The name means "High Salzburg Fortress". The construction was started in 1077 and was added to over the centuries until the 17th century by the various archbishops who ruled Salzburg. The fortress is the largest best preserved example of a medieval castle in Europe. One section of the castle is occupied by artists who are allowed to live in the castle.
Sunday, Sept. 19 – We went on a cable car ride to the top of a mountain in St. Gilgen. You can see the leaves just starting to change. It should be really pretty in about a week or so. We took a little hike and had a coffee and hot chocolate at a restaurant on the mountain. The weather was cool and sunny. We decided to go to the town of Hallstatt and go on a tour of salt mine tour. This salt mine is the world’s oldest. During World War II works of art were stored in tunnels at another salt mine in Altaussee, which is the largest active salt mine in Austria. These are all in the Salzburg area. Salz is German for salt and Salzburg was the salt center of the world for 100’s of years.
Monday, Sept. 20 – We went to Oktoberfest. Yes, we wore our Bavarian outfits. Most of the people are wearing their lederhosen and dirndls. This is the 200th year for Oktoberfest. Oktoberfest runs for 16 days and they expect over 6 million visitors. Munich only has 1.5 million people that live here. The tradition is that on the first Saturday of Oktoberfest they have a parade with all of the Munich breweries and at 12:00 sharp the mayor of Munich taps open the first keg. The major calls out “O’zapft is” confirming that the tapping was successful. After the first keg is open all the other breweries can then start serving their beer. There are tents from each brewery that have their headquarters in Munich. These tents can hold up to 10,000 people. The tables inside are small and you sit with ten of your closest friends. If they are not your friends before, they will be by the end. The Oktoberfest grounds are set up with food and drink booths and they also have your typical carnival rides, very similar to Houston’s Rodeo.
The tent that we were in was the Schottenhamel. In 1867 the Schottenhamel tent was a small beer booth that only seated 50, but now it is the largest with 10,000 seats. The Schottenhamel is one of the most important tents, because that is where the Mayor taps the first keg for Oktoberfest. You have to have tickets to be able to get into the tents for a reserved table. Munich Re had 26 tables reserved for that night. Later in the evening you can go into the other tents. Each tent is decorated differently. They only serve one size of beer. They serve only liters. That’s a lot of beer!!!! With the reserved table you get two liters of beer and ½ a chicken. The chicken has pretty good, or it seemed to be after the first liter of beer. There are bands playing in each of the tents. The band in ours was really good. They play all kinds of music, German, but also quite a bit of American music, and yes they played YMCA. Everyone one gets up and stands on the benches and sings along while the band is playing. We had a great time and we are going back next Monday.
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