Day 1 – Saturday (20/12/2014)
We arrived in Salzburg around 11am and went to the airport information center to find out how to get to our hotel, which was outside the city center. We took two buses (10 and 21, paying 2.50 euros per person on each bus) to get there and despite there being nothing written or spoken in English inside the bus or at the stops where we waited, we managed to get there just fine.
Our hotel #1
The hotel is far from the city center, as I mentioned above, but there is a bus stop very close by with bus schedules for weekdays, Saturdays, Sundays and holidays. All bus stops in the city have these schedules. timetables, so just look before you go out for a walk so you don't have to wait too long.
We chose the Blogger Hof (rated 9.2 on Booking) for this first part of the stay in the city.
It is a very cozy house, with a chalet style, a beautiful view of the Austrian Alps, a restaurant that is well rated on TripAdvisor and the owners are very friendly and helpful. They gave us a room with single beds pushed together, but as soon as I asked if I could change to a room with a double bed, the owner moved us to one with a beautiful view of the mountains. We loved it!
We left our things in the room and went out for a walk. We took bus 21 towards the city center and got off very close to the Salzach river. This river cuts the city in half and most of the attractions are on the Old Town side. We got off on this side and started walking around, with the help of a map we got at the airport and the guidebook we brought from Austria.
Our first Christmas Market
We entered a Christmas Market that was in DomPlatz square and I found it simply wonderful with its cute little shops with Christmas decorations and contagious energy. Everyone was beaming! We ate some typical snacks to stave off our hunger, because we didn't want to stop at a restaurant for lunch with so many new things to see, right?
Salzburger Dom
Then we went to the city's first cathedral, the Salzburger Dom, with capacity for 10 thousand faithful and we love its interior with baroque architecture. The city's first cathedral was built in the 8th century, but after many renovations and a fire, the archbishops decided to rebuild it with the help of an Italian architect, leaving it ready in 1628. Just look how beautiful it is:
From there, we walked along the riverbank and passed a square with many carriages and an artist dressed as Mozart, who, for those who don't know, was born in Salzburg and is the city's great pride. In addition to him, the city is also proud to have been the setting for the film Sound of Music.
We entered the Franciscan Church, which is a Gothic church that underwent several architectural changes when it took over as the city’s cathedral, while the Dom was being rebuilt. We found a kiosk that sold delicious chicken, which filled our stomachs very well. What delicious Austrian food, huh…
We then entered the beautiful Kollegian Church, consecrated in 1707. It is considered one of the most beautiful baroque buildings in the city and it impresses because of the excellent light that enters it. Luckily for us, when we entered it, we could hear the choir rehearsing and we took the opportunity to relax. I love church choirs! 🙂
Main Street / Goldgasse
We left and went to the most famous street of the city, the Main Street, which is pedestrian-only and all the shops have their names printed on beautiful metal plaques. It's a delight to walk along this street, even though it's very busy. We then passed another famous street, Goldgasse, which is also a pedestrian street, famous for its jewelry stores. It is very pretty and is narrower than the first one.
We walked around the city center until nightfall because the vibe of the place was so good. When the shops and Christmas markets started to close, we took our bus back to the hotel. We had dinner there, since we saw that the restaurant had a good rating on TripAdvisor (#9 out of 493 restaurants, at the time). We loved the food, but the service wasn't all that great, because it really is a family restaurant, with a small staff and not much extravagance. You have to go there with patience. We ordered the most famous dish in Austria, a Schnitzel and it was great! The best thing of all was arriving at the room in less than 2 minutes, without having to take transportation.
Oh, and you should know that we only visited free places on this day. It was on purpose! Keep reading to understand why…
Day 2 – Sunday (12/21/2014)
We took advantage of this day to enter the city's paid attractions and bought the Salzburg Card, which allows you to enter several tourist attractions for free, as well as having transportation included. It cost 23 euros per person for 24 hours and from our calculations, it was well worth it. There are cards for 48 hours and 72 hours too, so it's worth looking into that. website the values and attractions included.
Hohensalzburg Festival
We went straight to the fortress Hohensalzburg Festival, which is the city's main attraction and is located right on top of the Festungsberg mountain in the Old Town. It was built in the 11th century, during the wars between the Holy Roman Empire and the Papacy, but its current appearance dates back to the 16th century. It is beautiful from the outside, from below, and up close too, when you take the tour for it, but don't expect a castle with impressive rooms. It's a fortress, so the facilities are much simpler, of course. The view you have from up there is breathtaking – very, very beautiful! Oh, and an important detail: we went up by funicular Festungsbahn, which was also free with this card, and we walked back through the narrow streets that surround the fortress. I thought it was a great combination, because the walk up seemed quite tiring, especially with the amount of clothing we were wearing because of the cold.
Residence
After the fortress, we entered the Residence, which is the seat of the Prince-Archbishop of Salzburg, secular and religious regent of the entire province and is located right in front of the city's cathedral and ResidenzPlatz. We did the tour there too and I thought it was worth it, because the State Rooms They are to die for. It's a shame you can't take pictures, so if you want to get an idea, check out the photos on Google here. That tour takes you to a gallery with works from the 16th to the 19th century, to those rooms that are in the link, to inside the Dom, but on the upper floor where the organ is, and to inside the monastery that is there, with a cool exhibition about their lives.
We walked to the Museum of Modernity Monchsberg, from where we took an elevator to the top to see the view of the city from up there. The museum itself didn't interest us, but for those who like Modern Art, it might be a good one. The view from up there, as we expected, is also beautiful and well worth it! We walked up there and passed by a very cool wall, which we later discovered had a trail that leads to the fortress.
St Peter's Church
We took the elevator down and went to the Benedictine abbey. St Peter's Church, which is the the only 7th century abbey that remains intact in Europe. The church and monastery were built in the 12th and 13th centuries respectively, but were later renovated in the 17th and 18th centuries. This is where the oldest cemetery in the city is located, where Mozart's sister is buried, for those who are interested. You can also visit the oldest restaurant in Austria, the St Peter's Church, which is the oldest restaurant in Europe with over 1200 years of history.
Mozart's Wedding
After there, we went to the house where the Mozart was born in 1756 and lived until he was 17, Mozart's Wedding, which is on that first pedestrian street I mentioned above (Getreidegasse). It's a 5-story building and his house was on the top floor. I missed the real stuff about his family, but I thought it was worth the visit. We left there, crossed the river and went to Mozart's other house, the Mozart Wonhaus (or Mozart Residence), which was rebuilt after the Second World War. It was less than half an hour before closing when we entered, so we had to rush to see everything.
We took the bus to the hotel because we had to get ready for the our super dinner with concert in the oldest restaurant in the city, the St Peter's Church. We had a nasty surprise with the timetable of our bus on Sunday, as it only ran practically every hour, so we ended up taking a taxi (10 euros).
We were seated at a table with 5 other women, 3 from South Africa and 2 from Australia. We chatted a lot while we waited for the food and concert. I thought we would have dinner and then watch the concert (or vice versa), but we soon realized that the music alternated with the dinner courses, making the wait for the food much more enjoyable and dynamic. The musicians were excellent and the room where we had dinner was beautifully decorated! (It cost 65 euros, without drinks)
Leaving on Monday (12/22/2014)
We had a delicious breakfast at the hotel, we made checkout and we took advantage of the fact that our card was still valid to take the bus for free to the city center. From there, we took a bus to Bad Ischl and then a train to Hallstatt, but you can read all about this tour in this other post here.
From there we then went to Melk, Vienna, Budapest and Bratislava (see the summary of the 16-day trip here) and we went back to Salzburg to enjoy a few more days and catch the flight back to Dublin. Keep reading to find out what we did there. 🙂
Returning on Thursday (01/01/2015)
We took a train from Bratislava and arrived at Salzburg's main train station around 6pm, completely surrounded by snow. What a treat to see the city now with snow! We took the #2 bus to our second hotel in the city, the Best Western Plus Amedia Art, which was the cheapest we found for the end of our trip.
Our hotel #2
It's far from everything, but if you know the bus schedules that pass by nearby and take you to the attractions, it's easy. Best Western Plus Amedia Art It's modern and comfortable, but I thought it was absurd to have only one person for reception and the bar on a day that was certainly busy, because the end-of-year break would only end on January 4th. We waited in line to speak to this one person at reception, and on top of that, he wasn't very friendly. We weren't feeling well enough to go out for dinner, so I went to a nearby convenience store (SPAR) and bought some things to have in our room and have breakfast the next day.
Day 3 – Friday (02/01/2015)
We left the hotel super excited about the amount of snow on the streets. We felt like building a snowman everywhere. <3
Mirabel Palace
We went straight to the famous Mirabel Palace, which is in Cidade Nova, as that is where they filmed the movie Sound of Music and we loved the movie. In 1606, the area where the palace stands today was used by Archbishop Wolf Dietrich to build a much simpler mansion for his mistress and their 15 children. In 1727, von Hildebrandt rebuilt the palace in the Baroque style, which was almost completely destroyed in a fire in 1818. The gardens are very famous, as is the Angels' Staircase, but unfortunately we couldn't see many details because everything was covered in snow. Oh, and you can't go inside the palace because it's now a government building.
We entered the church in front of the palace, Andrakirche, and then we went to the other side of the river, to visit the Benedictine convent Nonnberg Stift, Founded in 714, but almost completely destroyed in a fire in the 15th century. This convent is that of Maria Von Trapp, the main character in the film The Sound of Music. We only visited the church, which is very pretty, but we went up to enjoy the view, which is beautiful.
We walked to the Kapuzinerkirche and Monastery, which is a church and a monastery on top of a mountain, the Kapuzinerberg, which is in the New Town. We found a staircase near where the map told us to climb and off we went. After a few minutes, we arrived at the St Johann am Imberg church, from 1681, and to our delight, we could already see part of the view. We continued climbing to the top (a total of 250 steps) and fell in love with the view. I think it was the most beautiful view of the entire trip, because it is the Old Town right in front of you, with the fortress, Dom, etc. We spent quite a while there…
We went to have lunch/dinner at the restaurant Sternbrau, from 1542, and we ordered delicious typical dishes. I don't remember the name of what I ate, but Celo ordered the Schnitzel, which according to him, was not as good as the one in Bloberger Hof. We returned to the hotel hoping to wake up early the next day to go skiing.
Day 4 – Saturday (01/03/2015)
We couldn't leave the hotel early and when we arrived at the train station, around 11am, we went to the OBB counter and said that we wanted to ski at the nearest place. The saleswoman explained to us that we could catch a train at noon to St Johan im Pongau, which would take 1 hour, but since the lifts closed around 4pm, so we would have had about 2 hours of fun. Given the cost of the train (60 euros per person, round trip) and the cost of renting the equipment (about 20/30 euros per person), we didn't think it was worth spending all that money just for 2 hours of fun. We left a little frustrated, but as soon as we went to the information desk to see what else we could see, the attendant gave us a great tip, which I have to share: Cable Car Untersberg.
Cable Car Untersberg
This cable car is located a little outside the city, costs 21 euros and, believe it or not, it goes up more than 1,800 meters on a mountain in the region. With the Salzburg Card (23 euros), it is free. We bought the card right there with the attendant, took bus 25 towards the cable car and when we got on we were surprised by a breathtaking view. The Alps were right there in front of us and we could play in the snow as much as we wanted to do when we were skiing. By the way, if you have your ski equipment ski, you can ski right there on the mountain, paying only for the cable car. I think it’s worth it, because we saw several people doing it. After playing a lot in the snow, we stopped to eat at a restaurant up there, which is very cozy by the way. I think the family that served us lives up there on the second floor, that is, 1800 meters high. I wanted to ask, but I just wondered… Do they really live there? What is life like there?
When it was almost time to take the cable car back, the weather started to get darker and the fog started to set in. It was a good thing we arrived early and were able to enjoy the view, because some people arrived when we were going down and therefore didn't see anything.
HellBrunn Palace
We took bus 25 back into the city and decided to stop at the famous HellBrunn Palace, which was the former summer residence of Archbishop Marcus Sitticus. It is located halfway between the cable car and the city and since we knew that the next bus would be there in 20 minutes, we had time to see the Palace only from the outside. The cool thing about it is the garden and the ornamental fountains, but since it was all snowy, we couldn't see them very well.
We returned to the hotel, rested and went out for dinner at Augustiner Brau, which is a brewery founded in 1621 by monks. It's a bit of a scam there self-service, then you go to the counter to order the huge mugs of beer that they make themselves, and on the other side you choose what to eat from the snack bars that are there. In the summer, there are some huge tables outside, in the style of Biergarten, but we stayed inside the hall itself, which has an interesting decoration. Both the food and the beer were great. It was worth it!
Day 5 – Sunday (04/01/2015)
Our flight to Dublin left around 2pm, but we arrived at the airport around 11am (bus 2), because we wanted to take advantage of the free bus ride. Salzburg Card. We also thought about buying drinks at duty free, because we saw that the supermarkets in the city were much cheaper compared to Dublin, but we only came across expensive and unknown things. It was super frustrating. To make matters worse, the airport is tiny, so we had to sit and wait, because there was nothing else to see. There was no golden key in the end... lol.
If I could go back in time, I would play in the snow and pay for the bus!
To learn more about this trip we took, see the posts below:
