Month: September 2016

Last night’s sleep was much better.  Sleep came easier and even when we woke up, we were able to fall back asleep pretty easily.  The only problem was the heat, it was so stinking hot in our room.  We opened the windows, but didn’t want to sleep too much with the screen-less windows open to the courtyard. We ended up with some good sleep and hopefully, crossing our fingers, we have finally adjusted to the time change and overcome jet lag.

We really picked the right hotels for breakfast though! The dining room that we ate breakfast in was beautifully decorated with a full breakfast buffet with some of the freshest fruit, creamiest creams, and tiny shot glasses for juice.  Thanks Rick Steves for the hotel recommendations!

Then came the big moment, one of the things that both of us were really looking forward to, our first big tour! The Sound of Music Tour!! Our tour bus, or our tour minivan really, was waiting for us outside our hotel a little early which made me think that there were going to be a ton of other people we were going to have to pick up. NOPE, that was not the case, there was no one else to pick up! It was going to be our very own private tour because no one else had signed up! Two thumbs up for shoulder season travel! I was expecting this to be a fun tour where we saw some cool sights from the Sound of Music, and we did. We stopped at the house where they did the outside shots and of course the gazebo! But that wasn’t even close to the best part of the tour.

The BEST part was the Austrian scenery. It is an incredibly beautiful country, in fact I don’t know if I have been anywhere else in the world that is as spectacular. My breath was taken away on countless occasions, from the mountains to the incredibly green rolling hills of the country side and the spectacular mountain lakes. I don’t think there will be anything as amazing on the rest of our trip and that makes me a little sad, wish we had booked more time to spend in Austria.  I guess there is a good excuse to come back! It was amazing and we got so much more than we bargained for.

There was one stop on our tour that really got me thinking. It was the church in Sound of Music where Maria and Captain Von Trapp get married. The church, or technically it is a Basilica, is basically set up for tourist and is even includes a gift shop as you enter. The church itself is covered in lots of very impressive sculptures and paintings. But I came to a realization that the church decided to spend money on making itself look good, instead of more important things. This led us to some really good discussion with our driver/tour guide about why Martin Luther left the catholic church, leaving mainly because he felt they weren’t focusing enough on the teaching of Jesus. Don’t get me wrong, the church is beautiful, but it felt strange.

That was the end of our official tour, but we got plenty of more great scenery as we drove back into Salzburg. Just one more note, on our tour guide. He was what I would classify as stereotypical Austrian and I don’t remember his name, but he did a great job (only been doing the tour guide stuff for 2 weeks) even if he did smell like cheese. He even tried to turn on Sound of Music songs to get us to sing along, but quickly turned it off when he realized we were enjoying the scenery and conversation with him about Austria too much to sing along. It really was a great tour! Maybe even the highlight of the entire trip! Now we can’t wait to go back to spectacular Austria!

As we arrived ready to get to our hotel, we were confused again and walked out the wrong side of the train station.  Now most likely this is because we are both in a deep jet lag haze that it was hard to communicate.  This could have been a reason …or maybe it was because I was trying to use the map from Rick Steves Germany on my Kindle, which does not zoom in so easily.  I’m glad we took that detour because I was able to take a picture of an Austrian Post Office for my brother, who collects pictures of post offices from all over the world, but mainly the USA.  Eventually, we figured out the right direction to go, the exact 180 degrees from where we had gone and went for an adventure walking around Salzburg to find our hotel!  We did find the hotel without too much problem, once we got our bearings using the little map in Rick Steves Germany!  It was a hard walk with all our gear and in a haze, but we made it!

Hotel Wolf Dietrich was our home for the next couple nights and it was very nice!  Of course, it would have been better if our room had more than zero ventilation, but we weren’t staying in the room now, because we had coffee and cakes to eat!  Very helpful for a traveling couple to plan out their night enjoying a hotel provided coffee and some Austrian cakes.

We decided that our first stop would be to take a walk down to Old Town Salzburg and that was really fun!  The old-looking shops, shop signs and the cobbled streets really made it feel old, and it is!  This definitely feels like the touristy area though as there are lots of people around and tons of construction going on around the area, which is most likely getting ready for the high season.  Not going to lie, kind of like being here in a less crowded time means more room for us!  After walking around the shops, we walked down the street to Mozart Platz, or Mozart Place.  You see, Mozart is a native Salzburgian and they are very proud of that fact!  It was so crazy to see a bronze statue of the man in the middle of his square, which is not something I am used to seeing around where we live, though where we live hasn’t been around that long. We walked around the corner of Mozart Platz to see a super cool fountain that even had water coming out the horse’s nose (as pictured above). This was enjoyable for a couple who were a little out of it like we were.

After seeing these sites, we were hungry and decided on a place that was just a little ways away from where we were. Unfortunately, it turned into quite the adventure to find the restaurant. This was good and bad. Good because it was nice to get off the beaten path and see some new things with almost no one around. Bad because my world at that time was spinning and I had a monster headache, which most likely this was a combination of low blood sugar and lack of sleep from the jet lag. We actually walked past the restaurant once, not thinking it was the right place and then eventually back tracked to this small little place called Zirkelwirt.

This is where I truly experienced a different kind of lifestyle in another country. As we walked in, the waitress asked us, “Do you have a reservation?”, to which we responded, “No.” Then she looks over her clipboard, mind you the restaurant has like three empty tables, and asks us if an hour and a half will be OK. Thinking that we had to wait an hour and half I start to walk out, but my wife realizes she was asking if we could eat in an hour and half. Wow!  In America we probably eat in less than half an hour!  This place is awesome! Our favorite restaurant!  Great food (a giant bowl of spätzle) and a delicious beer.  We had so much leftover that we were able to give some to a homeless person on the street.  It was a great day seeing so many different things.  Started in Brussels and ended with a giant bowl of spätzle in Salzburg! Now time to get some sleep….hopefully!

I need to start this day by saying that Jet Lag is a stupid buger. We thought we had done it right, got as much sleep as we could on the plane, but not too much. Stayed up during all of our train rides and gone to bed at a nice 10pm in Belgium. Well even though we were unbelievably exhausted after all of that travel and we had passed out pretty quickly, we still woke up only 2 hours later and struggled to fall back to sleep. We decided that it would be best to fight through the tiredness today and hope that our bodies could reset and get a good nights rest. The way that we planned it though, there wasn’t much to do on this day. As referenced by the title, today is a day full of train rides. From Brussels all the way down to Salzburg, Austria. Looking forward to some first class train travel as we use our train passes for the first time.

Train #1, Thayls, Brussels, Belgium to Köln, Germany: Up bright and early for this one after an awesome breakfast at Hotel Ibis. It sure is beautiful here in the Belgian countryside. Very excited to get to Germany. It is interesting to see that as we entered Germany there was a change in the way that buildings look. You can really tell when we cross the border. Nice short ride into Köln, a little nervous about figuring out passes, but left plenty of time in between trains to make sure to have time to get them validated.

As we got into the station, it took some time to figure out where to go. Eventually, we found our way to the right offices and it was fairly easy to get the passes validated. Actually, we found the right spot on the first try! Also, we got to use our German for the first time or lack there of, “Sprechen Sie English?” Luckily, they do speak English better than me in some cases. Finding the place so easily makes up for walking around the entire Brussels train station trying to figure out where to go yesterday.

Train #2, ICE, Köln, Germany to Müchen(Munich), Germany: First Class! We do not really fit in but the Germany business men sitting around us don’t seem too bothered though, so I will enjoy the comfort on this 5 hour train ride. Germany is a beautiful country and getting to see lots of it on this ride. Got really close to having an actual conversation in German with the train attendant when ordering “Kaffe und Wasser”. I got thrown for a loop when after saying “I do not want milk and sugar”, she asked if my wife wanted some too. Darn, so close. Again 1st class is totally worth it! So much space to spread out.

Train #3, Local Regional Train, Müchen, Germany to Salzburg, Austria: Almost got on the wrong part of the train, half of the train spilt at one point and went in a different direction. 1st class was not as nice on this train, but we kind of had our own compartment which was nice. Lots of stops, but still these trains go fast! The views started getting better and better as we got close to Austria. We got our first glimpse of the Austrian Alps!! The hills (mountains) are alive! At this point jet lag was really getting worse, we were so tired. As this train went on my head started to spin a little, I think too much sitting and not enough walking around didn’t help. But before we knew it, here we are in Salzburg!