Visiting Salzburg

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The view from our hotel room early morning. It was grey and cloudy.

We went to Salzburg today. On our way to the train station we stopped by the Zeller see. It was beautiful, even with the clouds.

There was hardly any wind which makes the water very still. A few birds said hello to us.

Us.

We met my colleague Ernst at the station and then took the train to Salzburg. It's a nice ride with great views. Quite different from the Dutch fields with cows don't you think?

Tree just before the Mirabell palace gardens.

Part of the Mirabell palace hardens.

Walking towards the inner city you can see the Hohensalzburg castle.

Walking over the pedestrian bridge we noticed hundreds of locks hanging on the fence. Apparently it's trendy to leave a lock somewhere these days. I had never heard about it before but it's been going on for a while now. I must not be very trendy I guess...

The house where Mozart was born. It's mostly very yellow.

We also visited the Salzburg cathedral. Pretty big place. The place is free of any lead-glass which makes it brighter inside than in your usual old church building.

There's a very funky grave.

We also visited the (Hohen)Salzburg castle but first things first: Food! We had chips with sausages. Ernst was quite happy and so were Marjolein and me.

Tree in the castle's centre square. It must've seen a lot during its life.

The castle was constantly expanding so doorways and interiors were changing a lot as you walked through the building.

Cool art in one of the rooms.

The castle around the year 1100.

The castle in present times.

We took a guided audio tour to the "torture chamber" which was only called that way because there were torture instruments hanging on the wall. They'd never been used however because the castle never was a court and therefore was never allowed to actually use them on prisoners. The room was used as a small prison at some point though but the only "famous" prisoner the castle ever had was put somewhere else.

So all in all the whole thing felt a bit fake which was a pity.

This is another house where a famous person was born. Not many people know this though.

It's the house where Christian Doppler was born. He became famous for the so called "Doppler effect".

We ended a very nice and relaxing day with dinner in Salzburg and then went home where we had a few drinks in the hotel. We sat there a bit with my colleague Ira's sister...

... and Ira and Ernst. Then it got too smokey and we left.

In Austria you are still allowed to smoke in hotels. The rooms are often non-smoking but the lobbies aren't which sucks. Next time I'm gonna ask for a non-smoking hotel.