Prague - Day Two

Friday, August 30, 2013

This morning we started at the Astronomical Clock, built in the late 14th century, since we didn't see it go off yesterday. It has a clock that tracks a number of different astronomical events. It chimed directly on the hour, and the 12 disciples did a little trip around the clock for us, and that was it. Not nearly as exciting as the Glockenspiel in Munich.


Afterwards, we climbed the Clock Tower and got some good views. It was an easy climb because it was a ramp the whole way. Some people still took the elevator.


Our Prague Card said we could get into the Stone Bell House for free. The house itself dates from the 13th century and was built as a town palace for King John of Luxembourg. It is the only house in Prague remaining in its original Gothic appearance. Being named Stone Bell House, I guess we were kind of expecting bells? Instead, it was home to a gallery featuring the photographs of Viktor Kolar, a Czech dude who exiled himself to Canada for several years.

We decided to walk down to Charles Bridge and see if we could catch a boat tour of the Vtala River. We got really lucky, one was leaving in a few minutes, and it was a really good tour. It was a small replica of a 1920's cruise boat, and it wasn't very full. The captain of the boat piloted from the center of the boat and gave narrative along the way, which is much better than a recording because you can ask questions.


The boat did not actually go very far along the river. He circled Charles Bridge, which was built between 1357 to 1402, and is 516 meters long. In 1890 the middle section collapsed in a flood so that section now looks newer (different coloured stones). There used to be traffic allowed on the bridge, and even had trams, but traffic has not been allowed since 1965. This bridge was used in the Mission Impossible scenes with Tom Cruise. Other movies filmed here include Amadeus, Harry Potter, and League of Extraordinary Men. Sean Connery's expensive 5000 euros a night presidential suite got flooded out in the 2002 flood.

The Vltava River is 430 km long. Vltava means The Wild Water, so called because it always floods.

This boat line (Venice Prague) is the only one allowed to go into the Certovka, or Devil's Canal, because the canal is only one meter deep. The reason it is called Devil's Canal is because once upon a time it was a smelly and poor area where people dumped whatever they wanted into the water. There is a giant metronome on top of a hill, signifying freedom from communism. There used to be a giant statue of Stalin up there that took 6 years to build and only stayed up for 7 years. The sculptor was so unhappy about his commission that he committed suicide when it was finished.

After our boat tour, we went into the Tower Museum and then climbed the Old Town Bridge Tower, which is the entrance gate to the Charles Bridge.


After a quick lunch, we went back to the Astronomical Clock to find Keith, the "free" tour guide from yesterday. Today we knew he was doing a Castle Tour at 2 pm. In fact, of the 7 of us on the tour, 6 of us were on his city tour yesterday.


He started by walking us to the tram stop so we could catch the tram up the hill to the castle. He gave us all tram passes and told us to validate them on board, because there are "controllers" who randomly check tickets and fine you $40 if you don't have a validated one. Then Keith pointed out that the guy standing behind us was probably a controller, and the guy smiled, Keith was right. Keith also warned us that trams were the worst place for being pickpocketed. He said they are so good, they should have magic shows in Vegas. Anyways, when we got on the tram, we were packed in like sardines so that absolutely no one could have moved, let alone pickpocket.


We got off the tram and stopped at a memorial of a ripped up flag with the dates 1938 - 1945. He said WWII really began in 1938 at the Munich Conference, where Hitler was granted permission to enter and take Czechoslovakia (who were not invited to the conference). Chamberlain walked out and declared, "Peace in our time," thinking Hitler would be satisfied, but of course he was not. So even though the area was "granted" to Hitler, the Czechs have always felt invaded and this is why they say WWII started in 1938.

We stopped for a "break" at Strahov Monastery, even though we hadn't really gone very far into the tour. Strahov Monastery was founded by a drunken priest named Strahov, when lightning struck in front of his horse and he was paralyzed for an hour (probably drunk). This caused him to reform his ways. Strahov Monastery is very famous for the beer they have been making since 1628. Apparently monks make the best beer. Keith had reserved a spot in their restaurant (I won't call it a pub), and the 8 of us sat around the table and some ordered the beer. We just filled up our water bottle.

We continued on the tour, and Keith showed us Petrin Tower in the distance. It was built 2 years after the Eiffel Tower to model it, and is the same height as the Eiffel Tower IF you include the hill it is on.


We had a stop at Loreta, built in the 1620's in the baroque style, in the hope that its beauty and treasures would lure everyone back to Catholicism. We heard the bells ring the hour, very pretty, but they don't ring at night. Apparently they bothered the astronomer Tycho Brahe when he was stargazing.

The Capuchin Monastery (built 1600 - 1607) was interesting to look at because there are cannon balls still embedded in the walls from when it was attacked in 1757.

We walked down a 600 year old street which is architecturally protected. The walls of the houses are curved to follow the shape of the street. It was nice that Keith took us here, there were no other tourists here. Apparently there is a similar street in Prague called Golden Lane that charges 8 euros just for the privilege of being there.

We saw the 1543 Schwarzenberg Palace, the outside has a 2 layered effect done with a plaster pattern called postal.

There was a Plague Column built which was supposed to ward off the plague, but didn't.

There was a professional protester outside the palace gates. Keith explained that the guards outside the Matthias Gate are actually Czech army guards, not hired kids.


We got another look at St Vitus Cathedral, which we saw yesterday on our own. The Gothic archways are pointed to resemble hands folded in prayer. The flying buttresses may look imposing, but are just being used as supports.

Vitus died in 303. Later when the church declared him a "saint", they dug up his remains and distributed his limbs as holy relics. When the arm got passed down to Charles IV, he decided it was so holy that it needed a cathedral to house it. The cathedral is lovely, but the arm was looted long ago. The front doors of the church tell the history of its construction. It was begun in 1344, mostly in the Gothic style, but the main tower was finished in the renaissance style, because Gothic had by then gone out of style. The church was not finished until 1929. On the side of the building are attached statues of the builders. It is funny to see statues in togas beside statues wearing business suits.

The bell in the St Vitus Tower is named Sigmund, but it is too large to ring because it could damage the cathedral.


There is a mosaic on the side of St Vitus Cathedral that they were having trouble keeping clean, so they called in NASA who applied a special epoxy to it, the same one they use on space shuttles.

Keith showed us a statue of a young boy built during the Communist regime. The Communists felt that the "dangly bits" of the boy were indecent and ordered them removed. When the statue was unveiled, the people thought it was horrible that the young boy was missing his "dangly bits", and organized protests in the street. So the "dangly bits" were reinstated, and that part of the statue is very shiny where everyone has been rubbing it. The statue now has the nickname "Gold Member." No, we didn't take pictures.

The tour ended at a nice panorama spot, and the two of us wandered into Wallenstein Garden, where he had a stalactite wall with demons built.


We tried to buy tickets for the organ concert, but were told we had to come back half an hour before the concert because we had the Prague Card. Makes no sense to us, and we didn't actually end up going back because we went to the hotel and were too tired to go anywhere. The restaurant at the hotel was full (they probably took one look at us in our tourist shorts and didn't want us). We tried a restaurant down the block but it was too loud, so we eventually gave up and went to the market to buy a few things (they were selling cannibas but we passed), and ate in our room.

There was a lot of excitement tonight because of a vital soccer match being played between Chelsea and Munchen, apparently 2 of the best teams in this league. There was a lot of rowdiness, and stronger than ever police presence, and even helicopters flying overhead. We wanted to go back to the Old Town Square to experience it all and to see the buildings lit up again, but we were too darn tired!

This is our last blog for this trip. Tomorrow we are flying Prague to Dusseldorf, Germany, and then home to Toronto.

Prague - Day One

Thursday, August 29, 2013

The breakfast buffet at the Hotel Boscolo was the size of the main floor of our house. There was lovely music, and we realized it was a live harpist.

Our Prague Card gave us a free 2 hour bus tour of the city, so we took the earliest one, there were only 6 of us on this tour. The bus had a retractable roof. He took us all over the city, and gave us a half hour stop at Prague Castle, where we walked around, enjoyed the panoramic view, and visited St Vitus Cathedral.


The tour dropped us off at the Old Town Square, and we decided to see the Astronomical Clock. We heard a tour guide giving a group very good information on it, so we sneakily walked up to hear what he was saying. We noticed that he had a green t-shirt that read "Free Tours", so we decided to follow along and found him (Keith) very likable and knowledgable, so we stayed with him for his whole 3 hour walking tour. It's a very interesting idea: he gives a free tour, and if you liked it, you give a tip at the end. Of course, he cleaned up at the end. He told us a lot of things that we wouldn't have known on our own. For example, the lovely Church of Our Lady before Tyn has 2 towers, and if you look closely, they are different sizes. They are called the Adam and Eve Towers because one is larger than the other.


There was a very strong police presence in Prague. Keith said Prague is a very safe city except for petty theft. He warned about the money changers on the street (they will give you counterfeit money), and the pickpocketers. Someone we met said they were in a tour group of 14 people, and 6 got pickpocketed. Anton is wearing his extra special slash-proof money pouch.

He told us about the gables in town: before people could read, houses were recognized by their signs. We saw, for example, The Black Madonna. House numbers were introduced in Prague in 1770.

The Powder Tower dates from 1475. It was one of 13 entrances to the Old Town. The gate was used to store gunpowder in the 17th century.


The Church of St James the Greater has an interesting story (besides the one about Count Vratislav being accidentally buried alive in a tomb there). There is a tale of a thief who was intent on stealing the jewels and relics in the church. He attempted to steal the jewelled necklace adorning the statue of the Virgin Mary, and she came to life and reached out and gripped his arm so that he could not escape. When the monks found him, he begged for release, so they sawed off his arm that was in the statue's grip. The 400 year old arm still hangs from the ceiling of the church (we saw it). Apparently the thief was so filled with remorse that the monks forgave him and he became the caretaker of the church.


Prague claims the oldest Jewish cemetary in Europe. People were buried there from 1439 - 1787. The plot of land the cemetary occupies is incredibly small, so people are buried on top of each other in layers, up to 12 people deep. 90 - 100,000 people are buried there.

The Nazis occupied Prague from 1938 - 1945. Hitler preserved the Jewish Quarter here because he thought it would serve as a museum to an extinct race. Heinrich Himmler took over the Prague Castle, but would often go to the Rudolfinum Concert Hall to practice his violin. The Rudolfinum roof has perched statues of several composers, and Himmler learned that Mendelssohn's statue was among them. This was not acceptable since Mendelssohn was a Jew, so he ordered Mendelssohn's statue removed and destroyed. The workers, however, had no idea which was the correct statue. The supervisors told them to just pick the statue with the biggest nose, so they destroyed that one. The one they destroyed, however, wasn't Mendelssohn, but Richard Wagner, Hitler's favourite composer.


After our tour with Keith, we found lunch and then had to make our way back to the hotel because we had only taken out 600 czk. We thought that was a lot, but it only turned out to be $30. We had to be careful what to order for lunch, since we had given Keith a good tip. We found an ATM and took out 2000 czk, but it came out in one bill. We went into the building to see if we could get change. There was an information desk, and she gave us a number. When our number was called, Anton had to step into a small room and close the door. What a strange bank.

We walked down the shopping district and found a back way to the Charles Bridge over the Vtlava River. First there was a wooden bridge in this spot, but it was destroyed by floods in the 11th century. In 1172, Wenceslas I ordered the first stone bridge and named it the Judith Bridge for his wife. It collapsed in a flood in 1342. The current Charles Bridge was built in 1357 by Charles IV. It is said that egg yolks were used to strengthen the mortar. It has 30 statues of saints, and towers at either end. Today it is a pedestrian bridge which is full of vendors and street performers. And people rubbing the statues for luck. You can see the polished bronze from all the rubbing, except maybe they don't know that the statues are replicas with the originals kept elsewhere .


We walked back through the Jewish Quarter, found dinner, and walked through the Old Town Square. We watched a street performer stuff a cucumber down a man's pants and chop it into pieces while blindfolded. We spent the evening at the Image Black Light Theater to see their Africania performance. It was an interesting combination of black light, dance, and pantomime, set to African themes.


The show was an hour and a half long, but we had trouble getting back to our hotel because we were distracted by the spectacular way the buildings and steeples were lit up. Prague monuments begin to light up after dark. The first to light up are monuments from the 10th century, then every 3 minutes monuments of a century younger. One minute after midnight the process reverses. Prague is absolutely gorgeous in its architecture. All the street lighting is done by gas lamps.

Vienna to Prague

Wednesday, August 28, 2013

We had the morning open before we had to catch our train to Prague. We decided to take handy tram #1 to the Hofburg Palace. This was the Imperial Palace of the royal family, where the great empire of the Habsburgs ruled for more than 7 centuries. The Hofburg includes 18 buildings and is the largest palace complex in Europe.

We first accidentally happened upon the Schatzkammer (the Imperial Treasury), where they displayed some of the crowns, jewellery, robes, and trinkets of the once great Habsburg Dynasty. And some narwhal tusks, for some reason. Some of the items dated back 1000 years, such as the Imperial Crown which dates from 962, and some funny looking footwear.



The next thing we saw was the Kaiserappartements (Imperial Apartments). They started by taking you through rooms and rooms of all the old collections of porcelain and silver and gold dishes and centerpieces, and all the cutlery. Well, something had to happen to all that stuff after the end of the Habsburg monarchy in 1918. Believe it or not, there were 28 displays of it you could look at, and audio guides to boot. The most interesting fact is that porcelain only became acceptable to the monarchy after they had to sell all their gold dishes to finance the war.


Next came the Sisi Museum. There were 26 displays all dedicated to the empress Elizabeth, Franz Josef's wife. She was 16 when she was forced to marry her cousin, and from what we could tell, she despised court life and possibly him as well. She spent her whole reign being reluctant to fulfill her royal duties, and traveling as much as possible to get away from it. She took cocaine on a daily basis for "medicinal reasons". She was considered very beautiful and used this to her advantage. She had ankle length hair which took 2 to 3 hours a day to style. She was 5 foot 8 inches tall, and only weighed between 99 to 103 pounds. She was constantly dieting and there are rumours of bulimia. She experimented with different beauty regimes, including sleeping with a veal mask on her face every night. It was at this point that the king and queen got separate bedrooms.


The people loved Franz Josef and didn't think much about his wife until her sudden assassination in Geneva. The Italian anarchist had intended to assassinate someone else, but his intended victim changed his itinerary and the assassin changed his target to Elisabeth. He rushed up to her and stabbed her in the chest. She thought she had just been knocked over, and got up and got onto her boat. Later, she collapsed, the wound was discovered, and she was taken back to shore and her hotel, but it was too late. When Franz Josef received the news, he said, "You do not know how much I loved this woman." It was after this that she became a cultural icon.

Next came the Imperial Apartments, although they only allowed you to pass through 18 of them. It was all very similar to the Schonbrunn Palace that we toured a few days ago: The Audience Waiting Room, the Audience Chamber, the Conference Room, the Study, the Bedroom, the Salons, the Dining Room. We really didn't care which glasses were used for which wines, and which dishes were used for which courses.


We found our way back to our hotel. We had checked out this morning but left our luggage there. We sat in the hotel restaurant and had lunch, they actually found a gluten-free bun for Frankie's hamburger. We found our way to the train station, it was a different station than the one we came in at.

The train ride to Prague, Czech Republic took over 5 hours. It had one first class car which we took full advantage of. It was a smooth quiet ride, and we spent much of the time getting caught up on the blog.


Once we got into the Czech Republic, the scenery changed dramatically. It was hillier than Vienna. The houses are older, not as pretty, and not kept up.

The train station in Prague was nice. We bought a Prague Card and got some local currency, and then literally walked across the street to our hotel, The Boscolo. This is definitely a 5 star hotel, we weren't expecting that. We were met at the door by a bellboy who single-handedly carried our luggage up the 2 flights of steps to get into the building, which is 120 years old. The lobby was a huge empty room with a few tables and chairs for people to congregate, and a table for reception (not the normal desk).


Our room is very nice. The bellboy brought our luggage up for us and gave us a "tour" of the room, including the nearest fire exit in case of emergency. The best thing, it seems that this hotel is within walking distance of the Old Town and even getting across the bridge to the palace is only 20 minutes away.

Brief history of the Czech Republic: The Czech state used to be known as Bohemia and was formed in the late 9th century under the dominance of the Moravian Empire. It was gradually integrated into the Habsburg monarchy. Czechoslovakia was formed in 1918 after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire after WWI. It was a democracy but became a communist ruled state in 1948. The communist regime collapsed in 1989, and this is when the Czech Republic and Slovakia split. The nice gentleman who checked us in informed us that all the food and customs and language is the same, the only difference is that Slovakia uses the euro and the Czech Republic uses koruna (crowns). The exchange rate is approximately 5 czk to 1$.

Vienna, Austria

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

This is a long blog, so skip it if you are not interested in Vienna.

Today we had 2 tours booked, so we took handy tram #1 to meet at the office of the first tour, which was a walking tour from 10:30 to 1:00. There were about a dozen people on this tour with us. Our leader was Andrea and she was very good. It rained pretty hard at times, and she was always looking for places to get us out of the rain. Some of the houses were built with "through" walkways, so people could get from one street to another. She also took us inside an old mansion which is now being used as an auction house. The door to the carriage house was fancier than a mansion back home.


We tried to stay at the front of the group so we could hear her better and so our views wouldn't get blocked by the sea of umbrellas around us. One girl in the group seemed obsessed with being fashionable rather than practical. She wobbled around in a pair of stylish high heels, and when it started to rain, she wrapped them in plastic bags (while on her feet).


There are 29 districts in Vienna, our tour covered district #1, which is the old town in the center of Vienna. We saw the old city hall, the old Jewish Quarter, Parliament, the Hofburg Imperial Palace, Heroes' Square, St Michael's Square, and the tour ended at St Stephen's Cathedral.

We learned a few interesting facts:

- The Jews were persecuted in Vienna long before WWII, and repeatedly expelled, but kept being asked back because the city needed money lenders.

- The older Gothic style churches tended to be tall rather than wide. They included vertical lines in the architecture to draw your eyes upwards, and a tall spire. They believed that the taller you got, the closer you got to God. We saw one Gothic church made of sand and what Andrea called "chalk"stone, she said it was weaker than limestone and you could scratch it with your fingernail (no, we didn't try it). Amazing that a church like that is still standing after hundreds of years.


- The Ring Road that runs around the Old Town of Vienna used to be a city wall. We saw one part of the old city wall still intact. It was right beside an apartment that Beethoven used to live in, but they don't make a big deal of this because apparently Beethoven never paid his rent and lived in 67 different apartments.


- There are still traveling theaters in Vienna.

- If a building has red and white flags on it, that building is historically protected. It is very difficult to make any renovations to these buildings, including replacing windows.

- There is a huge memorial to commemorate all the victims of the plague.

- She took us into the Volksgarten, part of the Hofburg complex, which has over 400 different kinds of roses. You can "rent" a rose plant for 2 years; for those who do, there are labels where you can write a dedication of your choice.

- Hitler came to live in Vienna in his youth. There are 21 universities in Vienna, and they are free. Hitler tried to enter art school but twice failed the entrance exam. He was forced to live on the streets for 2 years, and this is when he became very highly anti-Semitic, because he saw the wealth of the Jews in the area.

- Vienna is considered a top city in the world in which to live, with low crime rates and low unemployment (5%). As much as 57% of jobs are single person companies, such as tour guides.

- The Lipizzaner horses perform in the Hofburg palace complex, and train daily. The show has been ongoing for 4 centuries. You can pay half price to see them train instead of paying full price to see a performance. We did not feel we needed to see them, since we saw them perform when they came to Kitchener several years ago. They always use stallions for the Lipizzaners. The young horses are born dark, and mature to white.


The tour ended at the St Stephan's Cathedral, which is very impressive. It sits directly in the center of town, high above everything else. It was originally built as a parish church in 1147. The tower was built in 1430 and was the tallest in the world for 2 whole months at 444 ft tall. The church is Austria's most significant Gothic building. There are still several masses a day, and 10 masses on Sundays. The steeple has 343 stairs that you can climb to get a view over all of Vienna. We didn't have time to climb up, but we did go inside for awhile.


We just had enough time to find a restaurant for lunch, then we headed back to the same tour office for our second tour of the day. We were very thankful that the rain stopped for this tour. This one was a bike tour from 2:30 to 5:30. There were only 5 of us on the tour, us and 3 Australian guys, and the guide Horst. Frankie was the only girl, and she was bound and determined to keep up to the guys, which she did. It was nice having a smaller group, Horst usually has 15 to 20 on the tour, and then you have to wait 2 or 3 lights for the whole group to get through a stoplight. This tour took us around the Ring Road and out of the city a bit, for a total of 12 to 13 km. The tour included the City Hall, the Imperial Court Theater, Parliament, Maria Theresa Square, the Opera House, St Charles Church, Stadtpark, Hundertwasser House, Prater, the Giant Ferris Wheel, and the Danube Canal. Because we were a small group which gave him extra time, Horst actually took us to the Danube River as well.


Here are the interesting facts from the bike tour:

- Across from the Parliament, there are very young trees. The reason: the old trees were falling into the ground! The Turks had dug tunnels that the Austrians didn't know about. The weight of the old trees made them fall in.


- We rode through the Prater, a very large park (it took 15 minutes to cycle straight across). It was built as a royal hunting ground. When kings had wives who didn't produce heirs, they would take their wives hunting with them and there would be an "accident". Thus he could find a new wife legally (divorce was forbidden).


- There is a large ferris wheel in the Prater. The name: Giant Ferris Wheel. It has been there since 1898. It takes 20 minutes to go around, 7 of which you are out of sight of anyone else. They have had to start cracking down on young couples during these 7 minutes.....


- There are Frank Stronach posters all over Vienna. This is Belinda Stronach's father, and he is running for office here.

- Anton's bike was named "Willy Wonka", and Frankie had "Fresh Prince".

- The oldest house we saw was called Basiliskenhaus, from 1212. The house has 3 floors for living, and 4 floors for a cellar.

- The streets around the Ring Road are all filled-in moats, from when the Ring Road was the city walls.

- There is an interesting house we saw called Hundertwasserhaus, built in 1983. The architect believed that straight lines made people sick, so the house has round corners and windows of various sizes. It is a social housing project, and a popular stop for tourists.


- The Danube used to be a delta, but it has been transformed into a river and a canal.


We enjoyed our bike tour a lot. Vienna is a very bike friendly city. There are separate lanes for cars, for trams, for bikes, and for pedestrians. Each of these lanes has its own stoplights.

After the bike tour, we walked down Karntnerstrasse, the main shopping street of Vienna, comparable to Fifth Avenue in New York City. We only window shopped, except for a few small gifts for Frankie's parents. We found a restaurant with a live xylophonist for music. When the restaurant dimmed the lights, they attached lights to the menus so people could read them.

Saltzburg to Vienna

Monday, August 26, 2013

We took our time because there were so many trains going from Salzburg to Vienna. Finally, a train with a first class car! We were pretty happy until the attendant told us that this was a privately owned trained so first class was another 15 euros. It would have been nice if our travel agent had mentioned this.... So we paid up because we were not going to second class at that point. It was a double decker train, so we thought it would be nice to enjoy the view from the top, which lasted for all of 5 minutes before we moved down because there was too much rocking motion for our liking. It was a quiet 2 and a half hour ride, they go by very quickly.

When we arrived in Vienna, we figured out that we could catch a "tram" to our hotel, which is a cable car but it sometimes goes underground like a subway. The tram we got on was so old, everything was wooden, including the seats and the floor. Then it was just a few minute walk to our hotel. The Rainers Hotel is very modern, functional not ornate. Bigger than the last room we had, that's for sure! All the hotels have big duvets on the beds stuffed into a clean sheet. This is the first hotel where we have not had to take the duvet out and just use the sheet, because this is the first hotel with air conditioning. The others have been "climate-controlled", which means you could open the windows. So it's a nice hotel, but internet is not free, which is why we are late on the blog.

We had a tour booked at Schonbrunn Palace, so we hopped onto tram #1 to downtown Vienna (10 minutes), then we had to transfer to the subway line to go west to the palace. We picked up our ticket package at the Orangerie, it started with an audio tour of the palace itself. Schonnbrunn Palace was commissioned by Leopold I at the end of the 17th century as a palatial hunting lodge. The palace has 1440 rooms, 40 of which are open to the public. They made us check our backpacks before we entered, so we didn't know that it would be so warm inside, and we had to carry our coats around for the whole tour. The tour was generally well laid out, although we had to work around many large tour groups not using the audio guides. The rooms are large but they have only a small aisle roped off for you to walk through. The tour took an hour, no pictures allowed of course. This way you want to buy the tour book in the gift shop that you are forced to exit through. We usually just buy one or two postcards, then take pictures of them and that is what you see in the blog.


Our package included dinner and a concert, but we still had a few hours, so we walked the extensive grounds for almost 3 hours. There had been a light rain earlier, but we were lucky that it stopped. We saw about half of the grounds in that time. And this was only the "summer" residence! We can't figure out why the royals had to have a summer and a winter residence in the same city. Maybe this is one of the reasons why the Austrians have done away with their monarchy?

Short history of the Habsburgs: They ruled for over 6 centuries, over parts of Austria, Germany, Italy, Spain, Hungary, Croatia, Portugal, and the Czech Republic. The most famous monarchs include Maria Theresa who ruled for 40 years from her bedroom because she was always pregnant or nursing (she had 16 children). She believed in peace above war, and accomplished this by marrying off her daughters to neighbouring countries. One of her daughters was Marie Antoinette. The other famous monarchs are Franz Josef and his wife Elizabeth who they called Sissi. She was an enigma to the Austrian people until she was assassinated in Switzerland by an Italian anarchist, and then she became an icon. In 1918 the people were finished with the monarchy because it was so expensive. The last king refused to abdicate his throne, so he was forced to flee the country and died young. There are over 500 Habsburg descendants still alive, 50 of them in Vienna.


Even now we felt annoyed because they charged admission to every single thing on the palace grounds, including the labyrinth and the Gloriette (which is just a large column), and the WCs (toilets). Actually, almost anywhere you go in Vienna or Austria for that matter, you have to pay to use the WC.

There was one moment which brought sweet happiness to our hearts. A nun dressed in full habit stopped and whistled to the birds, and held out her hands with food for them. We watched her for quite awhile doing this, and she had so many birds flying to her hands and eating. She had no idea we were watching her.


Dinner "at the palace" was included in our package, and this of course means not the actual palace but a wing of it that was the servants' quarters. Still nicer than any of our homes! We were quite excited that the tea came with little chocolates, until we unwrapped one and discovered that it was a square of sugar. They also had sugar crystals on a stick that looked like a lollipop.

After dinner was the concert, in the Orangerie. Outside the door we were greeted by Emporer Franz Josef and his wife Elizabeth (Sissi) themselves (even though they lived in the 1800's).


When you entered, they asked you to check your backback, and then charged you a euro for the privilege. The concert room was very large and we chose to sit at the back. We found the acoustics were not as good as the Marble Room in the Mirabell Palace in Salzburg. It was a much larger orchestra, playing mainly Mozart and Strauss. This concert included several opera pieces and some dance demonstrations, all very regal and classy. Except for one opera duet where the man sang in Italian and all the woman kept singing was "meow". Very strange.


The Orangerie is the only known place where Mozart and and the Italian composer Salieri faced off against each other musically (The movie "Amadeus" was from Salieri's perspective). Salieri won. But Mozart went on to greater acclaim. It is interesting how both Salzburg and Vienna claim Mozart. He was born in Salzburg but lived in Vienna (briefly) as an adult, and wrote many of his works here. We have learned that Mozart was very brilliant but very reckless. He was hugely rich but he had a bad gambling problem and couldn't keep any of the money. He had to change apartments 14 times for not paying the rent. He died at the age of 35 from a lung infection.

Salzburg - Day Two

Sunday, August 25, 2013

Today we had another tour booked with Panorama Tours. Yes, the one that is a 4 minute walk away. Today, however, we were glad we had arranged hotel pickup because it was raining. The tour was very unusually organized: one group of people went one place, the rest went another place, we all met for lunch, some got dropped off, some went back to Salzburg, and some new ones joined. Confusing, but they all seemed to have things figured out. Too silly when they said keep the same seat in the bus. How can you when you are mixing tours like that?

We actually ended up spending the day in Germany today, which we didn't expect. Yes, it was called the Bavarian Mountains Tour, but we didn't make the connection. We had the all day tour, which started at Eagle's Nest (Kehlsteinhaus), perched high atop a mountain. Eagle's Nest was intended as a 50th birthday present for Hitler, to serve as a retreat and to entertain dignitaries. It is a chalet carved into a mountaintop, and sits at 6017 ft high. It took 13 months to build and was finished in 1938. The road leading up is 6.5 km long and cost about 250 million to build. Our bus parked in a parking area and then we had to take a designated bus up the road. When we got off, there was a 407 ft long tunnel to walk through leading to an elevator. The elevator fits 46 people and is lined with polished brass to make it look larger, since Hitler was caustrophobic. Almost all the buildings were bombed by the allies, with only the one remaining. We hiked a bit on a trail that is supposed to have awesome views, but all we saw was mist and clouds. We visited a conference room and a tea room. The conference room has a huge fireplace which was presented to Hitler by Mussolini. Chips of it are missing because allied soldiers broke pieces off to take as souvenirs. The rest of the building is now a working restaurant, so we sat and had some hot chocolate.



After Eagle's Nest, we were taken to the town of Berchtesgaden for lunch, and given one hour. It took 25 minutes for them to take our order, and they were definitely NOT gluten friendly. Frankie had salad, Anton had lasagna. We had started outside, but were chased inside because of all the smokers. Man, those Europeans sure do smoke a lot.

The rain stopped after lunch so the rest of the day was nicer. After lunch only 4 of us from the tour were dropped off at the salt mines at Salzbergwerk for a tour. Actually, we found it to be more of an hour and a half long amusement park ride (except underground). They had everyone dress up in a miner's suit, then we straddled single file on a train. The train took us to a steep slide, you slide on your bottom on wooden rails. We walked through some tunnels and stopped at different stations to learn about the mines. There was a second slide going down, then a boat ride across Mirror Lake, which had an incredible reflection from the roof. After the boat ride, there was a funicular ride going up, and lastly, the train ride again. No pictures allowed for "security" reasons, meaning they were selling pictures at the end of the tour.


The temperature in the salt mine was 12 C. Salt has been mined here since 1517, and the mine still produces 40 tons of salt per day. Yes, 40 tons per day. They call the salt "white gold". Originally, there was a salt-water lake, and the water evaporated. The mountains (according to them) "grew over" and covered the salt. Today, holes are drilled to get core samples. They drill a larger hole and pour freshwater down it, which dissolves the salt to create a cavern. The brine is pumped up and replaced with more fresh water, further dissolving the salt and making the cavern grow. The process can continue for 30 years in one hole.

After the salt mine, we were taken to the Berchtesgaden National Park for one hour to get a look at Konigssee (King's Lake). We hiked a 20 minute trail to get the best view at Malerwinkel overlook. Then the 20 minute hike back, first through the forest and then through all the tourist shops, ha ha. But happily for Frankie, she found some buffs, just what she had been looking for.


We were taken back to Berchtesgaden for a one hour "tea" break. At this point we felt they were just putting in time, but we took advantage of it by having a very rushed early supper. We got back into Salzburg around 6 pm.

In the evening, we walked down Getreidegasse (Cereal Alley) which is famed for being Austria's most attractive shopping center, but being Sunday night, most of the shops were closed. On a whim we tried to find Nonnberg Abbey, the nunnery from The Sound of Music. We got quite turned around and realized later that we had just skirted around it. We took a shortcut back though the St Peter Cemetary and went to the Franziskanerkirche for an organ recital. We have been trying to find one the entire time we have been in Austria. The concert was just over an hour long and included some Bach and Pachelbel. The first half was played on the baby organ, and then we all moved to the back for the second half on the papa organ. That was fabulous. It's not an organ unless it's ominous and heavy and just a little frightening, like the music from an old Frankenstein movie!

Saltzburg

Saturday, August 24, 2013

Salzburg is awesome! Favourite place so far! We started the day by walking 4 minutes to the tour meeting place, we took a one hour mini-van tour of the city. There were 7 of us, and the tour guide Marco used both Italian and English. We learned that the Mirabell Gardens has 30,000 flowers. There are 2 Mozart houses: the smaller one where he was born (when the family was poor), and the larger one his family moved into when he was 17 and quite famous already. The closest mountain is the Untersberg, where they got all the stone and marble to build Salzburg, and where Salzurg's water now comes from. Salzburg was founded twice: once by the Romans about 15BC, but it became a near ruin by the late 7th century. A bishop named Rupert is credited with the rebirth of Salzburg in 700, when he built a basilica here to convert the pagans. The name Salzburg means "salt castle", because of the barges carrying salt on the Salzach River. The barges had to pay a toll in the 8th century.

We stopped across the lake from Schloss Leopoldskron. A rich prince-archbishop from Italy wanted to live on the ocean but there was none here, so he had the lake and palace built in 1736 (this was after he expelled 22,000 Protestants from Salzburg. No wonder there is only one Protestant church in existence in all of Salzburg). The palace is still owned privately, although it was taken as "German treasure" during WWII, but returned later. Today it used as a place of education. The gazebo from The Sound of Music was built here just for the movie, but afterwards tourists kept climbing the walls to take photographs, so the family gave the gazebo to the city and the city moved it. The scene with Julie Andrews falling out of the boat with the kids was filmed on this lake. Marco told us that the scene had to be shot 3 times, and the youngest kid didn't know how to swim so she had to be fished out of the water and saved by Julie Andrews and the cameraman.


After our tour, we had an hour and a half, so we hightailed it back into the Old Town to see St Peter's Abbey. We didn't quite know where it was, so we asked a monk walking in that general direction, and he was quite helpful as he actually lives there since it is a working abbey with 21 monks. St Peter's Abbey was built in 700 by the aforementioned Saint Rupert, with most of the buildings built in the 17th and 18th century, and we found it to be the most beautiful church we've seen. We walked around back to the cemetary, very unique. Large gravesites and well tended with real flowers. There were catacombs (Petersfriedhof) as well, which were caves in the mountainside where some people are buried.



We bought a "love lock" with our initials on it, and on the way back over the pedestrian bridge (Makartsteg Bridge), we found a spot a locked it on. It's there forever now. We wanted to throw the keys into the river but felt funny about that.



We had a tour booked for the afternoon, and were picked up at our hotel. Little did we know that it was the same tour company, only a 4 minute walk away. We were lucky to get the front seat of the bus. We drove an hour out of Salzburg, and the tour guide Ingo showed us the real Von Trapp family home, which is now being used as a hotel. It was not used in the movie because it was not considered "grand" enough.

Our destination was the Werfen Ice Caves (Eisriesenwelt). It is the largest ice cave in the world, extending more than 42 km. It was opened up to tourists in 1920. When we arrived, there was a long steep hike up, then a 2 minute cable car ride, then yet another steep climb up. We were so tired! Then when the tour started, the guide told us there would be 700 steps to go up, then 700 to go down. Anton actually counted 701 on the way down.


It was actually quite strange to have ice caves so high in elevation, 1656 metres high. They are caused because the cold winter wind blows into the entrance of the caves, chilling the rock and freezing the snow inside. In the spring, water seeps into the caves and adds to the ice formations. There were several spots that had freezing winds blowing, this prevents the formations from melting in the summer. It was about 0 degrees C in the caves, we could see our breath. We were wearing shorts because it was so hot and sunny today, but we had brought warm sweaters. The tour was just over an hour. In 1920 it took 5 to 6 hours. Anton was given an old fashioned iron kerosene lamp to carry, which went out several times in the wind. He asked the guide why we didn't carry flashlights. His answer was, "Because we don't like flashlights here."


When the tour was over, we had a steep climb down to the cable car station. We took advantage of the restaurant and had an early supper. Then the cable car down, and another steep hike down. There was a tunnel that had lights illuminating where the drips were.


The bus ride back took a bit longer because we hit a traffic jam on the autobahn. We had half an hour at the hotel, and then we went to a Salzburger Schloss Konzerte at the Mirabell Palace. The public is not allowed into the palace because it is being used for government offices, so it was nice to have access for the concert. It was held in the beautiful Marble Concert Hall.  Mozart himself was a regular performer here when he was young. It was a wonderful string quartet, the first set being Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik. We didn't recognize the other sets, some of which were joined by piano. There were 4 sets of music in all, so it went later than we expected. But it was quite enjoyable. "Surprisingly delightful", according to Anton.