We were ushered into a mini-bus driven by our guide, Rosa-Marie, who filled us in little details about Salzburg that we had no idea about when we were poking around yesterday. She took us around to see many of the main sights of Salzburg, including Mozart's residence and several of the fountains we had seen the other day. We also got to see several of the sights around Salzburg that were either actual locations filmed in the Sound of Music, or were replicated in Hollywood but based on a Salzburg location. After touring for about an hour around various locations in Salzburg, we headed out to the Austrian countryside to visit several villages that were on the edges of some beautiful mountain-set lakes. Some of the actual locations we got to see included the Von Trapp's real life house, the house on which the back of the family house in the movie was based on, and the actual gazebo used in filming some of the critical scenes in the movie, including the song 'You are 16, going on 17'. All in all, the tour took three or four hours, but it was completely worth it, introducing us to a lot of the countryside that we otherwise would not have gotten to see.
After we got off the bus, we went and toured Mozart's residence. There isn't a whole lot of detail to talk about in that house, as it mostly just was displays of his writings and some of his handwritten music. The most interesting part was seeing the actual instruments owned by Mozart.
After getting a bite to eat, we decided that we would head up to the fortress that towered over Salzburg. On the way, we passed by a graveyard and catacombs that we had kind of been looking for yesterday, and we stopped to explore those a little bit. Given that the castle was so far up, Mom and Dad decided to take the lift up the mountain to the castle and let the kids walk. It wasn't that difficult of a walk, but it took a while to get up to the top. Once we had reached the top, we met up and discovered that we had been rewarded for our ambitiousness in scaling the castle mountain: there was an unparalleled view of the entire city and surrounding countryside, including the Untersberg, a massive peak only 16km away from the city and towering nearly 2km above the surrounding countryside. However, a foreboding cloud hung above the Untersberg, and a sheet of rain could clearly be seen moving rapidly across the intervening plain. We decided to head back down and get to the car as quickly as possible, but we ended up seeking shelter from the rain in one of the many shops carved into the mountain side.
Once we finally got the the car, the rest of the day went very quickly. We drove to Munich, got settled into our hotel, which is very nice and housed in a renovated mansion, and ate dinner at a small Italian eatery where the menu was entirely in German. However, the restaurant was quite delicious and the atmosphere was enchanting. Tomorrow, since Dachau is (unexpectedly) closed on Mondays, we will head to Neuschwanstein Castle in the south.
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