Roger's day in Salzberg

This is Roger's account of his day 6:

Set out at 9am and saw lovely knee-deep snow covered hills/alps.   But the 2 hour drive from Passau became 2 and a half hours on the bus with holdups on the freeway.  Arrived 11.30ish and the first stop for many was the WC.  Aloing the way commentary from the guide and some Mozart music kept us entertained.

Arriving in Salzberg, we saw the house where Mozart lived during his teens til 17 years old, until he left home and evetually ended up in Vienna, where he died in 1791.  A number of different touristy places were vistied including showing us where McDonalds was situated!!

 One place was the Mozart chocolate store. In memory of Mozart, they started making these delicious chocolates and then eveyone started making them.  The all called them “original Mozart chocolates”.  Now only this company can make ”originals”  and the rest have to call themselves “real” Mozart chocolates or something else of their own choosing.

During the 17^th and 18^th centuries, the baroqueness of the city was created and St Peter’s Catholic Cathedral sure was!  There were gold touches everywhere and it was almost overly ornate.  The cathedral dome was bombed during WW11 and has been retored, I would say almost to its original glory.  It the various church (choir lofts) there were five organs.  One, at the back of the church,  was immense and the other four organs were much smaller.  This was to allow for polyphonic chants and choir anthems to bounce around and criss cross the church.  Each choir with its own organ and when singing together, they would be accompanied by the main organ.   I think it would have sounded absolutely stupendous!!   Mozart was born into this atmosphere in 1756 and was baptised the next day at the font of this particular church.  Hans Gruber of Silent Night fame was also baptised here. 

After time to visit places on our own, we left at 4pm, just on dark, so the journey back to the boat was just about all in darkness. 

Of course Salzberg is also notorious for its Sound of Music fame.  We never actually saw the “hill” close up that became “alive with the sound of music”.  There was actually not much there to see, with much of it filmed in a studio in Hollywood.  The cemetery scene at the end of the film was shot in the old cemetery of St Peter’s Cathedral but there is no way that there are grave stones in it which could have been hidden behind, nor a back gate to leave from to flee into the hills!   Say no more, but if you do want more, I’ll be home in 5 weeks.

Also visited Mozart’s home where he was born.  I was a little disappointed with this, the 4^th floor of a building in the middle of town (up narrow stairs) is the designated place.  There were three rooms with wooden floors, all very bare, but with planty of pictures and information on the walls and display boards but no furniture.  One room was labelled as Mozart’s birth room and again, similar to the other two rooms.  That led to the Mozart museum and apart from a piano, believed to have used by Mozart, displayed in the middle of the room, it was similar to his birth house.  Lots of interesting information though on the walls and on the many display boards.

All in all, I had a very interesting day but sorry – I have no photos as Mimmy had the camera.