Salzburg

A day trip to Salzburg (Austria) was an optional excursion on our Danube river cruise. We elected this option because Salzburg was high on our list of places to see and we are glad we made that decision. The downside of selecting the day trip to Salzburg was that we had very little time in Linz, but one of the positives beyond Salzburg itself was that we got to at least briefly experience Mondsee on the way to Salzburg. Even though we spent far more time in Salzburg than we did in Linz or Mondsee, we were still only able to experience a small fraction of what Salzburg ("salt castle" / "Festival City") offers.

Salzburg is located on the Salzach River. This river is a tributary river to the Inn River and so its waters eventually become part of the Danube River (at Passau, Germany).

We started our tour of Salzburg on the New Town side of the Salzach in the Mirabell Gardens (gardens of Mirabell Palace [Schloss Mirabell]).

The Pegasus Fountain seemed to be one of the more popular spots in the Mirabell Gardens.

We used the Makartsteg Bridge to cross the Salzach River to the Old Town side of Salzburg. That bridge had numerous padlocks on it and these are discussed in online resources such as "Love Lock Pedestrian Bridge" and "Salzburg Bridge Attracts Lovers and Locks."

The Old Town portion of Salzburg was what I had pictured in my mind when I thought of Salzburg based on "The Sound of Music" and other sources of information on Salzburg that I had previously encountered. The Getreidegasse is described as "the bustling heart of Salzburg’s Old City."

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born at No. 9 Getreidegasse in 1756 in "Hagenauer Haus."

I was not able to get good photographs of Salzburg Cathedral (Dom zu Salzburg) because of work being done in front of it.

St. Peter's Monastery and Cemetery were popular with the tourists. It's no wonder given that St. Peter's Cemetery has been called "one of the most beautiful cemeteries in the world" and given the late scene in "The Sound of Music" that was inspired by this cemetery.

We have found in our first trip to Europe (and in other trips) that some of the best photographs and memories of a city can be captured from high vantage points. This was the case in Salzburg, where we took photographs from Hohensalzburg Fortress (Festung Hohensalzburg).

The easiest approach to the sprawling Hohensalzburg Fortress is via FestungsBahn, a furnicular that takes less than one minute to go from Salzburg up to Hohensalzburg Fortress.

Hohensalzburg Fortress is huge. I only show a single photograph here, but more can be found at this Hohensalzburg Fortress Pictures and Videos site.

Although Hohensalzburg Fortress and the Fortress Museum are interesting to see in its own right, the views from it are even more spectacular.

Residence Square (Residenzplatz Square) and its Residence Fountain (Residenzbrunnen) attract many photograph-taking tourists!

While at Residence Square, we visited the Panorama Museum. That museum's page describes the 360 degrees panoramic painting that visitors can view from a platform, "As far as the eye can see: the cycloramic painting by Johann Michael Sattler gives us a view onto the City of Salzburg and its environs around the year 1829." The platform within the 360 degrees and highly detailed panoramic painting is the centerpiece and highlight of the museum, but it also has photographs, drawings, and text describing Salzburg's history (particularly fires and rebuilding). See the TravelAdvisor reviews to get a good idea of what to expect and not expect from this museum.

Before leaving Salzburg, we visited a few of its shops and sampled the "Original Salzburger Mozartkugel."

I purchased small books with photographs and light descriptive text of most cities we visited on this trip. For Salzburg, I purchased a copy of Colorama's 14th Edition (July 2016) of Salzburg: The Festival City set amidst a Gorgeous Alpine Countryside." This book features a section "Surrounding Areas of Salzburg" ("Day Trips to Surrounding Areas") that includes some photographs that make me wish we had time to visit those areas outside of Salzburg. These areas include Kehlsteinhaus (The Eagle's Nest), the Salzkammergut, Giant Ice Caves in Werfen, Liechtensteinklamm, Hohenwerfen Fortress, and Hohe Tauern National Park.

When we were reserving and planning this trip, we had high hopes for Salzburg and it was definitely worth the bus ride to see it and spend time in Salzburg. I just wish we had more time to see a few more things in Salzburg and in its surrounding area (including Mondsee).

Mondsee

I normally would not dedicate a blog post to a town or lake that we barely spent any time in, but viewing Mondsee Lake (Austria) was my first experience in Austria where I appreciated, "I'm in Austria!" On our first day in Austria, we had only seen the side of Linz that is routine for any city, but we would get to enjoy Linz's more beautiful portions that evening.

We only got to see Mondsee (Moon Lake) on this river cruise trip because we had elected to participate in the day trip excursion to Salzburg (Austria). Our tour bus, like many other tour buses, stopped at the Landzeit Mondsee along the route from Linz to Salzburg that looks over Mondsee. One of the practical reasons for stopping there was to make use of the large public facilities area before entering Salzburg. This particular set of restrooms had a machine with an attendant that accepted Euro coins to use the facilities.

The photographs in this post were taken from that Landzeit Mondsee location.

The blog post "Mondsee Austria – A Delightful Lakeside Town" describes many of the things we missed by only making a "pit stop" in Mondsee and then driving by it on the way back to Linz from Salburg. We were able to view the Basilica St. Michael (Wredeplatz, Mondsee) from the highway as we rode back to Linz from Salzburg. We were not able to stop and spend time inside, however, and it's the inside of this building that is most famous because the interior was featured in the 1965 movie "The Sound of Music."

Because most of our day in which our river cruise ship was docked in Linz was spent in Salzburg, we did not get much time in Linz or Mondsee. I'd welcome the opportunity to return to this part of Austria in the future and spend more time in all three areas (Mondsee, Linz, and Salzburg).

Linz

We spent most of the day that our cruise ship was docked in Linz (Austria) on an excursion in Salzburg (Austria) and so did not get to see much of Linz. Although it was great to experience Salzburg, I was sorry we didn't get more time in Linz.

My initial impressions of Linz were not great because about all we could see from the cruise ship on the river was a graffiti-covered concrete wall. On the bus trip out of Linz heading to Salzburg, we mostly saw an industrial/business side of the city. However, on the bus ride back from Salzburg, the bus driver and tour guide intentionally took us back to the cruise ship via a route that went through the Old Town area and the Main Square (Hauptplatz). The photograph above and the next two photographs (which both feature the Trinity Column) are of that Main Square.

Although our river cruise ship's chef and his staff did a great job preparing meals for us to enjoy on the cruise ship, we decided to skip dinner on the ship on this night to allow us to spend a few hours in Linz after our day excursion to Salzburg. We were glad we made this decision as it allowed us to enjoy dinner sitting outside in the Linz Main Square's Restaurant El Greco in the early evening hours and then to enjoy the beauty of that square and Linz's position on the Danube at night.

The post "15 Best Things to Do in Linz (Austria)" begins with this sentence, "Linz is a beautiful and sometimes underrated city located in the northern part of Austria on the River Danube." I definitely agree with both the assessment of its beauty and its being underrated. Also, seeing that list of "15 best things to do in Linz" and the similar post "12 Top Tourist Attractions in Linz & Easy Day Trips" reinforces my feeling that I'd like to get back to Linz to more properly enjoy what the city has to offer.