Sunshine in Salzburg

On Thursday Leisel and I experienced one of the first nice sun shiny days in Salzburg. We decided to take advantage of this sunshiny day and go to the huge cathedral and the Hohensalzburg Fortress! We started out the day taking a bus to Altstadt (Old Town). From there we walked to the Dom, the cathedral church of St Rupert & St Virgil. This Dom was really cool. It is so tall and beautiful. The ceilings have amazing paintings and wood carvings.

From the Dom we walked to the Hohensalzburg Fortress. The walk up was tiring. I kept thinking of the Amazing Race. If the task was to get to the top of the Hohensalzburg Fortress I’m pretty sure all the old people would die if they had to run up to the top. But the Fortress was really cool. It was built in the 11^th century and the final remodeling of it was finished in the 16^th century.

The view for the top of the fortress was amazing. You had a great view of Salzburg and the river and the countryside.

They had a few museums inside the fortress. One of the museums was about the fortress. It gave a history and showed artifacts from the time and all the important and educational things that you needed to know about the museum. The other museum was about puppets. It was really random. I don’t know why they had it. But there were a bunch of creepy puppets which I guess is pretty cool. And they also had a cool thing where you can stick your face from The Sound of Music.

After the Fortress we walked down and watched a chess match. There is a cool place by the side of the Dom where they have a really big chess board with big chess pieces. We wanted to play a game of chess but there was one already in progress and the two guys that were playing were really intent and when the match ended they started another game. It was cool to watch and very confusing. I am really bad at chess.

A traditional and delicious food in Salzburg is called the Bosna. It is two sausages in 2 pieces of bread with ketchup, mustard, spices, and onions. It was delicious! I love sausages here! We got it from a stand in the plaza and the guy running the stand was really nice and funny. He gave me and Leisel “souvenirs” from Salzburg which were the caps off a Stiegl beer. Yes!

To finish off the sunny day in Salzburg we went and walked around Mirabell Gardens. We had been there before but not during the day. I cannot wait for when it becomes spring and when there are flowers there. There is an amazing view of the Hohensalzburg Fortress and the churches on that side of the river. You may know Mirabell Gardens from The Sound of Music. They are beautiful!
I am grateful for sunny days in Salzburg.

Castles!

One of the days, while staying with the Majers, Joerg took us and we drove down the river and saw the castles that were built along the river. As you drive down the side of the river there are about 60 castles. There was even one castle in the middle of the river. It was probably easy for that guy to collect taxes from the people using the river. The castles were very cool. Although we didn’t go in to any of the castles it was a lot of fun to drive around and look at them all. Therewere some really funny castle names. For example one castle on one side of a hill was name Cat and the castle on the other side of the hill was name Mouse. Then there are 2 other castles they belong to brothers. And it is said that the brothers were fighting because there is a fence between the two castles. So those two castles are called the Fighting Brothers.

We also saw a big boat that had tipped over on one of the sharp turns. The turn was called the Loralay curve. We stopped on the way back and went to this cool place where you were on top of the curve and took a picture of the statue of Loralay.

The boat was carrying tons and tons of Sulfur. So they had to figure out how to empty the boat’s cargo without ruining the river. The boat had blocked the way for a lot of other boats to get by. The boat had apparently been stuck there for a few days. So that was interesting to see.

We went to the point where the Rhein River meets the Mosel And we stood at that point. There was a cool statue there. So all in all it was a really great day! It was really fun to see the beautiful rural area of Germany.

Fachhochschule

Fachhochschule is the university that I attend here in Salzburg. It is a hard name for me to pronounce :( which is really unfortunate because people ask me where I am going to school and I always pause for a really long time and then attempt to say Fachhochschule. You are supposed to make this one sound that we don’t have in English. And you are supposed to make it twice! So I have been practicing and hopefully next time someone asks I will be able to answer with a little more confidence.

The Fachhochschule has been very nice so far. I haven’t exactly started classes yet… and maybe that is why it hasn’t been so bad. But they have a great program for the incoming students. We had Welcome Week last week which was A LOT better than SUU’s T-Bird Flight School. We went on a tour of “campus”.

(Now I put campus in quotations because the Fachhochschule campus consists of one building that has 4 floors. So it is probably the smallest campus I have ever seen. I’m pretty sure all high schools in the US have bigger campuses than the Fachhochschule. But it is kind of nice because it makes it really hard to get lost.) We went on a tour of Salzburg, we got administrative things taken care of, we were put into groups so we got to meet people who will be taking the same classes as us, we were assigned buddy students who are here to help us, and we went sledding in the Alps!

When I say sledding many would get a picture in their mind of a nice little plastic sled that they rode straight down a hill. That’s what I thought. But I was wrong. Sledding in Austria means a sled that looks more like a miniature sleigh and a winding downwards path down the side of a mountain. It was AWESOME!! Leisel and I shared a sleigh because they didn’t have enough so they told the experienced sledders to share. I figured that since I had lived in Utah most of my life and I had been sledding many times I was an experienced sledder. So Leisel and I get on the ski lift which takes us up with HUGE mountain. When we get off we see to the side a path for the sledders. So we get on and start to make our way down. It is a windy path that had many switch backs. The snow was really icy and since there were 2 of us on this sleigh we were going REALLY fast. At one point we couldn’t see because the snow was flying into our eyes and we didn’t think we were going to be able to stop so we were yelling and freaking out and praying that there wasn’t a turn up ahead. Finally we were able to stop. Luckily we didn’t fall of the sides. And we slowly figured out how to control our little sleigh. It was a blast!

All in all welcome week was a success!!

Haus Merian

Well, it has been a while and my excuse is Haus Merian. Welcome to my humble abode. Let me give you a little background on Haus Merian. Built in 1940, Yes! I said 1940. In the US this would be a historical landmark, I’m sure of it. BUT there is an elevator unfortunately it only goes to the 4^th floor and Leisel and I happen to reside on the 5^th floor. So that is a nice little walk up a flight of stairs. The elevator smells really bad and can only fit 2 people so I try to avoid it. I am pretty sure by the end of the semester I will have killer leg muscles J

So funny story: My room is quite a bit bigger than Leisel’s room. I think it was funny. I live on one side of the floor and Leisel lives on the other. Friday night we met the guy that lives across from Leisel. His name is Brian and he is from Ohio. He has lived here since September and is studying German at the University of Salzburg so he will be helping us with all our German needs. We were talking about how my room is considerably bigger than Leisel’s. This is how the conversation went:

Me: Yeah my room is a lot bigger than this one! ( we were chilling in Leisel’s room)

Brian: Oh you must live on the other side of the hall?

Me: Yeah I do! How did you know?

Brian: Oh that side of the building was bombed. When they rebuilt it they made those rooms bigger.

Me and Leisel: BOMBED?!? (thinking How old is this building?!?)

Brian: Yeah? Salzburg? We are right by the main train station? Duh?.

Yeah that is pretty much how that conversation went. I didn’t realize the we were living in such an old building. I thought this building was built in the 60s. Well my side of the building was built in the 60s. Leisel’s side was built in the 40s. I thought that was funny.

Worst Part of Haus Merian?

BATHROOMS!!

As I was getting the tour of my floor I was shown the shower room. That was when I decided that showering every other day was plenty! There is very little privacy in the shower room. This will be the hardest adjustment that I am going to have to make. I value my privacy and that shower room is an invasion of my privacy. The toilets aren’t too bad. I’m pretty sure one of the toilets survived the bombing because you flush it with a pull chain... The whole building supposedly gets cleaned everyday so everything is supposedly clean but I think age makes things appear permanently dirty.

Best thing about Haus Merian?

I didn’t have to fill out a damage report when I moved in. I’m pretty sure that means they are begging the residents to ruin the place so it can be condemned. Which I think it is only a few years away. Another really good thing about Haus Merian is that it is a 5 minute walk to the main train station. This means that with my semester train ticket I can take a 5 minute walk to the train station and be at the Fachhochschule in about 20 minutes.

Well that is the update from Salzburg for now. Everything is good J I am adjusting to tiny living quarters. Leisel and I (mostly Leisel) made a really good pasta casserole thing on Sunday. And we have eaten a whole jar of Nutella and A LOT of Milka chocolate. Why is European chocolate so much better than American chocolate? Good thing there are a lot stairs to climb up.

Deutschland!

So, since it has been a long time since my last blog I have decided to give a brief summary of my stay in Deutschland. My week there was so much fun! We did so many things and saw a lot of cool places. It was awesome. I stayed with the Majers. They live in a cute little house in a cute little town called Dinslaken. The surrounding area is a very industrious area. This is because of the Rhein River which goes right by all of the towns there. So as you drive through this area you see a lot of industrial factories.

The last full day that we were in Germany with the Majers we went to a Coal Mining Museum. In that area of Germany there used to be about 250 different coal mining companies/mines. Today there are only 3. This is because the cost to mine the coal became too big so now Germany imports a lot of its coal. The coal mining museum was very interesting and educational. The old coal mining factory where the museum is at is HUGE! The mine below the museum is big enough to fit like 3 Washington D.C.s!

Pictures of the Coking area, coal carts, and the elevator shaft.

One day Lisa and Laura took us to a town called Xanten. In Xanten there are Roman ruins and the Roman museum. I actually didn’t realize that the Romans went all the way to Germany. Yes, that is embarrassing to admit but it is true. So it was really cool to see Roman ruins without even having to go to Rome. Joerg joked that since we saw Roman ruins in Xanten there would be no need to go to Rome. Joerg is a funny man.. So in the ruins there is a Roman temple, an old amphitheatre and the old city wall. All were very cool to see.

Temple

Statue

Amphitheatre

Most of the nights that we were there we went to the “Altstadt” parts of the surrounding cities. So we went to Düsseldorf, Duisborg, Dortmund, Dinslaken, and I’m sure there are others but they all seemed to start with a D and I could never keep them straight… But Düsseldorf is like the fashion capital of Germany. All of the people in Düsseldorf were very well dressed with their furs and latest fashion sense. And I walked around in Maddie’s old ski coat… yeah I felt a little out of place and underdressed. There might as well have been the words “FASHION IDIOT” stamped on my forehead. Something that I really like about Europe is that they put the prices of the things shown in the window in the window. So you can be walking down the street window shopping and you can know exactly how much the things in the window cost. The most expensive thing that we saw was a necklace for 125,000 Euro. Things are very expensive in Düsseldorf.

I really like the Altstadt. I like how the streets are made of cobblestone and the shops are cute and the streets are small. I just love that feel of things. It is something that we don’t have in Utah. It is always fun to look around and see when the buildings were built. The only sad part was that it was cold and so we just walked around really quickly and tried not to be too cold. But it was a lot of fun. We saw a cool Lego Giraffe in one of the small towns. And in Duisborg there was a tower that told time by the lights on it. There were way cool buildings and way cool things to see and delicious food! We got crepes with Nutella on them in one place and those were delicious. There was always something good to eat with the Majers. I am very grateful that I was able to spend time with the Majers. They are truly wonderful people. I had a lot of fun and saw a lot things when I was with them. Hopefully I will be able to meet up with them again somewhere in Europe.