Austria

My last final was Wednesday November 30th. While the majority of my program flew home early Friday morning I hopped on a bus to Austria to begin my final two weeks of traveling.

Saying goodbye to everyone was harder than I thought it was going to be. Growing up, I was lucky enough to not move around. Whenever I closed one chapter of my life, I knew that it wasn’t a true goodbye, I would see my high school classmates or favorite Alameda places whenever I came home for the holidays.

This was the first time I had to say a true goodbye.

I love Florence, but I do not see myself living there in the future. I have seen everything I cared to see, eaten everywhere I wanted to eat. With so much of the world to explore, I really don’t know when I will be returning to Florence, let alone Italy.

My friends, scattered throughout the United States, would not be home when I return for the holidays. For many of them, I will probably never see them in person again.

These things made saying goodbye harder. Or at least until I find time for a road trip through the Midwest.

I especially want to thank Ashley and Alex, two of my roommates, for such an amazing semester. It killed me to say goodbye at the bus stop. Thank you for everything.

After a tearful sendoff, I boarded the bus for Austria.

I went through the same student organization as I went with for Oktoberfest. While they are disorganized and uncommunicative, it is a nice opportunity to meet other American study abroad students.

By chance, I ended up in the same room as girls from California. Three of them were from UC schools, all 5th years in their last semester. One was a Swimmer at UCLA, one was from Fremont, but at school in Riverside and the other one was from Berkeley! The fourth girl was also coincidently from the Bay Area, originally from Danville but attending school at Saint Mary’s in Moraga. I am really glad I was able to meet these girls before I left, hopefully we can keep in contact back once back in the Bay.

Anyways.

So day one in Austria our program stayed in Salzburg. Salzburg is a very small town best known for being the home of the Von Trap family! Naturally I HAD to do the Sound of Music tour. All the while singing songs from the movie, the tour bus took us to all different sights from the movie. We saw the road that Julie Andrews sings “I Have Confidence,” the Gazebo from 16 going on 17, the back and front of the Von Trapp mansion (two different buildings were used), the church where they got married, and the fountain and gardens where they sing Do Rei Mi.

I was in heaven.

Supposedly Hollywood only filmed the exterior scenes in Salzburg, most interior shots were done back on a stage in Hollywood. The only interior shot done in Salzburg was in the church where Maria and Captain Von Trapp get married. I have to say, it was a lot smaller than it seemed in the movie. Beautiful though. Of course after visiting the church, we had to go across the street to Edelweiss café were we had Warm Apple Strudel.

Our tour guide was full of tidbits about the movie. He pointed out, much to my amusement, that the hill used that the Vontrapp family “escapes” over to get into “Switzerland” in fact does not lead to Switzerland (not even close) but actually into Germany, where right to the location where Hitler had his Summer Home! The irony.

He also said that if you look closely in the movie while the children sing Do Re Mi in the hills, you can see that the littlest ones are grimacing. This is because when they shot the movie it was MARCH and probably in the low 40s the entire time. The poor things must have been freezing!

Once the tour was over, my new friends and I went and explored the Salzburg Christmas markets. There were two main locations for the markets. One was in the city square and another was outside the city, closer to the front of the Von Trap movie house. The Christmas markets were adorable. I’ve learn that all Christmas markets are generally the same: same set up, same general things for sale, but it was still really fun!

By then, my suitcases were already stuffed to the brim, so I had to refrain from buying presents. Of course instead I HAD to try all the delicious food. I must say, I haven’t been eating very healthily recently. My diet for the past week or so consists mainly of bread, cheese and chocolate. Oh well. I’ll eat healthy once I am home.

The next day our group took off towards Innsbruck, an Austrian town close to the Italian boarder. On the way, we detoured a couple of hours into Germany to visit the Neubraustian castle. This is the castle that supposedly inspired the Disney castle that we all know and love. The town was very small, mainly catering to the tourists visting the castle. The tour itself was underwhelming. Turns out the owner Fredrick, died before its completion. Today only 1/3 of the castle interior is completed. We were probably only in there for 30 minutes. It was interesting to see though. Supposedly Fredrick loved the Opera and crafted his rooms to look like an Opera House. He also had one corridor that was made to look like the inside of a cave. So it was interesting. Worth the 4+ hour detour? Eh…

The final day in Austria was spent in Innsbruck. I think I liked Innsbruck the best out of the three places we visited. Innsbruck hosts the oldest Christmas markets in Austria. The markets are smaller, but there are multiple locations scattered throughout the city.

The city is beautiful. Think a really quaint ski resort village. Big snowy mountains surround you everywhere you turn. The buildings look like colorful gingerbread houses, with the Christmas markets nestled in between. I really liked it.

A surprise to us, Innsbruck is the home of Swazarki Crystals (Oh! And Salzburg is the home of Redbull!). Anyways, we were able to visit the Swazarki Crystal museum and store, located right in the center of the town! The diamonds were beautiful. I never really gaggled over jewelry before, but wow there were some beautiful pieces.