City of Marzipan, Mozart and Maria Von Trapp
(At the Mirabel Gardens on a drizzly Austrian morning)
The prospect of flying into Salzburg from London filled me with anticipation. I had hoped to receive a bird’s-eye view of the Salzkammergut as in the opening scene of The Sound of Music in which Julie Andrews as Maria races joyously singing, “The hills are alive with the sound of music”. Instead of which, we flew into Salzburg airport after darkness had fallen leaving me with few glimpses of the spectacular folds of the green-draped mountains.
Despite the late hour, the area around the railway station still buzzed with tourist energy. We settled for the next two nights in the family run Pension Alderhof, a very charming place with painted wooden furniture and a short walk into Old Town. After a gigantic Austrian breakfast, we walked on a Sunday morning in a light drizzle, finding refuge at mass in the Church of St. Andras which was off the beaten tourist track and so devoid of crowds.
Then, crossing one of the many bridges over the river Salzach, we arrived at Alte Markt, a busy market square where business for the day was just awakening. For the next couple of days, we allowed the magic of Salzburg to creep upon us. Despite the dreary weather (we actually had pea-size hailstones rain down upon us during an icy shower!) this musical city of Mozart and the Von Trapps, found its way into our hearts as we explored Getreidegasse (below left) and munched on a delicious giant chocolate covered soft pretzel filled with apricot jam—deeelicious!
This famous shopping street with its curious wrought-iron signs adorning the shop fronts is the location of one of Mozart’s homes. The Salzburger Festspiele (Annual Salzburg Festival of Music) was on while Llew, Chriselle and I were visiting and the streets were filled to bursting with classical music-lovers looking for a bargain opera or a candlelight concert to enthrall them.
(Posing by the statue of Mozart at left and at the famous Pegasus Fountain at right)
Salzburg is a city to be met on foot and our walking tour took us into charming corners that came straight out of postcards. We posed for pictures by the famous Pegasus fountain that featured in The Sound of Music and in the courtyards of the many churches that give the city its distinctive skyline with is pointed steeples and its circular domes. Everywhere the genius of Austria’s Neo-Classical architect, Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach was plainly evident in the ornate Baroque altars with their layers of decorative embellishment—twisted marble pillars, gilded ceiling moldings, endless wall and dome frescoes by Johann Michael Rottmayr and curlicued stuccowork. As Llew put it, “Just when you think you have seen the most spectacular of the churches, you come upon yet another one that blows you right away”.
Determined not to suffer sightseeing fatigue, we stopped at Café Tomaselli for coffee and pastries and had a chance to visit Cafe KondatereiFurst where the famous Mozartkugeln was created—chocolate and marzipan confections that melt in the mouth and are found all over this city in their distinctive golden wrappers with Amadeus’s portrait on them. People-watching in the sidewalk cafes is a very enjoyable activity and we did a fair share of it throughout our travels. Salzburg also presents beautiful aerial views from the Hohensalzburg Fortress that we visited through a ride on the speedy funicular train. The views of the Untersberg Mountain within whose shadows the city lies and the extended views of the Salzkammergut Region (Lake District) of Salzburg are also beautiful from this height.We took the stairs on our way down to the city, a move that’s high recommended for the totally amazing views it presents of the Dom (the city’s main cathedral), and the pretty spires of the churches.
Finally, we ended our visit by exploring the Right Bank of the river, New Town, pausing to appreciate the beauty of the Mirabel Gardens and to gasp at the stunning Baroque marble staircase in the Mirabel Palace punctuated every so often with playful cherubs (right), a gift of Prince-Archbishop Wolf Dietrich to his mistress who bore him fourteen children. Now you know why they needed the Reformation!
I had visited Salzburg twenty years previously and had taken the famous Sound of Music Tour at that time. Not surprisingly, the tour is till popular among foreign tourists though Salzburg locals seem oblivious to the hype that surrounds the shooting of the film in this enchanting location. Apart from the tour, other things hadn’t seemed to have changed at all. The weather, for one, showed little improvement in two decades—it was raining when I left Salzburg in 1987 and it was still raining when I returned the following millennium! Nothing dampens my joys in the city’s charms, however, and its views are best digested on the bridges that lead out to New Town.
It was thrilling to be woken each morning to the peeling sounds of church bells in the many steeples that dot the skyscape and to munch on wurst at the several sausage stands around the city. On our way into Vienna, we made a detour into the fairy-tale village of Mondsee whose church featured in the scene where Maria weds Captain Von Trapp. The pastel colored facades of the pretty houses on the main street and the masses of flowering annuals tumbling out of profuse window-boxes gave Mondsee a very special charm. Then, just before we arrived in Vienna, we stopped off at St. Valentin to meet, after seventeen years, my former neighbor from Bombay from Bombay, Dinesh Marar, his wife Rosemary and their daughter Natalie, for dinner (below right).
Bon Voyage!
