Salzburg

…was one of the best trips I’ve had this whole semester. Despite the fact I was feeling super traveled-out after Leipzig. I spent four days there with Christy, and we went from being cultural-y to exploring nature to going into full-on shameless tourist mode. It was amazing. Here’s a breakdown:

I arrived Sunday afternoon, Sunday evening we were classy-touristy. After changing into appropriate theater-going clothes, we hit up the art museum in the Altstadt, had dinner, and then saw a production of “Jugend ohne Gott” (Youth without God). I was simultaneously impressed by how much I actually did understand and frustrated by how that still wasn’t enough for me to totally grasp everything that was going on. Fun nonetheless, though.

Monday we took a “Sound of Music” Tour which was incredibly cheesy and amazingly fun – they took us to a bunch of places where the movie had been filmed, and it was crazy to see how the filmmakers pieced together different areas of the city to create the film. After that we went up to Hohensalzburg, a castle/fortress up on a hill to the west of the river, where the view over the city is absolutely stunning.

Tuesday we hopped back over the border into Germany to visit a Salt Mine, which was totally cracked out and incredibly cool – I totally wished the brothers could have been with me to see it! Unfortunately, I didn’t understand a lot of the German they were using to explain the mining process (definitely not the type of vocabulary I’ve ever learned) but it was amazing to be in the mine and walk through the tunnels.

After that we continued on to the Königssee – truly the most beautiful place I’ve seen in Europe this far. It’s a long, skinny lake, incredibly clean and a beautiful aqua color and bordered by huge mountains – sort of Canandaigua-esque…but on steroids. We took a boat ride out to a little point further down the lake and just walked around the paths for a bit. It was drizzling the entire time but the rain and mist really didn’t detract from the experience at all.

Wednesday, then, before we left in the afternoon, we went to the “Trick Fountains” at Hellbrunn Palace, and were decently soaked by the end of the tour – our tour guide was realllly enjoying catching everyone by surprise and turning on random unnoticed fountains the whole time. There were also tons of little kids on the tour, who were mostly adorable and completely enjoying the ridiculousness, aside from the one poor German kid who sobbed the entire tour.

Salzburg as a city was also extremely touristy, but so wonderful/beautiful it didn’t even bother me – I can see why it gets so so many tourists each year!

I’ve spent the past two weekends in Tübingen and plan on being here the next two weekends as well – sort of a record! But totally necessary, as I need to prepare two Referats (oral presentations) as well as write my Hausarbeit (final-term-paper)…I’ve become great friends with the library recently.

Prag, Straßburg, Leipzig, Dresden

The mad travel spree continued this past month. Ali and Helen (sister and cousin) came to visit Deutschland/Europe/me which was WONDERFUL. It was literally so nice to have family around and people to talk about home-things with. Slash we did some amazing traveling:

Prag/Praha/Prague– completely beautiful and horribly touristy. I love the way the city looks – it actually reminded me of Vienna – and how it embraces it’s river – it’s very central to the town has simple gorgeous bridges, which I’m a total sucker for. We spent nearly all day Saturday at the Hrad (castle), a massive complex really, and both beautiful and intimidating in the best sense. Sunday we went to mass in a really stunning church just steps from our hostel, and an hour-long mass in a language I 100% don’t speak realllly made me appreciate Vatican II. We also saw parts of the Jewish Museum in Prag; the Synagoge/Museum focusing on Jewish history in the region from 1000-1800 was one of the best exhibits I think I’ve seen.

Then Ali and Helen ditched me for more awesome traveling (they went to Vienna, Venice, and München) and I went back to Tübingen for a joyous (read sarcastically) week of Uni.

The next Saturday/Sunday we went to Strasbourg/Straßburg. The spelling still confuses me, but it was incredibly beautiful! Which I was not entirely expecting but was pleasantly surprised to discover. I was also extremely pleasantly surprised to find that all of the people there – and by that I really mean the waiters, the only Strasburg-ians we talked to – we super-nice despite the fact we were speaking English (and me accidentally sometimes in German) to them. Although Ali and Helen said Strasburg was the most difficult place to use English that they’d been to, we very much got by.

We were extremely lazy tourists in Strasburg. Mass (in the really stunning Frauenkirche) and a boat tour on the river were the only things we did. All other time was filled with walking from one restaurant or bar or café to the next. It was wonderful.

After three days in Tübingen after Straßburg, we (me plus some Americans and Brazilians from Deutsch-Kompakt) left this past Thursday for Leipzig. We did a “Blind Booking” with Germanwings, which means you choose a general destination or theme (ex, “Eastern Europe” or “Sun and Sand” or “Nightlife”). We chose “Eastern Europe” and naturally get sent somewhere within Germany rather than somewhere like Sarajevo. Oh well. Leipzig was a lot cooler than I was expecting, and we were able to do a day trip on Saturday to Dresden, which is absolutely beautiful along the river. Museum-wise I was feeling a little screwed after the weekend was over, as Leipzig’s City Museum was only half finished (missing the 19^th/20^th Centuries) and the History of the German Military Museum in Dresden was closed until November. There was, of course, plenty of else to do and it was a really fun trip overall.

Tomorrow (Sunday) I leave for a four-day-trip to Salzburg, and then I literally never want to leave Tübingen again. By Sunday in Leipzig we had no desire to do anything, and I think I’m a little traveled-out. The new goal for my last two months here is to explore Baden-Württemburg (the federal state that Tübingen is in) and maybe start being serious about school. Maybe.