Salzburg, Austria

I am so excited to visit Salzburg! I am definitely the one who put this city on the list and I have to admit, my main reason for doing so is the movie “The Sound of Music.” I have loved the movie since I was a kid, when my little sister and I would perform all of the songs from the movie together in our living room. After watching the film time and time again, I decided that I had to visit the beautiful city of Salzburg one day. I have heard several times that the movie is purely an American thing and while “The Sound of Music” tours are offered in Salzburg to please American tourists, the movie isn’t a big deal to Austrians and other tourists visiting from around the world. While I would like to say that I am not going to be the typical American tourist singing and searching for every sight from the classic movie, I know that’s just not going to be possible. However, I am still very excited to see and appreciate what Salzburg has to offer apart from one of my favorite movies.

Salzburg is also the birthplace and former home of classical composer Mozart, who was born in Salzburg in 1756. Many sights around the city are related to Mozart’s life and music. While at first I was picturing Salzburg as a city swarming with Mozart fanatics and “The Sound of Music” lovers, the more I researched the city I realized that I think I am going to enjoy Salzburg even more than I originally planned. Pictures of the city look even more beautiful than I remember from the movie and the history in Salzburg goes much farther back than Mozart’s days.

In addition to The Sound of Music tour, which yes, we will spend one of our days in Salzburg on, here is a list of other top sights we plan to visit:

Hohensalzburg Fortress – Also known as “Salzburg Castle,” this castle/fortress (not quite sure exactly which one it is, looks more like a fortress to me) is the most dominant feature of the city’s skyline. The fortress sits above Salzburg offering great views of the city below it. It also features a couple of museums, but I am more excited to explore it and check out the view.


Hellbrunn Palace – Known for its gardens, "trick fountains" and the famous gazebo scene from “The Sound of Music” where Liesl sings “16 going on 17."


Hellbrunner Allee – I hope to take a walk down this charming alleyway which connects Salzburg with Hellbrunn Palace. Also off of Hellbrunner Allee is Schloss Frohnburg Palace, which was used for the exterior shots of the Von Trapp residence in the movie.


Salzburger Dom - The city's beautiful cathedral and one of Salzburg's top attractions.


Mozartplatz Square – A memorial to Mozart in the heart of the old town of Salzburg. Since I am not quite sure if we will have time to make it to the birthplace of Mozart, I would at least like to see the statue of the composer which stands in the middle of the square. Also in the square is the Salzburg Museum which exposes visitors to the history, arts and culture of Salzburg.

Residenz Palace - Once the palace of the Prince Archbishop of Salzburg, now a magnificent palace open to the public in the old town of Salzburg.

Mirabell Palace – The palace is famous for its flowers and gardens, for fellow Sound of Music lovers, Mirabell gardens is where Maria and the children sing “Do Re Mi” on the steps of the garden, around Mirabell's famous fountain and run through a hedge tunnel.


Before we leave Salzburg we will have to try a "Mozartkugel" or a "Mozart Ball," a delicious dessert made of pistachio, marzipan and a nougat core coated in milk chocolate. These treats are extremely popular in Salzburg!


And of course, after we have the chance to visit a German beer hall in Munich, we will have to visit an Austrian beer hall in Salzburg to compare! I hope to visit Müllner Bräu, or the Augustiner Brewery which is supposed to serve Salzburg's most delicious beer!


For more information on what to do and see in Salzburg, Visit-Salzburg.net has a lot of great information and is where I did most of my research on Salzburg!

FRANCE

No trip to Europe is complete without a visit to France… the wine, the cheese, the romance, haha… however, as I mentioned in a previous blog post, we decided to forgo Paris on this trip. Not that I don’t want to go back to Paris, believe me I do and I will one day, but we want to see a different side of France on this trip. We’ve all been to Paris, but this time we want to go off the beaten path. We want to stay in the French countryside, have a picnic with some fresh cheese and a local bottle of wine, bike ride to the nearest chateau, you get the picture. The only problem is figuring out where exactly to go for this experience. Here are the options I have been entertaining:


The Loire Valley – This region is referred to as the “Garden of France” and boasts vineyards, flowers, chateaux and rolling green hills. Sounds exactly like what I have been looking for…. what makes this choice difficult is that there are several towns to choose from in the Loire Valley, the most appealing options seem to be:

Bourges – Paved stone streets, Medieval and Renaissance architecture, a beautiful gothic cathedral overlooking the town, nearby chateaux and vineyards….

Chambord – Home to the largest castle in the Loire Valley and I’m guessing it is also the home of Chambord, I’ll take a glass of champagne with a splash of Chambord while I tour the castle please…..


Tours – University town and known to many as the hub of the Loire Valley, features Renaissance mansions, museums, wine, nearby chateaux and castles, oh you know just the same old same old in the Loire Valley….

Amboise – Known for its beautiful castle and white stone houses, this town was also once the home of Leonardo Da Vinci….

Many great choices, they all sound amazing and pretty similar, however I don’t want to let my travelmates down and choose the wrong Loire Valley town! Tough decision I must face, I know…. Any suggestions?

Outside of the Loire Valley I am considering:


Bordeaux – Much larger than the towns of the Loire Valley, this port city is located in southwestern France on the Garonne River and is known as a university town. What caught my eye about Bordeaux is that it is the heart of France’s wine industry, but I guess also known by some for its art and history.


Lyon – One of the largest cities in France, a major industrial city, but more importantly, the gastronomical capital of France, need I say more?

At this point, the Lorie Valley is sounding like the place I want to be. As much as I love food and wine, I am sure the Loire Valley also has some fabulous food and wine to offer along with its smaller towns, wineries, castles and chateaux. Any suggestions about where to stay in the Loire Valley or about our other options are welcome! Too many choices.....

Getting Around Europe

With our flights officially booked, our plans getting TO and FROM Europe are finally set! The next step is figuring out how we are going to get AROUND Europe once we’re actually there.

There are quite a few airlines in Europe that offer low-cost flights to many European destinations. Two that I know of are Easy Jet and Ryanair. I flew Ryanair twice last summer, to Dublin and Pisa. My travels on Ryanair were interesting to say the least, but you really can’t beat the prices. I booked my flight to Pisa a couple of weeks in advance and I remember it costing only about $50 round trip. However, as the old saying goes, “You get what you pay for!” For those of us that are not citizens of the European Union (EU), boarding a Ryan Air flight is quite a hassle. I saw plenty of EU citizens breeze by, but non-EU citizens must get their passport checked and boarding pass stamped before getting on the plane and the line is usually extremely long. Our group traveling to Pisa actually spent the night at the airport (London’s Stansted and that night is a story in itself) before our early morning flight and we still almost missed our plane because of the long passport line! On board, there are no assigned seats (think Southwest Airlines in the U.S.) and everything costs money (no free drinks). I have even heard that Ryan Air is proposing selling standing tickets! Cheap air travel definitely has its disadvantages but these cheap airlines get you from point A to point B for ridiculously low prices! I even know someone who found a free flight on Ryanair’s website and only had to pay tax! For those doing weekend traveling or looking to quickly get across the continent, budget airlines are a great option.

We’ve decided that our best option would be to travel Europe by train. We plan on visiting about 15 different places, so rail would be the easiest and cheapest for us. Eurail offers many different options. You can buy a pass for a particular country (if you are only traveling to one), to a few countries that border each other or a global pass that includes 21 European nations. Travelers should do some research on Raileurope.com to find the best option for themselves. The website allows you to input how long you will be traveling for, how many places you will be visiting and your age to determine the best deal for you. Based on my trip (2 months, visiting about 15 places, under the age of 26) I will be buying a “Global Youth Flexi Pass” which will allow me 15 days of travel in any of the 21 countries within 2 months. Flexi passes allow you to choose your travel days within the time frame (two months in my case) but consecutive day passes are cheaper. Eurail also offers discounts for seniors (60 and up) and a saver option for groups of 2 or more traveling together at all times. In addition, the youth option will save travelers under the age of 26 a good amount of money. I was initially expecting to pay about $1,000 for my rail pass but I will only be spending $674.

It should be mentioned that you cannot use your Eurail pass in Great Britain (you can only use your pass in the 21 participating nations). Great Britain uses its own train system called BritRail, which is completely independent of Eurail. Also separate from Eurail is the Eurostar, the high speed train that connects London to Paris and Brussels through the underground “Chunnel.”

Making A Plan

Staring to plan an 8 week backpacking trip is a pretty daunting task..... We realized this when we first sat down earlier this summer to begin the process. It's hard to figure out where to start! There are soooo many things to consider: Budget (How much can we spend and how do we know how far that is going to take us?), Timing (when to go and how long to stay in each location), Accommodations (Do we book hostels before we go or wait until we get there?) and my favorite part of the planning process.... developing an itinerary! We started out sprawled out in the corner of Barnes and Noble with probably 10 guide books. While these will be helpful when planning what to do in each place and where to stay, we found the internet to be most helpful starting off. During a Google Search I found a webpage (First Time Europe by Rick Steves) that mapped out an itinerary containing many of the places we wanted to go and for the right amount of time! Even the description fit us perfectly, "two months, plenty of energy and a desire to see as much of Europe as possible!" Using Rick Steve's itinerary as our foundation, we made some slight modifications (8 days in Scandinavia wasn't going to work) and developed our own perfect itinerary! Here is what we came up with:

London (U.K.)
Loire Valley or Bordeaux (France)
Lisbon (Portugal)
Valencia (Spain)
Barcelona (Spain)
South of France
Cinque Terre (Italy)
Rome (Italy)
Naples/Capri (Italy)
Florence, Venice, Verona (Italy)
Switzerland
Munich (Germany)
Salzburg (Austria)
Prague (Czech Republic)
Berlin (Germany)
Amsterdam (Netherlands)

Pretty extensive list, huh? It was actually longer at first and we had trouble trimming it down. Once we reached this list though, we just couldn't eliminate anymore places. Each of these stops is a "must-see" for at least one of us! Are there any other "must-sees" we overlooked? Are there any of these places that don't live up to the hype? I'm sure some of you will notice one big city missing from the list.....Paris! We all agreed to skip it. Each of us had the chance to visit Paris on our study abroad trips and felt that is wasn't somewhere we had to visit again. I know it sounds crazy, but I didn't love Paris as much as I thought I would! Should we give it another chance?

Please let me know your thoughts/advice on our tentative plan!

About This Blog

Hey everyone!

I'm really excited to start this blog! I've contributed to a few blogs before, but I have never had one of my own! When my Campaigns professor, Dr. Russell announced that one of our assignments this semester would be to actively participate in some form of social media, I knew that I was going to start a travel blog. I love to travel and I am currently planning the most exciting trip of my life! I hope to use this blog to talk about/plan for my trip as well as many other travel related topics! I plan to make it very interactive with lots of links, comments and hopefully followers :)

About my trip:

I don't really remember when we came up with the idea, but about a year ago (shortly after returning from our various study abroad programs) my two best friends (Chelsie and Chelsea) and I decided that after we graduated college we would take a backpacking trip around Europe. We all had so much fun on our study abroad trips in Europe and loved the traveling aspect, but wanted to go back and explore Europe without school work on our minds (I studied abroad at Oxford, so it was just as much work as it was play). We talked to our parents about our plans and received mixed reactions. Chelsie's Dad was excited for us, mine not so much.... After spending a lot of money funding our study abroad trips, our parents were understandably worried about how much this trip was going to cost. After promising that we were going to travel as cheaply as possible and fund part of the trip with our own money, our parents finally all agreed that this would indeed be the perfect graduation present!

We plan on leaving March 1st and returning at the end of April. We will be visiting about ten countries (mostly Western Europe). We will only be bringing our backpacks and plan to stay only in hostels! We've spent a lot of time this past summer doing some planning and I hope to use this blog to continue the planning process and receive some advice!


Chelsea, Me, Chelsie






Pisa, Italy


Notre Dame in Paris



The London Eye


Ireland