Of Sights and Pastries in Salzburg

SALZBURG, AUSTRIA. I woke up in our room in Austria Trend Hotel Salzburg at around 6 in the morning. It has been my usual routine to go to the restaurant first to have my breakfast before going back to our room to take a bath and dress up but knowing that this would be the last leg of our Imperial Europe tour, I chose to do otherwise. Located at the 15th level of the hotel was the Panorama Restaurant. We had our dinner there the previous night but since it was already dark outside, I was not able to see the restaurant then in its full glory. The next morning was different. As I stepped out of the elevator to the 15th floor of the hotel, I instantly became blinded by the light coming in from the ceiling-to-floor windows of the elevator lobby. Adjusting my vision to the light, I came to discover that I was standing face-to-face with a lovely view of Salzburg. Taking a few steps more toward the restaurant, I instantly understood why the restaurant was named Panorama. There in the whole perimeter of the room were glass windows that run through from the ceiling to that part of the wall that is in the same level with the top of the chairs' backrest. Other than the glass windows letting an ample amount of sunlight to wake up the soul, they also allowed me to enjoy Salzburg from above while I dose myself with bacon and eggs to get me started for the day ahead.

Since love for me is the universal language and not English, I think it was apt that we started the tour with some love in Makartsteg Bridge which features numerous love locks placed by hopelessly romantic couples who chose to tell to this side of the world about their undying love for one another through, well, a lock and by the mere gesture of throwing the key to the river to signify that theirs will be forever.

What happens now if the couple does not have a happy ending as they have initially thought they would? As I have been told, they have to remove the lock from the bridge. Only then that the act of putting the lock and throwing the key becomes absolutely absurd. Not only will they have to fly back to Salzburg but they also have to dive through the river and find the key amongst other keys on the sediment bed. All of these has to be done while they cry a river and torture themselves by reliving the good times they had in this lovely city with the person that they presumed to be the one.

Now, that's just fantastic.

On a lighter note, it pays that the city is amazing as it is with its long rows of light-colored houses and buildings running along the sides of the Salzach river.

Getreidegasse is known to be a busy shopping street so it was just fun and refreshing to see it devoid of the everyday shoppers that flock the street during an early morning stroll. More than the eye-catchy shopwindows that displays each shop's newest offerings, I fell in love most with the wrought-iron guild signs hanging above each store there which were carried over from medieval times.

Along this infamous street, specifically at Getreidegasse 9, you can also find the house (in Mozart yellow) in which Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born and lived until the age of 17.

Of course, a mandatory visit to the Salzburg Cathedral has been done as we know that we can never leave Salzburg without viewing this seventeenth-century Baroque Dom; a religious icon of the city.

Walking through the sight of an old water wheel and cemetery, we arrived in Horse Wells at the end of it. Unlike the Trevi Fountain where you can make a wish and toss some coin, the Pferdeschwemme Fountain or Horse Wells as some call it is nothing anywhere near that as it was originally built as a horse bath which explains the numerous horse paintings that acts as the background of the fountain. Now, it is there for pure aesthetic purposes.

Before walking back to Getreidegasse, where our tour started, we sat for a lovely piece of cake and hot chocolate to warm and at the same time excite our tummy. They say that Austrian cakes and pastries are well-known features of its cuisine so it would be a crime not to have anything from the Niemetz Cafe which is a Salzburg institution.

And for the cherry on top, we had a nice seafood meal filled with oysters, shrimps, prawns and squid in Nordsee back in Getreidegasse which happened to be a filling tour-ender in quaint and interesting Salzburg.