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Welcome to the blog! Živeti Slovenija is a Blog for those interested in the workings of another country - in this case, the quirky and exciting Slovenia.

Monday, April 26, 2010

Ziveti Avstrija

Hello to all!



So very sorry about my continued silence on the airwaves!



But I'm back...

...in Austria!



Yes, the title of this post is Ziveti Avstrija!



I am on vacation in austria, and it is different!



We arrived after an exhausting car drive (three and a quarter hours) and some beautiful mountains. Sharp, jagged peaks rising up, more often snow-covered than not. We drove tunnels under these mountains. Some incredible feats of engineering - The longest was 8480 meters, or eight and a half kilometers, about 5.3 miles. No kidding, a behemoth tunnel. We couldn't roll down windows because of all the fumes.



We arrived in Salzburg for a lovely view of their trian station, undergoing extensive work. After adjusting slightly from slovene to german, we found the hotel. Living in the US, it is weird for a different country to be only a car drive away - different countries for us were usually separated by a grueling plane ride. All the slovene is useless, as everyone here is german!



We found our hotel, and had unloaded our baggage and entered the room complex. There were three doors, and we assumed one must be the elevators. Dad pulled one door open and prepared to walk in, only to find an electrical panel. Oops. So we tried the second. Locked. The third was a trash bin storage area. So we lugged our large, international-sized suitcased up a impeccably polished marble stair case.



We met our grandfather and grandmother - they are visiting - at the train station after a hopeless search to find the platforms in all the construction. Then we dined a dinner, and after tasting their hotel's original sacher-torte, I decided that all my time in Austria was for desserts.

The Austrian flag.

The restaurants and cafes have been troublesome because, out of habit, we all say "Dober dan" and "Hvala," and we expect the poor waiters to understand. They never do, but they speak perfecdt english, so no matter.


Today, we took the sound of music tour. Interesting enough - the movie differs incredibly from the real story. We learned other fun facts - the captain's villa was filmed in two pieces. Explaination? The front of the house, where Maria sings "Confidence" and the back where the lake is are acutally two different houses. And the inside is all stage - in hollywood. The Gazebo where two pairs of lovers meet is in the palace of an archbishop, who had his guests sit on fountains and spray them, and the inside of the gazebo is in hollywood. Haha.

We next visited Mozart's house, and learned all about the composer. He apparently hated Salzburg, and so did his father. One third of his life he spent traveling in horse-drawn carriage all around Europe, performing and composing.

Well, that's all I have time for now. We are going to Vienna tomorrow, and I will have new material.

Nasvidenje,

Garrett