June 2, 2022
Day 51: Mondsee to Salzburg
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Each of the last three nights has featured heavy rain, even thunder and lightening, but the days have been dry. This morning started with some leftover rain and we put on all our rain gear, but it soon came off.
We set off into the town, and things seemed much calmer than last evening. Or perhaps it was us who were calmer, because as you see from the photos, there were still cars on our case, and even quite early, the darn sand and gravel trucks were already at it.
We aren't really crabby about Mondsee, because it is a nice town, particularly right at the core.
Mondsee also has two famous locations. The first is the hotel where we think the McLeods stayed, right by the church. (We are not counting in this famous list the hotel where we stayed, which we are sure is where Andersons stayed - in our room most likely!).
The second famous location is the St. Michaels church. Until we read it in the Andersons' blog later in the day, we did not realize that this was the setting of the wedding scene in the Sound of Music. I have now replayed that scene, and it's all true. For example in the movie we clearly see the big black bearded guy in this altar:
More about the altar - there are quite a few steps leading up to it, and in the movie you see Maria slowly mounting these. In my own case, I respectfully stopped before these steps and took my picture. But then an electrician in jean shorts came galloping past, up the steps, and off to stage left, presumably to change a light bulb or something. He spared not a glance for the pretentious golden edifice. Taking my cue from him, I went up the steps too and reshot. As it happens, my first photo was better anyway.
The large golden altar structures caught my attention in this church, firstly because it lacked a painted ceiling. But next, though at first glance they seem like just a mass of golden carvings, details emerge when you really look at them. In my case, I noticed that the Christ figures looked really distressed. We have seen ones in worse shape - like with guts hanging out, but these definitely need cheering up.
Each altar also of course has a history. Just opening the church guidebook at random reveals how serious these histories are:
That was it for our visit to the famous church. The electrician too had other stops to make!
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What came next was what we felt was the most peaceful/scenic section of the Salzkammergut excursion. It may not have necessarily been absolutely the most scenic, but the relative absence of cars also had a big impact on the overall impression. The section extended from just outside Mondsee to just beyond the top of the Irrsee. This was no doubt partly because the highway, 154, was safely on the other side of the lake.
While you are still absorbed in the sweeping, gorgeous, clean vistas we will throw in here what we were also looking at - piles of manure. These interested us because each was planted with squashes. We expect this would be very successful, unless too acidic. Too bad we won't be here to check on it.
Another roadside attraction continued to be the baby boom, attended by many storks. In this case Malia, destined to be a cyclist, joined us on May 13.
When we reached Straswalchen, we sent Dodie into a grocery to find some salads. This left me standing with the bikes. My first thing in this situation was to check blogs, like the Andersons, to see what interesting things they had encountered right by here. It's fun to see what others have seen and done, but it could also be argued that this taints one's own independent experience. Anyway, I read about the pizza at the radler treff, coming up, and it was fun when we reached the exact same spot.
My next activity standing with the bikes was observing the other grocery customers arriving on their bikes and parking nearby. What struck me was that each and every housewife pulling in was using a bike with Bosch Performance CX motor, and low derailleur gears. A bike like that has 56% more push than mine. Clearly these ladies are from a tougher neighbourhood than Apeldoorn, Netherlands, where my bike looked pretty powerful when it came out of the box!
We stopped by a small chapel to eat our sandwiches (the salads are for supper). Inside were some graphics, that looked to me like angels were engaged in some sports competition.
We continued to pass by scenic towns, like Kostendorf seen below. There was a poster naming all the mountains in the background, but no use, since my camera is not picking them up.
We arrived at the spot by the Wallersee where Scott and Rachael had stopped for lunch. There was no one there this time, and it looked like this:
For Scott and Rachael it had looked like this:
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When our track took us back to Eugendorf, which we had passed through on the way out, looking the other way revealed a lot more scenic beauty than we had earlier thought:
Also, instead of unwillingly running into McDonald's we found an eis cafe. In line with our new "sane" policy towards these we split a (ok, three scoop) concoction. Dodie made the mistake of handing me the menu and saying "you choose". So I chose the Mozart becher (bowl). "Hey, that's the most expensive one", she squeeked. "Yeah, so...", said I.
When the server came, I told her "Mozart Becher", and she said the equivalent of "say what?" "Moe zart bech her" I repeated. After some quizzical expressions, she said "oh" "moat zart becker". I told Dodie the lady had a strange accent, Dodie told me I don't know how to say "Moat zart".
When the thing came, we built a wall from waffle triangles to divide it in half. This helped prevent border disputes. We also found that included in the price had been two Mozart kugeln. The great thing is that the brand supplied was one we had not seen before. So we ate one and squirreled one. For back home we now have quite a good supply of different kugeln for a tasting session with Joni.
Once we returned to the Salzach it was a straight run into the now so familiar centre of Salzburg. Along the river are these unique flood control structures. I remembered them from eight years ago, but Dodie did not. There are other things that one or other of us remember, or not. It shows that we need to return to places perhaps every five years to keep memories fresh. Yikes, there are already all kinds of places we've been whose "best return before" dates are already expired!
Not only is Salzburg now comfortably familiar again, but so is our hotel. We know where to put the bikes, we know where they have free coffee, and our computers already know the internet password. We were able to dump our stuff and immediately head out for a walk.
One reason we were eager to go for a walk was to test out Dodie's new walking stick tips. As you see, they are immune to getting stuck in Salzburg cobbles.
That made it a lot easier to negotiate our street using the sticks, which Dodie does find helpful. In this shot you see our destination, the St. Sebastian church.
The church is most famous for its cemetery, but it was a bit of a chore finding it, since signs and locked doors stopped anyone getting to it through the church. But we found a way in. A sign claimed the cemetery had graves of the Mozart family, the Dopplers, and others. It was not clear exactly where, since there were long colonnades with family crypts along the walls, and many graves in the large grass area.
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Back at the hotel, Dodie spent several hours booking places to stay as tomorrow we shoot off into the mountains to the south. We are very excited, as this was to be either a highlight or an impossibility for this tour. It's looking like a coming highlight from here!
What gave Meaning to Life today? Those idyllic narrow, curving, Austrian bikeways through green meadows, with mountains in the distance.
Today's ride: 58 km (36 miles)
Total: 2,897 km (1,799 miles)
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