Salzburg Things to Do Tips by globetrott Top 5 Page for this destination

Salzburg : Mozarthaus, the birthplace of Mozart

In Salzburg you will find the so-called Mozarthaus, the birthplace of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, he was born there on January 27th, 1756 as the son of Leopold Mozart, who was a violinist and music-teacher.
On the 3rd floor of Mozarthouse you will see the kitchen of the family Mozart as the first part of the various rooms you can visit.
You will not be able to step inside the kitchen, but you can take a look through a fence.
In anoither room you will see various musical instruments, used by all members of the Mozart family and also the first - rather small - violin of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
In my 3rd photo you can see the very special door-knob of the Mozarthouse in Getreidegasse 9 !
It is made in the shape of a snake, held in the mouth of a lion.
It would be a pity if you would just pass by it without taking a closer look, and you will even be able to knock on the door as it is fully functional still.

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Opening times of the Mozart Geburtshaus are:
daily 09.00 a.m. - 06.00p.m. (entry until 05.30p.m.)
in July and August until 07.00p.m. (entry until 06.30p.m.)
Dec.24th: 09.0a.m. -03.00 p.m.

Address: Salzburg/Getreidegasse 9

Directions: Mozarthaus is in the centre of the old city of Salzburg, in the pedestrean zone of Getreidegasse.

Website: http://www.mozarthaus.biz/

Erlebnisburg Hohenwerfen / Werfen castle

Werfen castle:
a great daytrip from Salzburg
The castle of Werfen can be visited easily on your own, you can walk uphill or take the newly built funicular. Already at the ticket-box at the large parking you have the possibility to fix certain times for the tours on your ticket ! Audioguides are available in English, French, Italian, Dutch, Magyar, Spanish, Czech and even in Russian !! You may get those at the place, here the guided tours start next to the restaurant ! The guide will speak only German !
My 2nd photo: The belfry of Burg Hohenwerfen dates back to the year 1535 and inside of its basment you may get inside and find the souvenir-shop there, the upper part of the tower is part of the guided tour and you may see the large clockwork and the bells that were ring in case of fire or enemies approaching. On the very top of the belfry you will have a great panorama-view, but there is just a quite steep stair to climb up.
in My 3rd photo: Fuerstenzimmer is one of the most beautiful rooms of the castle and you will get there at the very end of the guided tour. The original room dates back to the year 1566 but unfortunately it burned down completely in 1931. In 2003 it was rebuilt according to old photos by a local artist, specialized in wooden works of art. A small part of the furniture is from another room and you may not walk around in the room, you just enter at one side and may take pictures from behind a fence.
My 4th photo:The small castle kitchen is another of the rooms that you may see through a window, while walking through the castle on your own. This furniture dates back to the 17th - 19th century and this chamber is just above the place, where you get out of the funicular.
In my 5th photo: Karl's Room was made for Archiduke Eugene with furniture of the 17th and 18th century. It might have made sense to call it Eugene's room then, but for some reason it is called Karl's Room anyway according the inscriptions in the castle. This is one of the rooms that you may see when taking a look through a window 1 floor above the place, where the funicular ends in the castle. There are several such rooms that you may see, while waiting for your tour to start at each full hour !

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the castle is open for visitors between
easter and november 1st
(in april except on monday !)
The funicular + guided tour + falcons are 13 euros a person
7 euros for children
guided tours start each hour between 10.00a.m. and 05.00p.m.
falconry is only at 11.00a.m. and 03.00p.m.
the first ride of the funicular is at 09.00a.m.

Directions: Werfen castle is about 40km south of the city of Salzburg : take the highway (you will need a highway-sticker / vignette) or you take a bit longer and take the ordinary roads !

Website: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/1ffe4/4e394/

Eisriesenwelt - a giant ice-cave in Werfen

Eisriesenwelt - a giant ice-cave in Werfen
Eisriesenwelt is the place most of the tourists are coming to Werfen for. I did not go there, because photography is forbidden inside that ice-cave !
A cable-car is taking you uphill, and then you have to walk quite a bit before you get to the caves, lots of bustours are going there from Salzburg and sometimes it gets quite crowded, so I decided to explore the castle of Werfen instead and show a picture of an ice-cave here, that I made in Jungfraujoch / Switzerland.
Take a look at their web-page, many pics that are shown on VT are taken from that web-page !
This is the biggest ice-cave in the world and all of the summer the temperature is an average of Zero celcius, so you better get warm clothings, the cave has a length of 42 km, 1 km of wich you will be shown in the guided tour.
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The caves are open between
end of April and end of October
in 2006 that was April 29th till October 26th, 2006
the 1st day might be flexible the end
is the Austrian national holiday
that might stay the same each year !
guided tours are available between 9.00a.m. and 03.30p.m
(in july and August till 04.30p.m.)
17 euros is the fee for the cablecar+the caves
children pay 8,50 Euros

Directions: Eisriesenwelt is in the north of the village and the castle of Werfen. They also have a large car-parking there !

Website: http://www.eisriesenwelt.at

Grossglockner - Hochalpenstrasse

Grossglockner - Hochalpenstrasse
an alpine toll-road taking you
to the highest mountains of Austria
Grossglockner is the highest mountain in Austria with a hight of 3.798 m above the Sea-level. In the year 1800 the first successful expedition reached its peak and still today you may get there only when you are an experienced climber.
Grossglockner-Hochalpenstrasse passes by this mountain in a distance of several km, you will have a great view to Grossglockner and its surrounding alpine peaks from many places, but the ordinary tourists will never get really close to it.
Kaiser-Franz-Josefs-Hoehe is maybe the closest place you may get to by car, then you may walk a bit closer on Gamsgruberweg, but after some hundred meters the path gets dangerous, and you need a good climbing equipment to continue.
my 2nd photo:Fuschertoerl
Fuschertörl is just a monument to memorize all of the workers, who lost their lives, while building Grossglockner Hochalpenstrasse between 1924 and 1935. The austrian architect Clemens Holzmeister built this monument in a hight of 2428 meters above the sea-level at the place with the best view of the Grossglockner.
Fuschertoerl has a large parking-area, but no kiosk, no toilets and no restaurants closeby - the next facilities are in a distance of 500 meters, at Dr.-Franz-Rehrl Haus .
my 3rd photo: Kaiser-Franz-Josefs-HoeheThe austrian emperor Kaiser Franz-Josef was hiking in 1856, in the age of 26 years, from Heiligenblut in direction to the Grossglockner and he reached the area that is still called after him and is nowadays the central place for most of the tourist activities. From there you can step down to the Pasterze-glacier, or you can also take the short funicular there. You may watch the marmots or start hiking the Gamsgruberweg. And of course you will find various restaurants and souvenir-shops. The Post-bus fom Zell am See will stop there and before returning to Zell am See or changing to the bus to Heiligenblut, you will have enough time to get out of the bus and look around a bit.
Cardrivers will find a giant (and really ugly) parking-house there free of charge.
my 4th photo: Swarowski-Warte
Swarovski-Warte is the name of the great observation-point high above Kaiser-Franz-Josefs-Hoehe, you may see it on my picture, reaching out of the parking-house like a giant crystall ! The name of Swarowski does in this case not stand for the well-known cristall works of art, but rather for their traditional productions of optical lenses with high precision that will help you there to watch the alpine animals like marmots and ibexes etc.
my 5th photo: Gamsgruberweg
Gamsgruberweg is a quite easy hikingpath that will take you from the large parking at Kaiser Franz-Josefs-Hoehe to the upper part of Pasterze-glacier. That hiking-path is partly in the open air, partly through various tunnels and these tunnels are also used for exhibitions and interactive installations explaining the history of the glacier and some myths and ledgends of that area.
Hiking on Gamsgruberweg takes about 30 minutes, at the end of it it is advisable not to continue, except that you have a good equipment and are an experienced mountain-climber/hiker.

Directions: Grossglockner is about halfway between Heiligenblut and Fusch an der Glocknerstrasse. Go by car or by bus from Zell am See or from Heiligenblut.

Website: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/1ffe4/5052e/

Schmittenhöhe in Zell am See

Schmittenhöhe & Elisabethkirche
in Zell am SeeSchmittenhoehe is the mountain high above the village of Zell am See and you can go there easily by cablecar. In summer you will have endless possibilities to take a walk or longer hikes and paragliders will be waiting there for tandem-passengers as well.
In wintertime Schmittenhoehe is a great area for skiing.
There is a chapel for the austrian empress Sissi, a mountainhotel and various restaurants.
Elisabethkapelle was built in the year 1905 on top of Schmittenhoehe, in a hight of about 2000m above sealevel, in order to memorize empress Sisi. You can enter this chapel freely and without restrictions during the day and will find a nice interior in a combination of Art Nouveau and traditional style.
This chapel is just a few meters from the station of Schmittenhoehe.

Directions: Zell am See is south-west of Salzburg, you can go there as a daytrip by car or by train from the city of Salzburg !

Website: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/1ffe4/4e18a/

Krimmler Wasserfälle

Krimmler Wasserfälle
Austria's highest waterfalls
First of all you should know that this attraction needs a lot of walking uphill and downhill for quite some time in order to see at least a small part of these gigantic waterfalls. You will mostly see just a small part of it and in order to see all of the many cascades at the same time in your photos you have to step up one of the mountains opposite of the falls or even better : take an airplane (e.g. from Zell am See).
Nevertheless it is worth to step up at least to the 2nd viewpoint, the view from there is excellent, but the haze of the water is sometimes taken to the viewpoint by the wind, so take care of your camera and a rain-gear is never really wrong at these waterfalls, even in bright sunshine !
My 2nd photo: Unterer Wasserfall / the lower waterfall is the easiest access to the waterfalls, you just have to walk almost flat from the entrancegate to the falls. This place shows the waterfalls from below and it has the big disadvantage, that you will have all the dust there as well and from the best places it is simply impossible to make good photos, because you get deeply wet within a short time.
You might find a good place for looking at the waterfalls there, for photography it is a waste of time !
My 4th photo: Riemann Kanzel
Riemann Kanzel in a hight of 1100 meters above sea-level is about 20-30 min. to walk from the entrancegate to the waterfalls.
Riemann Kanzel is the name of the first viewpoint that you will get to, when climbing up the mountain, the way is mostly asphalted, but quite steep and you will need about 20-30 minutes in order to step up to this place, from where you will have a good view of the waterfall and mostly the winds will not blow the dust into your direction.
After 05.00pm the gates of the road are open to be used by everyone without a ticket, this is also done for the hikers who might want to return from mountain-hikes late at night.
My last photo: the ibex / Alpen-Steinbock
The ibex / Alpen-Steinbock is a typical animal of the austrian alps, but you have to step up high into the mountains in order to see one. It is hard to believe what steep slopes they are able to run and jump up and down. I once saw one of them running downhill the steepest slope I ever saw and it was running with full speed for about 500 meters without stopping or stepping into a wrong place, then it stoped and started to eat some grass or herbs.
You will be able to see an Ibex in the Zoos of Schoenbrunn and Salzburg/Hellbrunn or here in Krimml in a sculpture next to the entrancegate of the Krimml waterfalls

Directions: Go to Krimml by train from Zell am See or Mittersill or by daytrip from Salzburg or Innsbruck.Bus #670 from Zell am See is another possibility to go there !

Website: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/1ffe4/517ba/

Bad Gastein - Hofgastein - Sportgastein

Bad Gastein - Bad Hofgastein - Sportgastein
Austria's famous spa in the alpsBad stand for "bath" in german and Bad Gastein is known as a healthy spa for quite some centuries. At the end of the 19th century/ beginning of 20th century this had been one of the most famous health-resorts for the high society and celebrities from all over the world.
My main pic: The Grand de L'Europe
The Grand Hotel de L'Europe is not a hotel anymore, but still an interesting sight with its lovely details in art-nouveau-style and at the beginning of the 20th century this place used to be the place to go for the rich and famous and for the high society of Austria and the whole world. The hotel was opened in 1909 and used to be one of the very best hotels in the Austrian Monarchy. Nowadays it is not used as a hotel anymore, only a part of it is used by Casinos Austria !
The rest of the rooms in this former hotel are private appartments now.
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Some celebrities that spent a vacation in this hotel:
William Somerset Maugham, Liza Minnelli, Heinrich Mann, Robert Stolz,
King Ferdinand of Bulgaria, King Faisal I. of Irak,
Ibn Saud and the Shah of Persia, Dr. Wilhelm Opel ...
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The giant waterfall in the citycentre

is certainly the most important tourist-sight of Bad Gastein and on the total the waterfalls are consisting of 3 cascades with a total hight of more than 200 meters. In the citycentre a bridge will go across the waterfall and there is also a path along the falls from the top to its bottom, where you will also see a powerplant and some interesting works of art beeing displayed in the field where the falls end and the Gasteiner Ache will continue as an ordinary mountain-river.

The waterspray of these giant waterfalls that fills the air in Bad Gastein is a part of the healing of various diseases that you get when staying there !

Directions: It is easy to get to Bad Gastein by train or by car ! It is a fulldaytrip from the city of Salzburg and you can combine it with St.Johann im Pongau or Zell am See.

Website: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/1ffe4/516f6/

Schloss Hellbrunn in Salzburg

Schloss Hellbrunn in Salzburg
& the trick-fountains of the prince-bishopHellbrunn is a nice palace in the south of Salzburg and mainly it is well known for its trick-fountains dating back to the year 1650.
Fuerstentisch (table of the prince-bishop) and the Roemisches Theatre (roman theatre) is the first attraction of Wasserspiele Hellbrunn that you will see during the guided tour. This table has some fountains built into each and every chair, except the one for the princebishop of course and back in the old times, while everbody was dining the fountains would start to flow all of a sudden. It certainly was a lot of fun in the old times and it also is still today, when the tour-guide will ask for voluteers...
Muschel-Grotte / Grotto of the sea-shells is another attraction of the guided tour through Wasserspiele Hellbrunn. That Grotto was built in the basement of the Schloss Hellbrunn, and when leaving that bGrotto again, you better watch the tourguide, so you will catch the right moment, when he turns on the water, flowing out of places that you would never expect...
b.t.w. Inside the museum of Hellbrunn you will see how some of the sculptures are moving their tongue etc. just by water-power and even today without electricity, that was quite fascinating to see.
Mechanisches Theater it dates back to the year 1750 and was built by Lorenz Rosenegger instead of another water-grotto. It is without doubt one of the most precious and special exhibits in Hellbrunn: Music is playing by water-power and all of these more than 200 small hand-carved persons and animals in that scenery are moving around, a great work of art and craftmen-ship, considdering that it dates back so many centuries.
The Festsaal / the large hall for festivities of the palace
Dont miss to take a look inside the palace of Hellbrunn, its really worth it : Markus Sittikus von Hohenems was educated in Italy, so this might be the reason, why many of the frescos inside of the Lustschloss Hellbrunn might remind you a lot of the ones you might have seen in Italy. This is the Festsaal, the large hall for various festivities, dancing, music performances etc.
Enlarge my photographs and you will see great frescos pretending colums and a view into distant halls, but in fact it is all completely flat and just an illusion !

Directions: Take the public bus #25 that starts at Salzburg Hauptbahnhof, it will take 30-35 minutes to Hellbrunn & is included also in the daytickets & Salzburg-Card.From the highway take the exit in ANIF in the south of the city !

Website: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/1ffe4/50504/

Hallstatt

Hallstatt - a great daytrip from SalzburgHallstatt is a MUST for every tourist in Austria. Nowadays it is a village of just 2000 inhabitants, but it dates back thousands of years and gave the name to a time-peridoe in the stone-age that refers to the kind of settlement in Hallstatt : the so-called "HALLSTATT-CULTURE"
Another interesting and quite unique fact about Hallstatt is the way that the dead people are treated: The tiny cemetery in Hallstatt has to follow strange rules: Come first, served first !
And after 10-20 years, the dead bodies will be excarvated, cleaned, the bones will be sorted and the head-bone eventually decorated, when the descendants order it that way.
The Carnel is open during the day and in the high season you may only enter it after having payed a small fee of 1 Euro to the lady at the entrance.
You also get a small leavlet with some infos and pics togeather with your entrance-ticket.
You may walk into the carnel on your own...
all the rest of the year you may just take a look through an iron fence into the carnel and take your pics from there like I did for that picture.
The head-bones have engravings with the names of the dead persons, all the other bones are not sorted.It is certainly a special feeling that you get, when you are standing inside the carnel, beeing able to almost touch the head-bones of people, who died a long time ago and their head-bones were beautifully decorated by an artist - mostly it is done as a side-job by someone from Hallstatt with an ordinary profession as well.
Hallstatt is a place that photographers should visit in the morning untill maybe 02.00p.m., because the sun will set Hallstatt into the shadow of the high mountains surrounding the village afterwards.

The village of Hallstatt is built on a steep mountain close to the lake, and when walking through the small street - that was the ONLY street through the village still 20 years ago - you will see that not a single of the private gardens is flat, but all of them consist of many different levels of terraces combined by steep steps leading to the houses.

-------HOW TO GET TO HALLSTATT------The train stops at the opposite shore of Lake Hallstatt / Hallstätter See and you will have to take the ship to get into the village.
The distance is just a few hundred meters, as you may see on my picture - and when you click on it you might even see the train in the background.

Better check HERE for the timetable of trains well in advance, as trains run regularily but not really very often and especially later in the evening it might be a problem to catch a train.

Directions: Take the train as explained above or by car as an easy daytrip from Salzburg.

Website: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/1ffe4/50609/

Berchtesgaden - a hop over the border

Berchtesgaden & the Kehlsteinhaus
a hop over the borderKehlsteinhaus was a present by Martin Bormann on behalf of the NSDAP for Adolf Hitler's 50th birthday. Thousands of workers were working for 13 months for this giant project that included a scenic mountain-road from Obersalzberg to the upper parking, the tunnel into the mountain, the lift up to the Kehlsteinhaus and the house itself.
Hitler did use that building only a few times, But Eva Braun spent a lot of days here. While most of the other buildings on Obersalzberg were destroyed, this building remained untouched and it is nowadays owned by the state of Bavaria.
The interior is still the same at a few places, it is used as a restaurant today and millions of people go there each year in order to enjoy the great view and also breath a bit of the history of course...
Kehlsteinstrasse is one of the most scenic alpine roads in Europe and it was built within the rather short time of just 13 months. 700 meters is the difference in hight and the road has a length of 6,5 km. There are 5 tunnels and the road is mostly just 4 meters wide. Therefore the time-table of the buses taking the tourists up and down the road are very strict and oncoming buses have to wait at the passing-places.
This road was used by A. Hitler only 16 times and that road was public untill 1952.
Nowadays that road is for the buses ONLY !
Pedestrians are absolutely forbidden to walk there, there is a seperate walking-path through the woods !
The golden elevator for the Fuehrer from the tunnel to the Kehlsteinhaus looks quite "out of time" and also the lights and the decorations of the elevator were not changed since 1933. There is an operator, who might normally also have the duty to ask for the tickets for that lift, but in fact he did not, while I was there.
The ticket is included in the price of the bus, but of course some people might have walked up that distance and take the lift now for the rest of the way without having payed anything at all...
Those people should actually get a ticket at the counter, where the return-times for the buses are stamped at your ticket.
It is quite an easy walk to the summit & the cross on top of Kehlstein and I may highly recommend it in order to enjoy an even better panorama-view than from Kehlsteinhaus. The path is not asphalted, but easy and not slippery at all, no special hiking-shoes are necessary and many benches will be there. Spectacular is especially the view down to Koenigsee and to the Alps in the south-east of Salzburg.
-------HOW TO GET TO BERCHTESGADEN-------
Berchtesgaden has its own train-station and the trainline ends there, trains are arriving via Bad Reichenhall. From Salzburg to Berchtesgaden it is about 1 hour by train and you may as well take the bus from Salzburg :
Take the bus #840 from Salzburg Rathaus and in case that you like to go to Koenigssee as well, change there to Bus #839 or #843 , the total ride will be a bit more than 1 hour and there is mostly 1 bus-connection each hour.

check the timetable here, and search for Berchtesgaden !

There is NO public road from Obersalzberg to Kehlsteinhaus, BUT only the historical, scenic road called Kehlsteinstrasse, that is used nowadays for the buses taking you up the mountain.
You will have to leave your car at the large car-parking in Obersalzberg, have to pay a parking-fee there of 2,50 euros a day (1,50 with a Kurkarte) and get a ticket for the bus to Kehlsteinhaus. That bus-ticket has a time printed on it and is valid ONLY at that time !!
As soon as you have reached the upper parking you will have to register for the bus you would like to take back, and you will get a stamp on your ticket, indicating that time.
In case that you would like to get down again prior to that time, and they still have empty spaces, they are glad for everyone going down prior than the last buses.
1 hour at Kehlsteinhaus is enough, in case that you don't plan to spend some time in the restaurant or want to start any of the hikings (that would also require experienced climbers & equipment !!)
The ride is 14,50 euros both ways and 12,50 euros one way and just 13,- / 11,- Euros for holders of a Kurkarte (you get it when you stay in a hotel in the area) and it includes the fee for the lift inside the mountain, that takes you from the upper parking directely to Kehlsteinhaus !
Buses are leaving the lower parking at :
09.20 + 09.24 + 10.10 + 10.35 + 11.00 + 11.25 + 11.50a.m. + 12.15 + 12.40 + 01.05 + 01.30 + 01.55 + 02.20 + 02.45 + 03.10 + 03.35 + 04.00p.m.
The last bus is leaving the upper parking at 04.50 pm !!

Directions: %CBSee the details above !

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