07/20/13 In the morning, for our last day of the biking tour we went on a walking tour of Salzburg. Maybe if we had gone on a walking tour of Munich I would have a different impression of Munich, but I thought Salzburg was beautiful.

They have a few weird modern art pieces around. This thing is right next to the castle/fortress Hohensalzburg built in the 11th century. I think someone needs to tell the people in charge not to erect anymore “modern art”. In my humble opinion, It takes away from the charm. And Cherie…..I have no caption.

More of the castle/fortress.

This chapel has also been around since the 11th century, added on in the 1600’s and repaired after WWII damaged it. We were baking outside and it was nice and cool inside.

Hydrangea bushes grow all over Austria. I’ve decided it’s my second favorite flower after a rose.

This is Cherie’s giant pretzel but we all shared it. It is handmade and surprisingly tasted really good.

There was a free operatic concert in the chapel that afternoon. We thought it’d be fun to go to, so Mark went to save us a bench while Lori and I shopped. When we got there he said that he had to pretty much fight people to save our place. We sat down and I put my bags next to me because B was coming from the hotel and this old man pushed his way in and kept grumpily looking at my bags taking room on the bench. After 7 days of being there, I was getting kind of immune to grumpy looks. B came and sat down I moved my bags to the floor. The concert started and B leans over to ask me what I bought, so I reach into the bag to get something out and the man reprimands me in German. I look at him and say “I don’t speak German” and he then puts his finger up to his mouth and shushes, while spitting on me a little. That was the 3rd time I was reprimanded on this trip. First the lady in the bike lane, then the guy from the restaurant (I call him the General because he looked like a Nazi General) about our diet coke and now Mr. Shush. I didn’t make many Austrian friends. And then we could only take so much Mendelsohn and we loudly left after 30 minutes.

I chose to not do anymore bike riding on the last day, instead we went shopping. B was insistent that I buy this dirndl, women were wearing these all over the place. I bought it, thinking I’d wear it for Halloween or something but he was dead set that I wear it to our last dinner. He even got Mirjam to come up to our hotel room wearing hers to talk me into it. So I negotiated and agreed to wear it. If anyone wants to borrow it for Oktoberfest or something – I will rent it to you. They are handmade in Salzburg (when I asked why they were so expensive, the woman said “they are NOT made in Pakistan or China”.  I felt like a little girl with her mommy.  Mirjam’s was definitely more mature looking.  Just call me Heidi.The last night of our tour dinner was great – but I was really looking forward to a good apple strudel and they had to go and put raisins in it. I did find a drink there that I really like though and ordered it at every restaurant called Holler. It’s sparkling water flavored with Elderberry.