This morning Liz Cante and Christy Colcolough and Yours Truly found ourselves in a little bit of Eden that God forgot to lock away. Halstatt, a tiny little salt mining town way up in the the mountains on the edge of a deep deep lake, a little bit south of Salzburg. In fact, this is what makes Salzburg Salzburg. This is where that corrupt Bishop dude got all his white gold with which he built Salzburg.
The town is archeologically proven to be the oldest inhabited town in Europe. Its mountains full of salt have been exploited by Anciets, Barbarians, Celts, and Germans 7000 years and counting, and it is said there is a good 7000 more years worth of salt to be mined.
Mountains peeked out from swirling fog only momentarily as we snaked out way up the railroad tracks early in the morning.
Mountains + Sunflowers = Ostereich!
The town of Halstett, from across the lake. You can't tell from this, but the water was incredibly clear and extremely deep. It reminded me of Crater Lake in Oregon. Deep deep dark still cold water. Like glass. I wouldn't have been at all surprised to see the Lockness monster make an appearance, it was so surreal.
What a perfect way to wake up, especcialy if you never got a chance to go to sleep.
The roof tops of the town, including a guy repairing own.
An hourglass in the cemetary that is bigger than me. I guess it is supposed to remind you that time runs out on your life. And it uses salt from the salt mines to depict this. I thought it was cool.
St. Barbara is the patroness of the town. I think because she is the patroness of sailors. Here she marks a Rudolf grave.
Elizabeth, do you have Bad (Austrian play on words...= salt-mining) relatives from Halstatt?
The graveyard and the
see (Austrian word for lake).
Inspiration # 1256: I want to grow a pear tree like this someday.
Taking in a fresh cold draught of the pure Austrian Alp mountain spring water, coming down from the waterfall.
A very random kitchen table, floating on the lake, with a pair of yellow rubber boots sitting on it, along with a couple of live ducks. Austrians are funny about what constitutes art, sometimes.
The lift that took us way up into the fog - up to the mines.
We got up to the top of the mountain, and: took pictures of snails. There were hoards of them, all shapes and sizes. We stopped to ponder their
incommunicability for a while (PHL 113 has possessed us).
Yep. Surrounded by Alpine peaks, Liz is photographing snails.
So, we passed a field of sheep. A very steep field, I might add. The fence was not difficult to get over. And the sheep were much more friendly than I expected. Within seconds of being in the field, I was surrounded by the things. One in particular, a big brown ram, was quite friendly with me and Liz, and showed his affection by trying to see if he could shove me off the mountain.
Liz and I had fun, but people on the trains the rest of the day probably would have prefered that we didn't smell like sheep schmuck (interesting side note: schmuck = jewelery in german)
Inside the mines, they made us get dressed up in overalls. Here, Liz is about to slide down to the next level. Apparently, there are some 12 levels to the mine, with only three used for tourism, the others still active salt mines. The tour was really cool, way better than we anticipated. It took a couple of hours, and we got to go down slides and watch lazer shows and movies and be lectured to by a creepy German robot, and rode a train on the way out that was like a long long log that everyone straddled.
A rather creepy ancient salt miner. Creepy mostly for his irregular body hair growth....
Some nicely illuminated salt. It is tinted red from tarce amounts of iron. It looks awful pretty with just some light shining through it.
One of the mining slides we went down. On one of them, there were cameras that took your picture like you were on a six flags ride. And, they recorded your speed. There apparently is some technique to it. I don't know, I was just holding my hands up and yelling. I don't know how fast I went, but our tour guide lady definitely won: she clocked at 49 kph!
The town Obertraun across the lake, as seen from the mountain top. We were hoping to get to the Ice caves located there, but we ran out of time.
A guy with a gondola-type-boat on the water.
It was funny, we sat next to a couple of Austrian highschool girls on the way there. We told them we were going to Halstatt, which, we were advised by Mrs. Minto, was one of the most beautiful places in all Austria. They laughed and said Halstatt? No! They were of the opinion that Paris was much more beautiful.
I say, after now having been to both, they were way off. Paris was nice but, Paris can really not even be compared. Not at all. I would take Halstatt any day.
Stopped over for a bit in Bad Ishcl between trains this afternoon. Stopped by this lovely Kirche. They are almost without exception lovely here. Afterwards we did a little window shopping, and happened upon a thrift store, the first i have seen since coming here. We entered and then spent the next half hour playing dress up. They had traditional Austrain clothing for real cheap. Most of it was home-made. I had given up hope of getting a durndle because they are so expensive, but this time we found a deal. I couldn't resist. None of us could. We all came away with a durndle and apron, feeling like real Austrians. I will take a picture of it tomorrow perhaps. If Liz wears hers to Melk I will too. (That is one of many favorite things about Austria: Austrians here really do wear traditional Austrain clothing for everyday clothes. I love it!)
Liz after the first ascent.
This part of the hike was pretty hard. It was really really steep. See those little people down there?
IHI John on the rock.
moi en ze mountainz
The view from the Ski Lodge view, still a ways from the top, but quite nice.
That guy was making me jealous. He came so close to us we could hear him shouting to us. I am in the process of designing a parachute from my bed linens. I found a nice piece of rope. Shh, don't tell, we aren't supposed to take them out of our rooms.
dangling feet over cliffs is awful fun.
The mountains proclaim the glory of God.
A kind of random awkward photo. Liz taking a picture, Metod leaning against the cabin, Nick I think, taking off his sweater, IHI John, and Dominique.
Taking in the view. This was about halfway up, perhaps a little more. You can't tell from the picture but there was about a hundred foot drop below me. You proably can's see the really really big snow-covered Alps in the distance, either, because well, they were white like the clouds. But it was gorgeous.
Our path we trudged across to the summit. Pictures don't tell depth very well, but trust me it was no walk in the park. Going back down was so much fun. It was like skiing/sliding/rolling/falling/sinking/head-over-heels/start-and-you-can't-stop through drifts of snow that were up to my thigh. I was completely soaked in snow and muddy by the time I reached the bottom, and feeling like I could eat an entire hindquarter of beef alone. And now I need a massage.
At the very summit, the only picture I got before my camera decided to go on strike. It works when it wants to, and then turns off. And it isn't even of the view. It is of people taking pictures of the view! But I will get pictures from Liz and Jon later. You sould see the twin spires of Mariazell way down in the valley. You could see mountains bordering Switzerland. It was pretty sweet. 
Vince, our RD's door this morning. A brilliant prank. Someone put name tags all over it with everything from things like sleeping beauty to Peter Pan to Santa Claus to Pete Parker to Bourne: saints and superheros. And he has earned every one of his titles.
