VISITING "THE SOUND OF MUSIC"

Thursday, March 28, 1996 Salzburg, Austria

I was up at 6 AM; finished 25 postcards for Manfred to mail for us. Showered and packed and was ready to go by the time Barbara and Jim stirred about 8 AM. We were packed and ready to go; but waiting for André and the laundry which Manfred was going to do for us this morning. Finally about 10 AM we got a call and André arrived with the laundry.

André got on the phone and worked for about half an hour with Jim and Barbara to arrange for reservations for the next week using the International Entertainment Book. Couldn’t get a room in Venice over the weekend so we’re going to Florence first. We have the Sheraton in Salzburg, Austria for Thursday and Friday. We’ll then head for Florence for Saturday and Sunday at the Hotel Continental and go to Venice for Monday and Tuesday at the Gabrielli Hotel. We have Friday, Saturday and Easter Sunday in Rome at the Rivoli Hotel; Barbara made these reservations from the United States prior to leaving. We knew it’d be tough to get reservations on Easter Weekend in Rome. We told André we’d like to take him and his language skills with us. He speaks about six languages. Manfred arrived punctually, he is German, at 11 AM. We visited for about half an hour and then got on the road by noon. I took the front seat as Barbara doesn’t like to sit in the front when Jim is driving on the Autobahn.

Traveled through some very scenic country. Entered into the mountain areas….lots of snow on the ground at the higher altitudes. Crossed the boarder; only had to flash our passports at the guard. Then dropped down into Salzburg, Austria. We arrived at the Sheraton Hotel just in time to toss the luggage into the room and get on the bus to go on the four hour “The Sound of Music” tour. Very well done with an entertaining American who now lives in Austria as the guide.

We managed to get some money changed during the tour when we spent an hour Mondsee, a small town on a lake. When we returned to the hotel we donned our coats and headed for the old town area to find some dinner and window shop. Ate dinner at a delightful little café in old town. Continued to walk to the churches and finally found the Elephant Hotel which Barbara had tried to get reservations for us…but it was full. (We stayed at the Elephant Hotel in 1997.) Never did find the Augustina Beer Gardens that the bus driver told us about. Back to the hotel and time for hot chocolate and twinkies. I called the office using my calling card. Alyssa, our granddaughter, has broken her arm. We have one large room and had them put a roll a way bed in to save money plus two twin beds. It’s still $220/night and that’s half price due to the International Entertainment Book! I volunteered to take the roll away. We’ve decided to leave tomorrow morning and start for Italy. It’s a long way to Florence and this way we’ll take two days to get there with a stop at some small Inn. It was about midnight when we decided to only stay one night, because we can’t get all the way up to Hitler’s Eagles Nest from Berchtesgaden due to the snow, the road is closed until May. So Barbara called the desk as Mrs. Jansen and got us out of the reservation!

MONEY: ONE DOLLAR = 10 SHILLING ($10.00 = 100.00 Shillings)