Austria

We decided to take a 3-day weekend and go somewhere just because. We chose Austria because we though it would be pretty in the winter and we could take a day to ski. We drove about 5 hours and got to our hotel just a little outside of Innsbruck. It served a wonderful breakfast each morning (I could live off of the fresh bread in Europe!!) and was very quaint looking - I loved it! The next day we went to Innsbruck where we just wandered around town and admired the architecture. A big sight to see there is the Golden Roof (Goldenes Dachl - see picture above), an addition to a normal house on the main square commissioned by Maximilian I in the 15th century. We also took a funicular up a couple hundred feet and got a bird's-eye-view of the city where I indulged in a coffee and a traditional Austrian cake - chocolate, of course! The next day we drove to Salzburg - famous for Mozart and the home of the Von Trapp family. Again there was magnificent architecture as well as street musicians. We toured the Hohensalzburg fortress, had coffee at Cafe Tomaselli, saw Mozart's childhood home and spotted some of the filming locations from The Sound of Music. Our last day there, we went skiing at a place called Axamer Lizum - where Olympic skiing was help twice. This meant that the "easy slopes" weren't on the same level of easy as I've seen in the Appalachian Mountains ; I stuck to the bunny slope :) It was a good trip - though quick! I feel like we could have a full-time job exploring all the neat places that surround us and still not see all there is to see. But I'll take what I can get!

Hotel Tyrolis in Zirl, Austria

A view of Salzburg from Hohensalzburg

This quaint cafe is located right around the corner from Mozart's home and was oft visited by his wife - Constanze. The coffee and the cakes were delicious!