Hallstatt, Austria

Hallstatt Austria was one of the most beautiful places I've ever been to. It's a small 7000+ year old town with a population of only 945 people. It is the sight of the world's oldest salt mine, but historically it was very isolated, with the first road into the town not being built until 1890.

We arrived by train from Vienna, but as there is hardly enough room between the mountains and the lake for a town, let alone a train station, we arrived across the lake.

We crossed the lake on a ferry, grabbing some great pictures. The lake was a clear dark blue and over 125m (400ft) deep. It really reminded me of home to see wide expanses of clean, blue water, it even smelt like the river.The city is literally built on the side of a mountain. Many of the buildings have four or more stories on the front and one, or no, full stories at the back. Even the central square was on a fairly steep angle.

What looks like a vine growing up the front of this house is actually a pear tree. Click on the photo for a larger version, and you'll be able to see all the pears hanging down. Wouldn't it be great to be able to wake up, open your window and pick breakfast?

The hostel we stayed in was great. It was built beside a waterfall, so you always thought it was pouring rain until you looked out the window to see the sun. On Saturday night we ate supper there, and had our choice of delicious home-made pizzas. Saturday afternoon we went around the lake to the Dachstein ice caves. To get to the caves you had to take the ski gondola to the top.

From the gondola building we had to walk further up the mountain to the entrance. We had to wait for the guide and killed time taking photos. In the photo below clockwise from me are Marina (Croatia), Andrew (Canada), Atilla (Slovakia), Robert (Croatia), Yashar (Iran), Katherine (England), ans Lori (Canada).The caves were really cool, with giant ice deposits like the ones shown below. The largest tower of ice in the photo is 9m (18ft) high. It was funny to see all the people from the warmer countries slowly getting colder and colder as we progressed into the caves. Not -3°C!!The view from the exit of the caves.Saturday night we had dinner at the hostel then went to a Fireman's festival held in the city firehall. It was really funny because it was like something you'd find hosted at the Legion back home. The whole town was out, sitting at folding tables, with a man and his father(?) singing away to pre-recorded background music from a keyboard. The father had a tambourine and was singing Austrian folk songs and translated Frank Sinatra music, to name only a small fraction of their repertoire. A lot of the waiters were dressed in Liederhosen, serving steins of beer and sausages.

As expected, we got some pretty odd looks. But in a town of less than 1000 people, if you're not a cousin you're a stranger, let alone 30 English-speaking international students. It was a lot of fun though, and the singers loved us because we sang along to the English songs, cheered, and even danced a bit, while the locals just sat and talked, about us.

Sunday morning was very relaxed. We woke up at 9, had breakfast, and lounged in the sun on the porch.We eventually met up for a guided tour of the town. The guide was pretty funny, but spoke in rough English. She told us stories about how the nuns would give the children Schnapps to calm them down all day while their parents worked in the salt mine, making them all 'idiots'. She also said that some women in the past had up to 18 children! because there was no TV.

The highlight of the tour was the 1000 year old Catholic church, cemetery, and ossuary.

Historically, when the city had a population of 3000 people, there was no room for graveyards. So, people were only buried in these short graves around the church for a period of ten years or so. After that, they were exhumed and their bones were bleached in the sun for a few months on a shelf built into the eaves of the gravediggers house. Then, the bones were moved into the ossuary, but first the scull was painted with the person's name, date of birth and death, and some decoration. The skulls were also stacked in the ossuaryaccording to family groupings.The ossuary containes over 1200 skulls alone, with the most recent being from 1997. Now that the city is much smaller people can keep their graves if they choose, and most people are cremated anyway. Only people who request to be placed in the ossuary will be, but only their skulls, as there is no more room for other bones.The rest of the day was free time, so six other people and I rented two paddle boats for an hour. We went out into the lake, and some people went swimming. I chose to lay back in the boat and relax as the sun was so warm and the water so cold.

Wow, I'm actually done the weekend's post on Monday morning! This Friday we leave for Budapest, my last weekend adventure in a row, as the next weekend (11-12th) my friend Pat from Brockville/Queen's will be in town.

Keep up with the comments, I love to hear from everyone who reads my blog.