European Vacation - Day 6 (Hallstatt and Salzburg)

Today's journey was the scenic route between Vienna and Salzburg. In our guidebook, it recommends Hallstatt, a beautiful mountain town of 1000 nestled among the Austrian Alps on a clear lake. Well, based upon that description and the fact that it has the oldest Salt Mine in the world, we had to go.

The drive was a little unnerving. Winding roads and steep drop offs, but the view was spectacular. It was raining, so our raincoats came in handy yet again. We parked the car and headed to the Salt Mine and the tram that took you straight up the side of the mountain...and it was a pretty steep mountain!

The tour was about 3 hours long and included a walk through the mountain, sliding down a wooden rain about 35' and then a second rail about 65'. Chuck had the fasted slide time at 33.6 km/hr on the second slide. It was a little scary for me. I think I said Holy Crap about half way down the 65' drop. Ahhh, adventures. The Salt Mine was actually quite cool and I'll blog about that one in more detail later.

Later in the afternoon, we arrived in Salzburg. We stayed at the Hotel Sacher, which is a great hotel, complete with chocolates on our arrival. The Hotel Sacher is known for the Sacher Torte in Austria. We even received mini tortes as part of the turndown service. Yum.
Pictures will be posted soon.