A Taste of Mozart...

Here is a little video clip from the concert!

Mozart Dinner Concert...

So before I start this just in case people only look at dates - I published the Barcelona post today (even though it says May 4th). Enjoy!

On Wednesday the 7th, we had a Mozart Dinner Concert with our entire group. It was kind of like a last dinner type thing where everyone gets dressed up, we eat in the oldest restaurant in Central Europe (started in 803), eat a 3 course meal, hear Mozart's music, and talk with your friends. Literally...what more could you ask for.

It was really an amazing night, but just another reminder that we are about to leave. It seemed so far away in May and then it just sprang up on us! But everything went well and we had a lot of fun - hopefully we did for the 50 Euro it cost...haha (Thank goodness AIFS set it up - even though it is still our money) :)

Caitlin and me in the room before we are about to leave!

Caitlin, Macy, and I - look at the waiter trying to get by as I am taking this...oops

The inside of the dining room

Our table at the dinner

Leah and I

The main course - chicken, vegetables, and some type of biscuit

The dessert - look at the cinnamon - it's Mozart! haha

I'll try and post a video of a part of the concert - it has been messing up all day when I've been trying to do it. Boo.

Update...

So this blogger website is kind of stupid and I can't figure out how to change this...

But I wanted the Prague trip to be at the top since it's the one most recent, but it publishes them in order of the date I started the post....

SO ANYWAYS - my Prague post is new and some more might be coming, but they might be a little out of order - so just check on the side or scroll through them to see if you have read them or not. Sorry guys.

Barcelona...

About Barcelona...we left Salzburg, took a train to Munich, got to the Munich airport, took a flight to Barcelona, took a bus to the city, and then walked to our hostel. We basically unpacked, made our beds, and wanted to go eat because by this time it was around 7pm. Our hostel was really cool too. It had wristbands that opened the outside doors, our room door, and our personal lockers inside. Sweet! We were in a room with 3 other people, about 4 different ones through our stay.


Anyways, so we asked them someplace to eat and they said this place around the corner. It looked pretty cool and we wanted to get some tapas (kind of like Spanish appetizers). So we get beers out of the tap on our table (yuck compared to Austrian beer) and decide on what to order. (Reminder: Barcelona's language is not Spanish - it's Catalan which is like a mix between Spanish and French. I'm sure most of them can speak Spanish, but everything is usually written in Catalan - sometimes Spanish/English below.)


So Emily asks the waiter what "Sepia" is and he says, "Fish." Wanting to try something different, she gets it. I get chicken and Caitlin gets ribs. (We also got a a pork loin tapa which was great!!) This is what she gets:


Also known as jelly fish??? hahahhaha

We finish eating there and it's somewhat late so we just decide to walk around Las Ramblas (a street with street performers, souvenir shops, restaurants, hotels, etc.) We walk all the way to one end and see this really cool bridge.


Bridge at night



I wish I could have taken a better picture but it was really dark and hard to see through a camera. BUT there were HUNDREDS of fish swimming all in the water. They look small in water, but they were around 18 inches long or so.


We ventured back home, took showers and went to bed. The next morning we wanted to hit up the beach, so we walked a while to Barceloneta - it wasn't all that great. It was man-made for the Olympics in 1992 and it was actually really windy so we got cold after laying out for a hour or two.

Here is the Colon Statue at the end of Las Ramblas during the day


Barceloneta - and a man with his metal detector haha.


We walked around the city for a while and wanted to eat tapas again. Finally finding this place called Micky's we went in, ordered some tapas and water (since that was the cheapest beverage on the Menu - but still 3 euros for half of a bottle!!!). The meal was insignificant. 4 pieces of food for around 12 Euro (18 dollars....GRRR). AND our Russian salad had tuna all over it....we didn't touch it. Let's just say we then had to get a euro cheeseburger from McDoanlds because we didn't want to spend any more money trying some place else.


That night the hostel was having a pub crawl, so we signed up to go (15 euros). We also got our roommate to go with us. At the first bar it was free sangria from 9:30-10:30. We then went to 3 others after that and then a night club (which is actually in a mall). It was cooler going with a big group rather than just by ourselves - we probably wouldn't know where to go anyways.



Our roommate Casey (which is graduating from med-school this month), us 3, and the pub crawl leader....what a job...haha.

The next day (Wednesday) was going to be a sightseeing day. We took the metro to La Sagrada Familia. Long story short, Gaudi is a famous architect who started building this cathedral in 1882 and it's still being constructed today. It was absolutely breathtaking and detailed. There obviously aren't any pews or an altar, etc inside because there are huge pieces of cement and everything else that they are using to build it.


La Sagrada Familia from one side

Us on our audio tour


A view from the other side


One of the 4 doors



Inside. Gaudi took most of his inspiration from nature. See how it resembles tree trunks with branches at the top. The patterns at the top also look like light shining in through the trees.



There was so much detail and so many stories of Jesus, saints, and disciples all on the outside of the Sagrada Familia.


After that tour we wanted to see more of Gaudi's works, so went to Park Guell that had some more famous things!


Me in the park, its really high on top of the city - you take outside escalators part of the way to get there.



Simulating a wave...cool huh?




This kind of reminds me of a gingerbread house!


The famous Gaudi Lizard and me

Another one of his houses that we found walking back - the little patio things kind of look like skulls

Here's another!

We kind of shopped around and then went back towards Las Ramblas. We wanted to eat at that one restaurant that was in Caitlin's book and that was supposedly the best food ever. It was around 8, and it opened at 8:30 so we tried to hurry. We got there around 8:40 so they had just started letting people in. We made it close to the front but the inside was full. Why wait? We said we would sit outside. Nothing on the menu was over 10 Euro...great prices and a great atmosphere with candles, white table clothes, etc.

Here is part of the line waiting to get in - totally worth it

So we ordered 2 appetizers, bread, a main course (each), desert, and a liter of sangria - it only cost around 14 euro each. IT WAS GREAT!!! (Emily has the pictures or else I would show you). After a 3 hour dinner we went back to the hostel and that was it for the night.

Thursday we got up and wanted to go to a different beach so we asked the hostel staff and they recommended Sitges which was around an hour train ride away. After getting to the station, we find out the tickets are free...score! We basically wander down to the beach and it was MUCH better! It was kind of crowded, but then again compared to what Emily was saying about Cape Cod, this was nothing! haha.

The beach and people laying out...probably half of them topless

Me laying out

Caitlin and I on the beach

We laid out for around 4 hours - the only ones wearing sunscreen too...haha. Those Spanish! We walked around in the city, got sandwiches and ice cream, and then headed back home. It was a great day trip and I totally recommend it to people who go to Barcelona and want the beach life as well as the city life.

We showered and wanted to go back to the same resturant as before, but wanted to sit inside this time. We got there probably 40 minutes before it opened, waited and got a seat! We ordered all new things and they were just amazing if not better than before.

Us standing outside the restaurant

This was another 3 hour long meal which I love to just talk and take your time so it was wonderful! We had to go back and pack to leave in the morning. Basically we just woke up, had some breakfast and traveled from 10 in the morning until 8 when we arrived back here in Salzburg.

A rainbow on the way from Munich to Salzburg - I had never seen one so bright and you can't see it in this picture, but there was a second lighter one too next to it!

Once again, overall this trip was amazing!! Less people, less hectic, nothing got stolen, beautiful weather, just great!! I still do want to see more of Spain because I think it would be a totally different experience of the Spanish culture.

Beer Fest...

On the Saturday before we left for Barcleona (April 26th), a big group of us decided to go to the Munich Spring Beer Fest (it's the halfway point until Oktoberfest...). There is a train pass that 5 people can ride on there and back for only 30 euro, so we each only had to pay 6 euros for a round trip...cool. So we got there around noon and went to the Augustiner Beer tent. (Caitlin, Clayton, and Keegan went to Dachau -a concentration camp - first and were going to meet us there later. I chose not to go that route.)


The stein


One side of the tent at noon - not very crowded at all


The other side with the band


HAHA. So long story short, Joe wanted to order a whole fish and thought it was only like 6 Euros, turns out when they bring it to him its almost 15 euros. He was like...umm...no...I don't want it then. Him and the like 50 year old waitress start yelling in German back and forth (thank goodness he speaks German) and he's like I can't pay for it, I don't want it, take it back. She's saying that it's going to come from her own paycheck and get his friends to pay for it, blah blah. He finally goes to talk to the chef guy and then we see him walking back....without the fish. HAH. Everyone at our table just busts out in applause. He said he's never seen 4 German men so mad....haha. But anyways, good story.

We then wanted to go ride rides, so we had a blast from the past and rode the slides!!


Me all the way on the left with my hands in the air!

We were are gearing up for this ride

Ok. So KC was taking pictures in the air while this thing was going around in flips and I was just cracking up the entire time. What a shot...I know.

After a few rides, some chocolate covered strawberries, and corn, we went back to the tent to hang out for a while. It was slowly getting more crowded as the day went on.

Caitlin finally showed up!

Look at the amount of people now!

So here is when it started getting so crazy - you can see that whole crowd on the right is standing up on the benches. Everyone was singing all these songs and just getting louder. haha. It started getting really smoky and pretty hot in there too. Our train was leaving at 10, so we left and made it just in time! I wish that I could have stayed a little longer, but the aisles were packed and people were everywhere so that was our cue. I can't even imagine what Oktoberfest is like :)

Here is a video to give you a little idea: