I had to wake up really early on friday morning. I got on the bus at 6:30 so that I could meet up with the group for hiking at 7 at the train station. We got a group pass (28 Euro) for all five of us. We took the train to Werfen. Then in Werfen we took a bus up the mountain. They dropped us off 5 minutes from the gondola. Many people take the gondola up to the ice cave, but we chose to do the 90 minute hike up the mountain. It was rather steep. After the first 2 minutes I was thinking (I should have taken the gondola), but it actually wasn't that bad, my body adjusted to it quickly. It was worth it. I went with a good group of people: Jackie and Stephen (CU-Boulder), Lindsey (Luther), and Ryan (Carnegie Mellon). Before heading further up the mountain into the ice cave, we thought it would be a good idea to cool down and dry off the sweat before heading into freezing temperatures. So we had our packed lunches at the restaurant at the top of the lift. The cave is called Eisriesenwelt, and it is the largest ice cave in the world. http://www.eisriesenwelt.at/site/content/CB_ContentShow.php?coType=home&lang=EN There is still another 5k of cave that we did not see. There are huge ice formations that grow every year. I was not allowed to take pictures because it slows the group down. We had to go up 700 stairs and down 700 stairs. It didn't seem that bad, it was just a little dizzying when we just kept going up and up and I couldn't see my feet. Every fourth person had a lamp. I got to carry one, it was really old-school with a gas and flame, no flashlights. The lamps put off very little light, just enough to see the path. The guide would burn magnesium for us to see the ice formations. After the ice cave tour, we went back to the restaurant and warmed up with hot chocolate and dessert, I had my first apfelstrudel of this trip. I took the gondola down with Ryan because we both were feeling weak. My hip was also acting up, I think I had pulled something. Surprisingly, most of us didn't feel that sore the next day.
That night I went with Lindsey to the Marionette Theater to see Sound of Music. It was good and it stuck to the original musical, not the movie. It's quite amazing what they can do with those puppets.
Saturday morning I met the other Lindsey, the one from Oklahoma, at the college. We walked along the river, they have a saturday market set up everyother saturday. Then went to lunch at the Afro Cafe. It's my new favorite restaurant in Salzburg. It's food with an African flair. They have couches and chairs to sit in outside under the awnings, very relaxed. All dining in Salzburg is relaxed, they expect you to sit for atleast 2 hours. By no means to they intend to push you out the door. Waiters don't get huge tips like they can in the US so they aren't concerned about getting lots of customers through.
After lunch we got some eis and walked around to Getreidegasse. Salzburg was so packed! It was the start of the festival! Lions club was selling cherries for a charity and glasses of champaigne outside of Residensplatz. So we stopped and enjoyed some cherries. When we asked if they were from Austria, they said that they were actually from Canada. Oh well, they were still really good.
We still had time to kill before the festivities of the festival opening happened, so we sat down to people watch in the Domplatz. We were sitting right next to the giant chess board and a group of University students from England started playing.
The three guys played the game and the one girl in the group sat next to us. We had a lovely conversation, she was from Bath and the four of them were just traveling through Europe by rail. In the middle of the game, the canons went off from the fortress overhead. We then headed over to the steps of the cathedral where some of the opera stars were signing autographs. I didn't know any of them, so I decided not to get in line. We ran into the other Lindsey and Zach, and then Stephen, Jackie, and Ryan. We all just sat down and enjoyed the jazz band playing all american music.
The guys split off and had dinner with their host family and we sought out the other side of the river and found a schnitzel restaurant just down the street from Mirabell Gardens. After that I was quite tired and just wanted some time to myself. I headed back to the hotel and watched some episodes of my new favorite TV show online.
Today I went online and chatted with the family on skype and then did some translating of my duet that I am singing and then slept again until 2:30. I ended up going to Jedermann tonight, which was not my original plan but my friend Angelina was feeling sick and wanted to trade tickets. Little did I know that tonight's performance was at 5:30, not 7:30 like I had thought. So I ended up not being able to go to mass in english at 5:00. The Jedermann play was well acted, though I had no idea what was being said. But I certainly could feel what was going on. Jedermann is based off of the medieval play called "everyman". It has been performed every year of the festival since 1920. Jedermann was adapted by an Austrian playwright. The story goes that God sends a messenger to tell Everyman (this is the main character's name), that he will die. When Everyman is looking friends to take with him at the end of his life, they all abandon him. Such friends as Goods and Fellowship won't come when he requests it. Good Deeds is the only character that is willing to go with him, though he had been ignoring Good Deeds for such a long time. Basically he dies with Good Deeds and the moral of the story is that only your good deeds can follow you in the after-life. All other things are lost.
This was performed on the steps of the cathedral. It was really cool how they used the bells of St. Francis church (directly behind) and a bell of the Cathedral for affect.
Unfortunately, I didn't get to practice today like I thought I would. I guess I'll have to do some more score study instead. The practice facility's close so early.
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