In case Christmas Eve gets too festive, I’m posting this now.

142 days of travel and we have winterized ourselves. Our EU Austerity Drinking Tour leaves icy, sober Dachau for the Austrian border and glorious Salzburg! Home to Mozart, music, and…salt.

Our train digs into the Alps. We slide on icy rails, the brakes burn in our nostrils. But we can’t care, the words “winter wonderland” are painfully apt.

We arrive late in Salzburg and wrench our war-torn luggage for miles across an unending sea of horrible, horrible cobbles.  Somehow, we are freezing yet sweating.  Hours later and a bit lost, we find our hostel, dump our bags, and head into the historic core.

Then we find the greatest Christmas Market booth of all: Champagner Platz No 1

But no! Bad Salzburg! This is an AUSTERITY drinking tour, where cheap and local matter. Stop tempting us with Moet!

We cross the river and enter the largest market beneath Salzburg Cathedral:

Shops glow with useless but adorable wood-knackery, pastries, and knitwear. But our goal looms above us: Salzburg Fortress, Europe’s largest: Hohensalzburg:

We forgo the lift (too expensive) and climb the most troop-demoralizing cliff-side. The air thins, the wind whips. We sing the Monty Python Holy Grail theme to revive spirits, but doubt we will ever make it.

Finally, we arrive on top of the world.

The snow-clothed Alps surround us. We go inside, but every window captivates us with that view.  Around the other side, we can see the city: small and jewel-like below:

Rooms gradient from stark, white washed arches to the intricate, interior palace. Here archbishops ruled with a secular and religious sway over the Holy Roman Empire.

Further into smaller and smaller rooms, every corner now fills with gilt wood and grape motifs.

The museum retains arches from the Romanesque period, where even then they had no lack for flamboyance:

Rooms of Renaissance armor and daily wares seem exciting. But then we catch the last tower tour. A short clamber takes us to the top.

We stuff ourselves on doughy snacks at the Fortress Christmas Market (of course). Darkness somehow turns the city aglow as we stumble back home.

Our hostel plays the Sound of Music, while snow falls heavily outside.  Don’t worry, Austrian wine will be in the next post.