The Hills Are Alive with the Sound of Music...and LIES!!!

Getting to Salzburg was a bit of an experience.  Due to all the rain that Germany and Austria has been receiving lately, our original train to Salzburg was cancelled.  This was a pretty common occurrence as we met a group of three Pennsylvanian girls who were also trekking through Europe, and two other of their trains were cancelled earlier that day!  We were informed by the train station workers, however, that we could get on a train, transfer at the small town of Müldorf, and head onward to Salzburg.  That is just what we did.

At our hostel, we met a pair of travelers from the exotic land of Calgary.  They both finished up exchanges in Europe and were traveling around before heading home.  We joined these two lovely girls in the hostel bar for a few beverages.  They mentioned that they would be going on the Sound of Music Tour the next day.  The Sound of Music was filmed in Salzburg, carrying in the footsteps of the real life story line of the Salzburger family, the singing Von Trapps.  It sounded like the tchotchke tourist shit I know and love.  So we decided we would go on that tour as well.

The following day we headed out on our Sound of Music Tour.  Much to my initial dismay, but eventually it came around as Schadenfreude thinking about all the distraught crazo-fans there are for this film, we discovered many inconsistencies between the Hollywood film the Sound of Music and the actual life story of the Von Trapp family.  Here are just some of the cinematographic horrors and untruths that took place:

1. Firstly, the film version used two different settings for the Von Trapp family home.  The real home here in Salzburg for the front of the house, and the Leopoldskron Palace, for the back of the house and the lake scenes.  These two locales are actually across town from one another.  The Von Trapp family home doesn't even rest on the lake! 

The Gazebo used in filming - found outside the Von Trapp family home

2. Rolf, the Nazi mailboy, never existed in real life.  Good! He was a jerk anyway!

Rolf - a total d-bag

3.  The mountain that Maria claimed as her own at the beginning of the film is about 10km away from the Nonnberg Abbey, where she runs to after hearing the bells chime, in about three minutes.  Fräulein Maria can really shit book it!

4. Those same mountains the Von Trapps climb at the end of the film to escape to Switzerland to avoid the Nazi regime in Austria, don't actually lead to Switzerland. They border Austria with Germany.  Geography was apparently not "one of their favorite things."

5.  And lastly the Von Trapp family didn't actually escape through Switzerland.  They boarded a train to Italy before eventually ending in Vermont.

These facts both shocked and sickened me.  Well, actually I could care less.  Come on people, it's a movie.  Cool your jets. Not everything can be wrapped up in brown paper packages tied up with strings you know.

The tour also took us the the grand countryside of Austria.  The hills and the mountainscape in the distance were astonishing. We drove to the town of Mondsee, which hosts the cathedral used in the wedding scene in the film.  Even though they were actually married at the abbey in Salzburg (another lie!!).

Cathedral in Mondsee

After the tour, we wandered though the Mirabell Garten where the children ran through during the iconic "Do-Re-Mi" montage.  It was beautiful.

Ooh pretty

Ooh more pretty

This dwarf deserves a pat on the head

Another dwarf statue, I decided to name him Mr. SassyPants

After the jaunt thought gardens, we walked up to Hohensalzburg.  The fort that was originally built during the foundation of Salzgurg.

The fort from the city 

Hohensalzburg up close

The pretty much ended our day.  We also looked at old things and ate some cured meats, but what else is there to do really. And to top off my day of shock and disappointment I also discovered that Austria has succumbed to comicsansitis.

 

Oh the humanity!!!

I am really considering studying this disease.  I am pretty sure it is up to epidemic standards now; it's taking over.  Is it even too late?!?

Tschüss