Mozart, Sound of Music, and Snow

The last couple of days of winter break found us in Salzburg, Austria. I could launch into stories about this amazingly preserved baroque city center or the fabulous views of this alps. Instead, we'll open with some nice meteorologic details of our weekend. First, it was cold and snowy as evidenced by the the desperate plight of the little ducklings on a Bavarian lake. I will say that the horses are well equipped and the brand placement will make Gore-tex well pleased.

While there are Neolithic relics in the area and there are Roman artifacts from 15 BC, the city's rebirth was when The king of Bavaria appointed a bishop over the region. He named the city Salzburg, which means "salt castle". In 1077, the Festung Hohensalzburg (the city's fortress) was build on top of the hill overlooking the town. There are two major tourist icons that are plastered all over Salzburg. One is the fact that this is the home of Mozart. The influence of Mozart is all over. The second is the fact that the Sound of Music was shot in and around Salzburg.

On Sunday, we opted to take a tour into Bavaria to see some local villages and to explore Hitler's mountain top retreat. The heavy snow kept us from going up the mountain but we were able to enjoy two villages. Berchtesgaden, Germany is known for the paintings on the buildings. Here we are walking into a square in the village. The whole place was made up in this manner. We also got a mean cup of hot chocolate here. The last stop on this visit was to the salt mines in Bavaria. This was not only educationally exceptional, we also got to take a train ride into the mines. We then went down two different slides into deeper levels of the mine. It was capped off with a boat ride across an underground brine reservoir. This was quite exceptional. The best part was how utterly cool we looked in our miner outfits. Dad wanted to take one home to wear around the house but we couldn't pull that one off. I will say that if there is a place where it would be amazing to see green and in bloom, this would be the place. Perhaps we can sneak a trip back before we return stateside. Here is a shot from the fortress looking over old town.

Finally, a holiday with no old churches and no museums

The winter holiday was upon us and we promised the kids there would be minimal educational value to this holiday. We almost delivered. We headed out to Alpendorf/St. Johann for a week of skiing in the Austrian Alps. We followed a suggestion from the Crawfords and stayed in St. Veit with a very family friendly group known as Seigi Tours. We had a great apartment on the side of a hill facing the mountain range where we skied. We looked down on the village where we went for group dinners and entertainment every night. We had traditional Austrian meals served by a wait staff that basically spoke no English. The food was exceptional and MJ has decided that Wiener Schnitzel is his favorite meal. I think he ate it 7 times over the week.

The view to the left is from our front porch. If you look closely, you can see the church on the market square (right side in the middle). This is where we went each evening.

Skiing was excellent. The first thing they do is put you into groups that are at your skill level and you spend the week with your group. MJ went the snow boarding route and shredded it up. By the end of the week, he was all over the place. Maggie made some great friends and did very very well. Big John had fun with his group and he was very good at pizza stops by the third day. Dad made the mistake of taking John up a slope that was a little beyond his pizza abilities and ended up skiing down with John in his arms. That was quite the feat. Vivian was a trooper and ended up in a non-beginner group that stretched her skiing to the limits. She did agree that she was a much better skier by the end of the week. She even skipped class on Friday to ski with big Marshall. As it was almost their 18 year anniversary, they spent it on the side of the alps together. Big Marshall ended up in a group that was led by an instructor the other instructors called Mr. Technique. He took them straight to a black diamond mogul slope and apologized to the class and said we needed to get this out of the way if we were going to be able to hang together for the rest of the week. Big M survived that one but he was able to do one slope head first later in the week. His highlight was a ski safari that took them half way across the ski basin and to the highest point in the range. Very nice.

In case you wonder what it all looks like when it is all over, this is it.

We snuck in a weekend in Salzburg but since that had churches and Mozart and things to learn, we'll save that for another blog.

Snow Day

It's a beautiful day in Cheveley, England. It's all white....School was cancelled due to snow today! The children are so excited! Marshall Jr. wanted to go to his friend Joe's house at 7:24. I held him off until 7:55 because he said that he and Joe discussed it the night before. So, off he went!

We all went to the park, along with many other families. There were many building snowmen and lots of snowball fights. This snowman was built mostly by our neighbors but Maggie helped to add the finishing touch. You can see my neighbor and good friend, Alison, and Maggie standing next to their creation!

Marshall and Joe had a ball blasting each other with snowballs. I just can't enjoy that as much as they do. John enjoyed eating the snow! John is helping Owen (next door neighbor) build another snowman. The body is almost as tall as John. They called it the obese snowman.

Marshall Sr. is back in Wilmington and missing out on the snow. He thoroughly enjoyed watching the Super Bowl with friends and said it was one of the better football games that he's seen. I have tried to clear the driveway using a push broom. You use what you have.....