A Place for Fish

 7/10

Hohenwerfen Castle and Hallstatt

Things I’ve learned - renting a car from Salzburg is best done early. It would seem that there are just not many cars to rent? I don’t know. Perhaps a combination of hours, weekend hours, and general busyness caused it to be more complicated and expensive than I had hoped. However, in the end I got a decent option that would work well for the trip, even if my faith in Austrian efficiency was severely shaken in picking it up. Took me 45 minutes to get through a line of 3 people, and they guy was late showing up. Disappointing. I have stereotypes to maintain. We ended up leaving Salzburg around 9:30/10 - which was fine. Honestly, while I thought a day or two more in Vienna would be worth it, another 2+ days in Salzburg could be easily filled - which is weird given how small it is. But you could even further extend that and use salzburg as a home base for numerous day trips (Hallstatt, eagles nest, Hohenwefen Castle, Salt mines…). Feeling lazy? Go to Salzburg for 2 weeks and book excursions, easy.

Our first stop on the trip was to swing by Hohenwerfen Castle - a well preserved medieval fortress on the top of a mountain. Honestly, the best thing about it is how it looks in the approach. Its exactly what you’d imagine an impregnable fortress to look like from the Middle Ages. Due to a fire from the early 1900s, a lot of it has been rebuilt, and there just isn’t a lot of significant history to it. However, they have a falconry show that was great and even if the coffee is the worst in Austria, its a fun half day with kids, not sure I’d recommend anything other than driving by for the adults. One thing I would strongly recommend against is getting coffee here… I’m honestly not sure how it was so bad.

From the castle we embarked for Hallstatt. Hallstatt IS an absolutely picture perfect city. To the point that a Chinese real estate developer literally copied the city in China to attract buyers… very odd, but mimicry is the best form of flattery? Might also be part of the inspiration for Arendelle in Frozen… not sure about that one though.

The town itself is tiny - officially around 800 or so people. I’d imagine that every day has more than 5x that number of people going through it - at least. My positives of it are that yes - its stunning. The boat rides you can take are wonderful for views. And if you stay the night, once the tourists leave and the shops close down (and they close early), it is extremely peaceful. But it feels like Venice times 10. I’m glad I went. Loved the views. Not sure I’d recommend it without a reason - like hiking, and even then, might be better to stay in a nearby town reachable by one of the ferries. But good lord, the scenery is perfect.

One last note - Hallstatt is my first experience with a beer vending machine outside the supermarket. We were very excited by this, but alas, you need some type of ID it recognizes with a chip reader that gives your age… so no dice for us there.