Officially Part of the Family.

I have officially become part of Steve's family.

Salzburg has a special place in the hearts of everyone on Steve's mom's side of the family: his mom and aunt have spent time studying abroad here when they were in school, his grandparents on that side have been here, his cousins have been here, he and his brother have been here.

And now I have, too.

I can officially say that I am part of this family now. :)

When we arrived in Salzburg the other day, it was POURING DOWN RAIN!!!!! Good thing I bought a coat :P an good thing our hotel was a five minute walk from the train station. Nevertheless, we got soaked!!! Since we are in Salzburg for almost a week, we decided to take it easy on that first day and have a true Austrian dinner of Stiegl beer (Salzburg's oldest and most famous brewery) and wienerschnitzel.

When we were planning this trip, we decided that, since originally we were going to spend almost two months straight on WWOOF farms, we would splurge when we got to Salzburg and stay in a fairly nice hotel. Well, as you may know by now, plans changed and we ended up hanging out at the beach and hiking around national parks in Croatia instead of working our buns of at another farm. Soooooo we get to stay at a nice hotel after three weeks of leisure. Woot.

Needless to say, we spent some time that first rainy day relaxing in the hotel saunas and steamrooms while Billy pigged out on Mozartkugeln.

Our second day was a beautiful, clear, slightly chilly day. Salzburg's Old Town is about a fifteen minute walk from our hotel, and we spent the day just wandering around the Mirabell gardens and laying in the sun by the river. At some point, we also hiked up the Monchsberg, a big hill on top of which is the place Steve, his brother, and his mom stayed when they came to salzburg about ten years ago. I got to see where my mother-in-law lived and spent time when she was studying abroad in Salzburg. It was a beautiful, tranquil wooded area with a small fortress and cow pastures.

In the past, whenever Steve mentioned anything about his previous trip to Salzburg, he would inevitably mention these "two skinny bratwurst in a bun, with onions and curry powder, that was sold at a tiny hole-in-the-wall kind of place where [he] ate all the time." Guess what? HE FOUND THAT PLACE!!!!!!! And those things (called bosnas) are delicious. I can now personally attest to that.

We spent the rest of the day basking in the sun by the Salzach river and admiring the silly displays of bread and beards in the shop windows on our walk back home.

On Saturday afternoon, MICHAEL CAME TO JOIN US!!!! You all remember Michael, right? The Austrian guy on the farm with us? Yup. He came to visit us and we had a splendid time walking way too far to Augustiner and Stiegl breweries that evening, eating delicious vegetarian Nepalese food, meeting up with another friend of Michael's and going to a bar because of COURSE we hadn't had enough beer yet, and engaging in all sorts of shenanigans, one of which involves me getting stuck in a hotel's revolving door -.-

That silly yellow thing on my finger? That's Kristofferson. He says hello. You don't want to know what he is or where he came from.

Also, when we woke up in the morning, I discovered that somehow a Mozartkugeln (Salburg's famous marzipan chocolate candy ball) had found its way into the bed and I slept on it. Chocolate was everywhere. We couldn't stop laughing. The world had gone mad. :)