Several highlights today...

We took a boat trip up the river to the Hellbrunn Palace. It was completed in 1619 by the Prince-Archbishop of Salzburg. The Prince had a thing for playing practical jokes on guests and to entertain himself, built the trick water gardens. Just to give you an idea of the gardens... the Prince had a stone dining table built in the gardens with stone seats. Each of the seats, except for the Prince's at the head of the table of course, was equipped to spray water out a hole in the seat surprising the guest from the bottom while fountains were triggered to spray directly on the person sitting on the stone seats. The palace itself is fabulous. Its a brilliant yellow in color which contrasts the green of the surrounding gardens creating a post card image with the Alps settled in the backdrop.

Ah but getting back from the palace was the fun part. We ended up catching the bus over-filled with wet, putrid, chattering school children. In terms of nonverbal communication, I could definitely tell who the troublemaker of the pack was. A blonde girl sporting cut off black jean shorts, a bright blue tank over a sort of tie dye-ish bra, Converses and huge horn rimmed glasses in a brilliant purple color. The style among the pack was in-your-face alternative. But this particular girl was the one who moved from group to group, yanked boys by their backpacks into the street and glanced at her teacher every 10-15 seconds. I personally found it odd that such a large group of middle school aged students were taking city busses on what seemed like a field trip.

We finally had our Sound of Music movie night tonight. It was really cool to watch the movie and see things we're seeing every day. But the most entertainment came from Johannes, the owner of the house we're staying in. I think already mentioned that he was a baron and a tone deaf one at that. He stepped in the room several times and hung out singing-a-long to The Sound of Music with us.

I do believe plans tomorrow include a cable car up into the Alps :)