We are back in Salzburg. What a beautiful city. Celeste declared that if she were ever to live in Europe this would be the place. The rest of us decided that we could get on board with visiting her at the University of Salzburg!

We went to a great beer hall, Augustine Brau. A simple, old place. They brew their own beer. When you walk in you grab a stein off the wall and get it filled. Then head to the back hallway where there are food stands. One for chicken, one for brats and kraut, one for pretzels and one for big hunks of meat. Then you head into the hall. No music, no tvs, just chatter, at big tables with big chairs and stained glass windows all around. The people at the table next to us brought their dog. We miss our dogs so much and asked if we could pet him. Yes. He stuck around so we asked if we could feed him. Sure. Then he was never going to leave. So we continued to pour on the love and apparently too much food. He went back over to his owner and barfed all over the floor. Oops! Time to leave.

The following day we hiked around the woods in the little village of Grossgmain where we are staying. Above the village on a hill is a crumbling castle from 1250. The views were amazing from up top. Below were green valleys with cows and sheep and the hills were alive with...fall colors. Did I get you to start singing a little Sound of Music? We have been humming and singing and watching the movie for the last few weeks.

By the way, does anyone know how all the grassy wide open spaces in Germany and Austria look so tended? We are truly perplexed. It must be a type of grass that is naturally short. It looks so manicured. We have had a lot of fun imaging some poor guy out there at night laboring away with his Toro, leaving everything perfectly looking in the morning.

Off to Italy tomorrow. I am ready to give up the beer for wine and pair it with risotto, risotto, risotto!

Amy