The Sound of Salzburg

In a place known best for its musical heritage, Salzburg is truly the city of song - birthplace of Mozart, filming location of the Sound of Music. It's no Vienna, but Salzburg is an entirely different city of music. Vienna's music is aristocratic and for the music connoisseur; Salzburg's music is for everyone.

On my first day in Salzburg, what else was there to do but of course to take the Sound of Music Tour? The hostel I was staying at, the YoHo Youth Hostel, is an amazing place and I highly recommend it to anyone who is going to Salzburg. It's a really big hostel with multiple storeys, its affordable, clean, friendly with a 24h reception, and with nearby supermarkets and a neat kitchen.

Image from HostelWorld.com

Also, they play the Sound of Music in the TV lounge every single night. Yup you read that right. Every. Single. Night. I confess to being one of the 30 people (of whom only 2 were boys) who sat in that room and watched it. I mean, come on - I'm in Salzburg, right, so why not?

I booked my Original Sound of Music Tour through the hostel, which was really good because they gave me 10% off. Not gonna lie, it's not cheap at €37 (before discount), but it's a great way to feed your inner child which secretly still wants to run down the Untersberg twirling and singing The Hills Are Alive. Also, it takes you out into the Salzburg Lake District, which is lovely.

My tour guide, Peter, was a lovely Austrian chap with plenty of jokes to tell. He's super nice, and really takes care of everyone - he makes sure everyone's having a good time, and he even liked me enough to give me some sweets at the end of it all :')

Grounds of Leopoldskron Palace

After driving around the city and seeing places like Nonnberg Abbey where the nuns lived, we drove out to Leopoldskron Palace to see the lake where scenes of the children falling into the lake were filmed. If you're looking at the picture above and wondering why that house in the background isn't the Von Trapp villa, the answer is - it's not!

Scenes of the Von Trapp villa exterior were filmed at the Frohnburg Palace, today the Mozarteum University. So really, the back of the house and lake were filmed at two different locations. It's some pretty neat editing they did to make everything look seamless!

Schloss Frohnburg - recognise the exterior?

The exterior of the Schloss Frohnburg was used as the exterior of the Von Trapp villa, while the interior was recreated in studios from the interior of the Schloss Leopoldskron and the lake from the Schloss Leopoldskron grounds. So really, the Von Trapp villa is three different places!

The Sixteen going on Seventeen gazebo

Since today is Valentine's Day and love is in the air, it's impossible to forget about those sweet lovebirds Liesl and Rolf. The famous gazebo where the duet, Sixteen Going On Seventeen, was performed still continues to attract people wanting to live out their inner romantics.

The interior of the gazebo in the film was studio-recreated to allow film crews to move their equipment in, and only the exterior of this actual gazebo was shown. The gazebo originally located near Schloss Leopoldskron has now been moved several times after tourists were overwhelming the area - today it sits near the grounds of Schloss Frohnburg.

The Sound of Music bus on the way to the Lake District.

Salzburg's Lake District and town of Mondsee is a beautiful place, and it was in the church here rather than in Nonnberg Abbey that Maria's wedding scene was shot, although the exterior of the Nonnberg Abbey was shown in the final cut of the film.

The town of Mondsee is brightly coloured in vibrant painted terrace houses, and the apple strudel (German: apfelstrudel) and hot vanilla cream sauce is pretty darn good, too!

I was lucky enough to grab lunch with a nice Australian family who invited me to join them at their table, since I was on the tour alone. Nice people make me happy :')

Mondsee

Exterior of Mondsee Cathedral.

You know that feeling when you walk into a place and feel extreme deja vu as if you've already been here because you've seen it so many times before? That was exactly how I felt when I walked inside Mondsee Cathedral. It was like being in the film, with everything being exactly how I remembered it from the wedding scene.

Inside Mondsee Cathedral

Just add a whole church full of wedding guests, Captain von Trapp at the front, Maria walking down the aisle accompanied by Liesl and it would have been completely perfect!!!! (I'm not going to talk about the nuns behind the gates because it was depressing that they couldn't be a part of the wedding.)

The altar at Mondsee Cathedral

And for the final touch of Sound of Music nostalgia... Here are the rows of trees right outside Schloss Frohnburg that the children were climbing as the Captain drove past in his car with the Baroness and Max. That scene when the Captain sees the group of 'local urchins' always puts a smile on my face ;)



The Sound of Music Tour is available through Panorama Tours and runs every day at 9.30AM and 2PM. The tour lasts approx. 4h and costs €37. Bookings made through your hostel are eligible for a 10% discount.