You have to love a city where they serve prosecco with salami and pickles for breakfast.
Salzburg is a charming city under any circumstances, devoted to Mozart and his fellow musicians,
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| Even the Archbishop Dresses for the Festival |
but we happened to arrive for St. Rupert’s Festival, a celebration of the patron saint and founder of the city. His feast day is celebrated in Austria on September 24 (although it is celebrated in March in much of the rest of the Roman Catholic Church).
The festival takes over the city on one side of the river. Booths of craftsmen, vendors, and food are stuffed into all the squares. Beer gardens bloom in every open space; carnival rides and games are squeezed in as well.
Musicians play everywhere.
And beer arrives by the wagonload.
Beer and music often mix
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| That’s the conductor on the stage with the mug. |
Many people who attend the festival wear
lederhosen and dirndls. Whole families are decked out in the traditional clothing. Little girls wear their aprons over their skirts, mature young women wear tighter (and lower) blouses, and older women wear refined wool jackets over their traditional skirts. Men of all ages wear lederhosen of varying lengths; even boy scouts wear them for the festival.
Small children look like dolls in their outfits. One toddling boy concentrated on his feet, perhaps wondering why it was more difficult to walk in his leather pants; one little girl pulled up her skirt, revealing her diaper. I met one woman who confessed to buying lederhosen for her three-month old son, “because it looks good.”
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| Me, trying to decide if I can eat the Whole Thing |
The city is filled with painted eggs (real ones).
They even sell plain eggs, already blown and cleaned for you. Since I collect eggs I thought I should buy one. I was especially taken with the one that had ladybugs glued to the egg, surrounded by flowers. Then I wondered how I would get it home and didn’t buy it. And then I saw the egg with the teddy bear (which I also collect) playing a musical instrument. It came home in an egg carton in the top of my purse. Fortunately, it made it intact. They are intended for Easter egg trees, but mine will join the other 118 bears on my Christmas tree.
