Ok, it’s an exaggerated title for a dumb joke. Hallstatt is an absolutely gorgeous tiny town built into the side of a mountain on a pristine Austrian lake. It’s truly breathtaking.

It’s also full of tourists, predominantly from China, with nary a local to be found outside of a souvenir stand, so we’re feeling a little let down after our incredibly authentic and peaceful experience in Salzburg.

Marthese and I took a little stroll through town this morning and as you can see from the pictures, it really is quite special.

After Tez decided to have a quiet day reading in the hotel, I donned my headphones, hit play on a nerdy podcast and took a long hike up the mountain. Gorgeous, but as you can see from my face below, I was miserable without Marthese.

Next stop was a fenicular ride up to a salt mine that afforded stunning views of the lake and villages below. Halllstatt has had an active salt mine for almost 7 thousand years (yep, they’ve been digging out of that one mountain since the Bronze Age!) and it is apparently the oldest salt mine in the world. I took a tour into the mine that was quite cool indeed, and included films projected on underground rock faces and lakes, a 3 thousand year old wooden stairway, and taking a few slides down 60m to break up the seriousness.

Last stop was the Catholic Church back in town and the Beinhaus, a charnel house stacked with decorated bones and skulls full of remains exhumed since 1600. Not as epic as the Capuchin variety we encountered in Rome, but suitably impressive.

Hopefully a nice dinner tonight if we can find a good place. We haven’t had the best luck here….

(also having some internet bad luck and some of our best photos didn’t upload. Trust us, real pretty.)

Miserable without Marthese