Sep 3, 2026 - Salzburg Day 2

Today we took a bus to Durrnberg (near Hallein)  to go down into the salt mine there. We have the bus system mostly working and Teri is an excellent researcher on most everything. Like anything, it looks complicated when you start but it is pretty easy after a day or two (and having tools like Google Maps).

The bus took about an hour to get to Durrnberg and the salt mine (Saltzwelten Salzburg) was right across from the bus stop. Our Salzburg Card got us on all the buses and gave us a couple of euros discount on the salt mine tour. It got us into all the museums and pretty much anything we were interested in. We paid 43 euros each and Deb counted it up tonight and we got 112 euros worth of entrance fees (per person)  plus all the free transportation.

The Salt Mine tour was top drawer. I think of our little Bisbee mine tour and I will say, Bisbee has it hands down as far as authenticity. This salt mine tour is slick and modern and very professionally done. This mine  stopped working in the 1980’s but the company has another nearby mine that still produces salt.

A young woman ran the whole tour by herself and gave each station presentation in German and English. She ran the tram and the boat that took us across an underground lake. There were two slides that we had to slide down. Everything was automated so one person could run it. They began mining salt before Christ and she was great at taking us through each time period and the tools and technology of each.

After the mine tour we went to Untersburg to ride the cable car to the top of the mountain there (also included in the Salzburg Card). We hiked a bit above where the lift ends and got a beautiful view of Salzburg nearby.

We took the bus back to Salzburg where Ralph and I went back to the apartments to “read” and Deb and Teri did some more exploring around town. They went over the Mozart Bridge, went to the Christmas Museum and found the giant pickle sculptures. They returned and we all went to Uncle Vans which had Vietnamese  food. Then we found ice cream and called it a day.