Side Trip (Back to Austria)

 

Supposedly it's only a 3 hour drive from Salzburg to Vienna, but these things usually take us about 6. This trip was no different, but our stops were awesome.  We passed a cool looking castle (which in and of itself is a fantastic reason to go to Europe - when do you just "pass a castle" as you are driving around?) and decided to take a side trip and check it out.  However, despite signage that seemed simple, and the enormous size of said edifice that was set on a hillside, we drove aimlessly around a little town for quite awhile - and happened on to another castle set on a hillside overlooking a river.  Again - reason to go to Europe.  Get lost, find castle and river perfect for skipping rocks and photo opportunities. 

 Finley lost her balance and fell, but decided it was actually a good thing - she was close enough to get her rocks to the river, and she had a good supply all around her.  Good times.

This has to be my favorite picture from the summer.

 Learning to skip rocks, and then pretending to be a buffalo in the river, like the ones in Yellowstone.  By the way, Will thought we were in Yellowstone the whole time we were in Austria because of all the trees.  And does anyone know where "Vasia" is?  He still talks about when we went there, and the things we saw, but neither of us can figure out where he is talking about. 

 This is the original "castle" we saw from the freeway, turns out it is an abbey.  Also, we found a local cookout going on, celebrating something, so we got some grilled porkchops and bratwursts for dinner, and shared a picnic table with some of the friendly people from Melk. Definitely one of our better side trips.