Salzburg #2 A surprise from above

When you are in a place this beautiful, with endless adventures awaiting, it’s rather hard to chose where to start. Are you going to climb a mountain? Are you going to ascend to the snowy mountain tops? Are you going to follow the bright river at the foot of the mountain? As we had so many options we decided to at least save Salzburg for the early evenings to spend as much time as the daylight provided, with the mountains. Gaisberg was our first adventure, 1.3 kilometres high yet close to the city, as neither of us felt like a long drive after yesterdays grand tour. It’s funny how the desire to discover, can beat the zombie-alike consequences that lack of sleep causes. Or maybe I won’t be able to say that anymore in about 20 years, all the more reason to go with it for now. The short drive took us out of the beautiful old centre of Salzburg that was a tiny gathering of towers and churches by the green cold riverside, of which we’d discover plenty later that day. For now, we left the noises of the crowded streets behind to soon enter the countryside. The Salzburg-ian countryside existed mainly out of green, intense green, rolling fields that all loyally ended up at the foot of a far-away mountain. These mountains quickly started to be covered by rainbow-alike shades, a seasonal gift brought upon the trees by autumn. I’d still fight anyone saying autumn isn’t an attractive season, the colours it splashes over the trees like paint dripping down, forever unable to settle as a temporarily event. But what an event that is. As if the shades of yellow, brown, red and orange aren’t enough, the sky was a constant restless spectacle. A thick mass of grey, being pushed around by the impatient clouds trying to cover up the thick rock mountains behind them. Still their solid rocks broke trough and managed to impress us with their heights, although the top we were heading for, was kept a secret the clouds didn’t yet want to reveal.

It was exciting to leave the curvy roads behind, having passed many churches and white wooden farms with perfectly messy courtyards, to arrive at the foot of the mountain. It always feels like a brand new start, a place where anything can happen, everything awaits. But 1 thing was certain, we weren’t literally going to climb this incredibly steep wall, so steep that the first part couldn’t even house the colourful trees that only started a lot higher, accompanied by more diehard vegetation. The top of this mountain could only be conquered by some heavy machinery; a terrifyingly steep escalator that not even halfway the mountain disappeared into a thick cloud of fog. Entering this massive glass box was pretty intimidating, even stranger was the feeling that appeared in my stomach when we went upwards with a surprising speed and a sudden pressure on my ears. The little world of Salzburg grew smaller beneath us as the river seemed to stop flowing, the cars seemed to stop driving and the city slowly turned into dwarves town. And only a few seconds later we got consumed by the thick fog hanging around us. This was honestly a little scary. We couldn’t see our own hands in front of our own eyes ad the blinding white completely consumed us and we had no idea where the elevator was taking us. We could only feel in our stomachs and ears we were still ascending, but had to let go of the control we didn’t have, the illusion of control, completely now. As if we were welcomed into a new world, we suddenly broke trough the thick cloud as a little cabin appeared in front of us, our finish line. The racing elevator suddenly stopped and as we left I could feel the temperature had dropped about 10 degrees here, hanging around the 0 degrees. Also, despite some excited babbling, there was a rather intense silence present here, as well as an extremely minty, chilly, deliciously fresh air I never wanted to stop inhaling. This combination, after several lucky experiences, I’d found to be my favourite addiction.

But what happened next, was beyond my expectations. I’d never expected that on top of this mountain, despite several undeniable evidences along the road, to end up at the top of a snowy mountain. Now the hopeful child inside of me had hoped to throw a snowball today, but I’d have been happy to scrape it from the surface and have it exploding mid-air as it wouldn’t nearly be solid enough, strong enough, yet. Safe to say it was a massive surprise finding out the top of Gaisberg was a total wonderland, where the mountain was as white as the thick, impermeable sky around it. just as solid as the endless white, was the silence creeping in on you at first, making you uncomfortable and disoriented, as if you’re looking for a certain grip, a familiar handhold. Only to find out as it sinks in only seconds later, this is what you’ve been looking for on the earth beneath you for several times now ; the total stillness. It is a wonderful thing to be able to escape from the thriving, never resting planet beneath you sometimes, wonderful as it is. Sometimes we simply need be in the silence with ourselves, look down at our precious planet from above, for a fresh perspective. A perspective in which we realize how magical of a place it actually is and how grateful we should be, as the silence forces us to emerge with the mountain. The mountain was a total blanket of glimmering white, untouched and perfect for eating (snowsnacking was a great hobby of mine) and the feeling of the fresh snow cracking beneath my not warm enough shoes, was calming. I was under-dressed for this temperature anyways, but that only made me feel more united with the roughness and pureness of the mountaintop. The snow that softly fell from the clouds, freshly served, dropped new-born flakes on our clothing, shaping the most beautiful creations: snowflakes. Most of us have seen snow at some point, but to be able to spot an actual snowflake, untouched in its pure form, is another privilege; it’s a stunning piece of art, shaped like an actual crystal.

We started following the path that wasn’t really there yet, but led us over the mountain ridge. It was almost impossible at times to separate the ridge from the sky, as the white was as bright everywhere. Luckily the sky here wasn’t at ease and therefore kept moving, keeping us from getting so snow-blind we’d fall down almost 1.3 kilometres. Sometimes we spotted little colourful dots, being others discovering the snowy tops. But most of the time we saw white, when the sky cleared another rock wall of the mountain turned up, steep and covered in sometimes even a meter of snow. Happily we just let ourselves fall over into the snow, rolled over to create angels, slid down a hill. Anything anyone wants to do when he or she first sees snow. Now all of us had experiences snow before, but the amount and the place were so overwhelming it felt like a first time. When the skies cleared for several seconds before a next army was on its way, we saw only more clouds. We found ourselves high enough to be unable to spot any other mountain tops. All we saw was a blanket of clouds, and nothing broke trough except us. That makes you feel extremely isolated, but in a powerful, poetic way, an ‘on top of the world’ way. As we carefully followed a path that we shaped at the same time, following the same ridge so we couldn’t get lost, the path started going up and down more, forcing us to slide down on our asses or put our feet down like giants trying to find some balance in the soft, fresh powder. At some point we realized we shouldn’t go further as a mountainwall appeared that offered many solid rocks, for summertime, but now was a hobbly-wobbly white blanket with tricky holes. We didn’t want to go back still, it was addictive being in this white world where everything was quiet and easy. So to stall some time before the elevator would go back down, we stared into the white, felt the fresh snow, admired the snow crystals, breathed in the cold, pure mountain air and listened to the deafening silence. And after all of that, we felt a little sad for having to leave this happy cloud, and I wished it could be the cloud I could quickly escape to at any time, anywhere in the world. But this being a one-time experience, made it all the more treasurable and admirable, I realized as the elevator rollercoaster-ed its way back down the autumn trees to earth.

- It's an amazing life