Salzburg

Rising at 424 metres elevation where the emerald glacial waters of the Salzach River emerge from the Northern Limestone Alps into the Alpine foothills, Salzburg owes its name, wealth, and monumental skyline to the "white gold" of rock salt mined in the surrounding mountains for more than 2,500 years. Founded around 696 CE by Saint Rupert on the ruins of the Roman municipium of Iuvavum and elevated in 798 to an archbishopric, Salzburg was ruled for over a millennium as an independent ecclesiastical principality of the Holy Roman Empire by powerful Prince-Archbishops until secularisation in 1803 and permanent union with Austria in 1816. Beginning in 1587 under Prince-Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau and his Italian architect Vincenzo Scamozzi and completed by Santino Solari and Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, the rulers reshaped the medieval burgher town into the Baroque "Rome of the North", inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996. Today the city divides cleanly across the Salzach between two dramatic dolomite hills. On the Left Bank (Linkes Salzachufer), squeezed beneath the 508-metre cliff of the Mönchsberg and the 542-metre dolomite rock crowned by the 1077 Hohensalzburg Fortress, sit the marble plazas and state apartments of the Cathedral, Residenzplatz, DomQuartier, and St. Peter's Abbey, the wrought-iron guild signs of Getreidegasse around Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's 1756 Birthplace, and the rock-hewn opera halls of the Salzburg Festival. Across the river on the Right Bank (Rechtes Salzachufer) beneath the forested 636-metre bastion of the Kapuzinerberg unfold the 1606 Mirabell Palace and Gardens, Mozart's Residence on Makartplatz, and Linzer Gasse, while ten minutes south stand the 1615 water automata of Hellbrunn Palace, Schloss Leopoldskron, and the 1,776-metre Untersberg Cable Car.

Fly into Salzburg Airport W. A. Mozart (SZG) just 4 km west of the centre and ride electric Obus Trolleybus Line 2 to Salzburg Hauptbahnhof in 23 minutes or Line 10 to the Altstadt in 16 minutes, or arrive directly at Salzburg Hauptbahnhof on high-speed ÖBB Railjet and Westbahn trains from Vienna (2 hours 25 minutes) and Munich (1 hour 30 minutes).

Choose a heritage townhouse hotel in the pedestrian Left Bank Altstadt around Getreidegasse, Judengasse, and Kaigasse for immediate access to the Cathedral and Fortress, stay on the Right Bank near Mirabellplatz and Linzer Gasse for quieter rooms and simple station transfers, or pick Mülln, Nonntal, or Leopoldskron for monastery breweries and lakeside parkland.

Ride the 1892 funicular up to Hohensalzburg Fortress and walk the Mönchsberg ridge to Nonnberg Abbey, tour the Salzburg Cathedral, DomQuartier state rooms, and St. Peter's Abbey Catacombs, follow Getreidegasse from Mozart's Birthplace to the Grosses Festspielhaus, stroll Mirabell Gardens and climb Kapuzinerberg, explore the 1615 Hellbrunn Trick Fountains, Schloss Leopoldskron, and Untersberg Cable Car, pour a stone stein at Augustiner Bräu Mülln and Stiegl-Brauwelt, and take day trips to Hallstatt, St. Wolfgang, and Berchtesgaden.

Taste hand-dipped blue-and-silver Original Salzburger Mozartkugeln at Konditorei Fürst (invented in 1890), share a golden three-peaked soufflé of Salzburger Nockerl, order cast-iron Pinzgauer Kasnocken cheese dumplings and crisp Wiener Schnitzel, grab a spiced Bosna sausage from the Balkan Grill passage off Getreidegasse, and sip an Einspänner at 1703 Café Tomaselli.

Birthplace of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 1756), home since 1920 to the world-renowned summer Salzburg Festival founded by Max Reinhardt, Hugo von Hofmannsthal, and Richard Strauss, and setting for the 1965 film The Sound of Music as well as the December UNESCO-listed Salzburger Adventsingen and Krampuslauf traditions.