To the Salt Mine

The program provided an excursion for the first weekend of the year. On Friday morning, we boarded the bus and left for a tour of the salt mines on northern Austria, near Hallein. The tour was really interesting. The mines were founded by the Kelts many years ago, and had since provided wealth to Salzburg and the surrounding area...hence the name...Salt Mountain. We all dressed up in white protective clothing (mostly so we didn't get too dirty) and we looked like little martians or something. The tour was entertaining, and I even got to go down two immense slides. Weee.
After the tour, we went into the Kelt villiage, which was alright. It reminded me of the World Museum of Mining. Yeah. Whoop de doo.
We had a sack lunch in Hallein before driving to Hallstatt. Hallstatt is a town of Virginia City size. In short, there isn't a lot to do there, after a certain time. I wandered around a bit before dinner. There is an honest to God Bone House there! I guess they ran out of room in their cemetary and had to dig up some bones and put them in this building because they didn't have anything better to do with them. I had expected something disorganized, but it was actually pretty neat and organized. The bones were set up in the shelves under the counter and the skulls were on top of the counter (for lack of a better word) and painted with the name of the dearly departed and their dates of birth and death. Some even had designs painted on the skull.
Later that night, we went out on the town, trying to find something to do. The grocery store closed at 7, and everything else had closed at 5. Basically, most people went back to the hotel. I sat in the lobby and chatted for a while. Others found a restraunt/bar in town, and others hung out at a drink stand by the lake.
Driving through the countryside, I realized how much this area reminds me of Northwestern Montana. There are mountains, forests, and lakes. It's also not heavily populated, which is nice. I won'd go so far as to say that I love it here, but it's definately beautiful.
I just learned that I broke a rule of the computer lab...no uploading photos. I guess my posts will be a little less multi-media style from now on. I'll have to save that for the occasional internet cafe.
Well, I'll sign off for now. Tomorrow should be a slow day, but I finally start classes on Monday. Yay, life.