• Westautobahn - The federal capital Vienna is located in the east of Austria. The A1 Westautobahn is the most important road from Vienna in a westerly direction to St. Pölten, Linz and Salzburg. The connection from Vienna to the west used to be the Roman imperial road, which ran along the southern bank of the Danube, the northern border of the Roman Empire. Later came the k.k. (imperial-royal) Reichsstraße and, from 1921, the Bundesstraße 1, which runs parallel to the A1 west motorway. The National Socialists were keen to build a motorway from Bavaria to Vienna. On 13 March 1938, Austria was annexed by Germany and on 7 April 1938, Adolf Hitler began building the Westautobahn near Salzburg. After the Second World War, further construction of the motorway was prevented by the Soviet occupying forces. Further construction was only possible after the State Treaty of 1955. We take the Westautobahn motorway from Vienna to lake Attersee, where we have a break before we continue to Salzburg.
• Attersee - Lake Attersee, also known as Lake Kammersee, is a fjord lake in the Salzkammergut that was formed by the Traun glacier during the ice ages. The Attersee forms the final link in a chain of lakes that flow into the Attersee. The famous Austrian artist Gustav Klimt spent his summer holidays at Lake Attersee between 1900 and 1916, where he created numerous masterpieces. Klimt spent a lot of time together with his muse Emilie Flöge at Villa Paulick in Seewalchen am Attersee. The villa, located directly on the Seewalchen promenade, was a meeting place for many artists. Kammer Castle is a moated castle on Lake Attersee. The former common name Kammersee for Lake Attersee refers to this castle. The outlet of Lake Attersee is the Ager, which drains into the Danube via the Traun. Not far from the outlet and the bridge over the Ager, the first Neolithic pile dwelling was discovered in Lake Attersee in 1870. A pavilion at this site provides information about the life of the population at that time.
• Mirabell Palace and Gardens - Prince Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau had Mirabell Palace built in 1606 outside the city walls of Salzburg on the right bank of the Salzach, modelled on the Roman “Ville suburbane”, for his partner Salome Alt and their 15 children, after he was unable to legalise the marriage. The Mirabell Gardens in their present form were designed from 1687 under the direction of Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach on behalf of Prince Archbishop Johann Ernst von Thun. From 1721 to 1727, Prince Archbishop Franz Anton von Harrach had Mirabell Palace remodelled by Lukas von Hildebrandt into a Baroque palace complex with a central fountain in the large garden parterre. Worth seeing is the Marble Hall, the former banqueting hall of the Prince Archbishop, and the so-called Angel Staircase, which leads to the Marble Hall, where Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart played music for the Prince Archbishop. In 1866, Emperor Franz Joseph I donated the gardens of Mirabell Palace to the city of Salzburg.
• Dreifaltigkeitskirche - The Holy Trinity Church on the right-hand side of the Salzach river in Salzburg, which forms the representative end of the upper Makart Square, was built by Prince Archbishop Johann Ernst von Thun und Hohenstein from 1694 to 1702 according to designs by the Austrian Baroque architect Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach as a central building with lateral wings and a mighty central tambour dome, modelled on various sacred buildings in Rome, where Fischer spent 16 years studying ancient and contemporary architecture. The longitudinal oval church interior of the Holy Trinity Church with four short cross arms is vaulted over by the large tambour dome. The dome fresco was painted by the Salzburg Baroque painter Johann Michael Rottmayr around 1700 and depicts the coronation of Marie with the assistance of holy angels, prophets and patriarchs. The high altar, which was made in 1700 according to plans by Fischer von Erlach, has a sculptural Trinity group with two worshipping angels.
• Sebastiansfriedhof - In 1595, Prince Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau had St Sebastian’s Cemetery modelled on the Italian Campi Santi with burial rock and crypt arcades built outside the Salzburg city walls to the right of the Salzach river in order to remove the cemetery next to the cathedral and create the Residenzplatz. Paracelsus, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s father and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s wife were buried in St Sebastian’s Cemetery. The circular Gabriel’s Chapel, the mausoleum of Prince Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau, is located in the centre of the burial ground. The Sebastians Church, a barrel-vaulted, late Baroque hall building with a relief of St Sebastian on the outer façade, was built between 1749 and 1753, after the Salzburg Brotherhood of St Sebastian originally erected a Bruderhaus church there between 1500 and 1512. In the Middle Ages, St Sebastian’s brotherhoods were consecrated to St Sebastian and were founded to provide emergency aid during plague epidemics.
• Mozartplatz - Named after the composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the representative, rectangular Mozartplatz is located in the centre of Salzburg’s old town to the left of the Salzach, in the immediate vicinity of Residenzplatz and Salzburg Cathedral. The square was created in 1588 when various town houses were demolished under Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau. Mozartplatz was originally called Michaelsplatz. However, in 1842, a 3.5 metre high bronze statue designed by the Bavarian sculptor Ludwig Schwanthaler was erected on a high, three-part pedestal made of Untersberg marble. Mozart holds a stylus in his right hand and a sheet of music with a line from his Requiem (“Tuba mirum spargens sonum” - A trombone will make a marvellous sound) in his left. A laurel wreath leans at Mozart’s feet on the right. Then, in 1849, Michaelsplatz was renamed Mozartplatz. After the erection of the Mozart monument and the founding of the Salzburg Festival, Salzburg became a musical metropolis.
• Residenzplatz - Mozartplatz merges into Residenzplatz, which was originally home to town houses and the old cathedral cemetery. In 1587, Prince Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau had the town houses razed to make room for the new square and had St Sebastian’s Cemetery built outside the city walls to the right of the Salzach in place of the cathedral cemetery as part of the reorganisation of Salzburg from a medieval city to a baroque royal residence. The Residenzplatz is bordered to the west by the Alte Residenz, to the east by the Neue Residenz and to the south by the cathedral. To the north, the square is bordered by a closed façade of town houses, adjoined by St Michael’s Church, which belongs to St Peter’s Abbey. Originally, the square was designed with a structured pavement of Salzach pebbles. In the centre of the Residenzplatz is the Residenzbrunnen, a monumental Baroque fountain carved from Untersberg marble, a limestone, which was commissioned by Archbishop Guidobald von Thun in 1656.
• Salzburg Residence - The Old Residence in the historic centre of Salzburg is the prince-archbishop’s palace complex located between today’s Domplatz and Residenzplatz. Archbishop Konrad I of Salzburg built a bishop’s residence in 1124 that was demolished by Archbishop Wolf Dietrich in 1597 to make room for the new residence. The wide, straight marble staircase to the main rooms on the 2nd floor and the floor plans of the Great Hall and Wolf Dietrich’s reception rooms are still almost completely preserved today. The princely rooms adjoining the large Carabinieri Hall, such as the Knights’ Hall, Conference Room, Ante Camera, Audience Room, Study, Casket Cabinet and Bedroom with House Chapel, were redesigned from 1711 under the direction of the Baroque master builder Johann Lucas von Hildebrandt and decorated with paintings by the Baroque painters Michael Rottmayr and Martino Altomonte. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart also played music in these magnificent rooms as the prince-archbishop’s court musician.
• Salzburg Cathedral - Salzburg Cathedral, which is dedicated to St Rupert and St Virgil, is located on the south side of Residenzplatz. The cathedral is connected to the Prince Archbishop’sResidence and St Peter’s Monastery via archways. After the Romanesque cathedral burned down in 1598, Prince Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau had it completely demolished in 1606 to make room for a new, baroque cathedral, which was consecrated by Prince Archbishop Paris von Lodron in 1628. The main façade of the cathedral is magnificent, baroque and marble-white, while the side facing Residenzplatz consists of a massive, rough masonry without decoration and almost no windows. The 32 metre high nave contains ceiling paintings depicting scenes from the life and passion of Christ. The dome area is designed as a three-conch choir. The 71 metre high tambour dome of the cathedral is located above the crossing. The high altar from 1628 has a free-standing marble structure with three angels on its pediment.
• Kapitelplatz & Kapitelschwemme - Kapitelplatz is a large square to the south of Salzburg Cathedral, named after the seat of the Salzburg Cathedral Chapter. The Salzburg Cathedral Chapter is an association of canons responsible for religious services in the episcopal church and the city of Salzburg. Canons are clerics who participate in the common liturgy as members of a cathedral chapter. Canons live in community. The head of a chapter is usually a provost. The cathedral chapter elects the bishop. In 1732, the chapter pond, a horse pond and a fountain were built under Prince Archbishop Firmian. In the past, a “Pferdeschwemme” was a flat, accessible place for horses near a water source where horses could be washed and watered. The chapter pond is a baroque niche architecture framed by a marble balustrade. The front side has two half-columns and a pediment on top bearing the magnificent coat of arms of Prince Archbishop Firmian. A sculpture in the arched niche depicts Poseidon, the god of the sea, with a trident.
• Petersfriedhof - St Peter’s Cemetery dates back to around the year 700. The oldest gravestone in this cemetery is that of Abbot Dietmar, who was buried in 1288. Under Abbot Peter (1436-1466), the cemetery was surrounded by a cemetery wall. The so-called catacombs, which were hewn out of the fortress hill, are located at the edge of St Peter’s Cemetery. They date back to the late Roman city of Iuvavum and served as early Christian meeting places. The caves known as the catacombs are the hermitage of the monastery of St Peter, as hermits found shelter here in the barren rock. The entrance to the caves is through the slightly raised communal crypt, where Mozart’s sister and the architect of Salzburg Cathedral, Santino Solari, are buried. In the middle of St Peter’s Cemetery stands St Margaret’s Chapel, a uniform late Gothic hall building, where the remains of the old Amandus Chapel were found, which was built by St Rupert, the first bishop of Salzburg and abbot of St Peter’s Abbey.
• St. Peter Stiftskulinarium - The St. Peter Stiftskulinarium has been a restaurant in St. Peter’s Abbey in Salzburg since 803, which was founded by St. Rupert around 696. The first monastery church of St Peter’s was built around 696. The Gothic ribbed vaults are still preserved in the vestibule of the collegiate church. Until 987, the office of bishop of Salzburg was linked to that of abbot. In 1927, the abbey was elevated to archabbey status. The abbey was confiscated during the period of National Socialist rule. During the Renaissance, the church was remodelled and given a slender crossing dome. The baroque onion dome was erected in 1756. The two high altars are by Martin Johann Schmidt, the so-called Kremser-Schmidt. The interior of the church was decorated in 1766 with rococo stucco and ceiling paintings. Mozart’s Great Mass in C minor was premiered in St Peter’s Collegiate Church with his wife Constanze as the soprano soloist. St Peter’s is home to the oldest library in Austria.
• Franziskanerkirche - The first Church of Our Lady was built on an early Christian place of worship. In 1592, Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau handed the church over to the newly appointed Franciscans as a monastery church and had a lateral oratory built into the first choir bay and connected to the residence via a connecting building. From 1189 until 1635, when the cathedral became the parish church, the Franciscan church was the parish church of the city of Salzburg. The Franciscan church consists of two parts. The original, dark, Romanesque nave basilica with a ribbed vault and then, two steps higher, in the same width as the nave, a delicate, light-filled, late Gothic hall choir with a star-ribbed vault. Since 1710, the choir of the Franciscan church has been home to the baroque high altar created by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach with a concave wall structure and bordered by double columns, in which the Madonna and Child from the former Gothic winged altar by Michael Pacher is integrated.
• Felsenreitschule - The Felsenreitschule, a venue of the Salzburg Festival, was built in 1693 under Archbishop Johann Ernst von Thun according to plans by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach on the site of the conglomerate quarry for the new Salzburg Cathedral. 96 three-storey arcades, one above the other, were carved into the walls of the abandoned quarry so that riding demonstrations and animal fights could be observed. In 1841, the Felsenreitschule was adapted as an imperial cavalry riding hall. After the First World War, the Austrian army was stationed here. Since 1926, the Felsenreitschule has been used for open-air theatre performances. The former audience arcades have served as a natural stage setting ever since. In 1933, Clemens Holzmeister built a simultaneous stage for Max Reinhardt. Herbert von Karajan transformed the Felsenreitschule into an opera stage for the first time in 1948. In the years 1968-1970, the Felsenreitschule was remodelled according to plans by Clemens Holzmeister.
• Grosses Festspielhaus - In 1607, Salzburg’s Prince Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau built the Hofmarstall ( horse stable ) for 150 horses at the foot of the Mönchsberg wall. Between 1956 and 1960, 55,000 cubic metres of the Mönchsberg were removed to make room for today’s Großes Festspielhaus, a theatre with an opera stage, between the old façade of the Hofmarstall and the Mönchsberg, based on plans by architect Clemens Holzmeister. The Grosses Festspielhaus, built partly into the Mönchsberg, is a venue of the Salzburg Festival, whose north portal and the façade of the northern narrow side facing Herbert-von-Karajan-Platz and the Marstallschwemme were designed according to plans by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach in 1693/94. Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach was an Austrian Baroque architect whose main works include Schönbrunn Palace and St Charles’ Church in Vienna as well as the Holy Trinity Church in Salzburg.
• Pferdeschwemme (Horse Well) - The Pferdeschwemme, the Hofmarstallschwemme, is one of the two preserved Salzburg horse ponds in the historic centre of Salzburg on Herbert-von-Karajan-Platz near the Sigmundstor, a historic city gate that leads into a tunnel under the Mönchsberg. The horse pond is called the ‘Hofmarstallschwemme’ because it belonged to the Hofmarstall, the stables of the Salzburg prince archbishops. Between 1695 and 1696, Prince Archbishop Johann Ernst Graf Thun had a pond, a bath, built for the horses according to plans by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach. As the granary was located on the Mönchsberg, the horse bath was fitted with a rear wall to conceal it. A granary is a building that was used to store grain. The marble sculpture of the horse tamer taming a rearing horse, made in 1695, is located in the centre of the pond. The motif of the horse tamer is common in the Baroque period and symbolises the competition between passion and the traditional (aristocratic) order.
• Kollegienkirche (Collegiate Church) - The Kollegienkirche, also known as the White Church, is the church of the University of Salzburg, whose patron saint is the Immaculate Conception of Mary. Johann Ernst Count Thun and Hohenstein, who persecuted the Protestants in his countries, had the collegiate church built by architect Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach in 1707 in the Baroque style with a church interior in a uniform white colour without paintings and towers that do not have bonnets but are crowned by stylised altars. The figure of St Mary Immaculate on a crescent moon crowns the centre of the building. The large and bright windows of the façade open the building to the outside. Inside, the church is vaulted with a towering barrel vault and a central tambour dome. The Kollegienkirche, the most important church building in the city of Salzburg next to the cathedral, is still a venue for the Salzburg Festival today, after Hugo von Hofmannsthal’s Das Salzburger große Welttheater was performed in 1922.
• Getreidegasse - The historic Getreidegasse, the heart of Salzburg, runs in a north-west-south-east direction parallel to the Salzach and leads from Karajanplatz to Kranzlmarkt and Rathausplatz. Even in Roman times, the Getreidegasse formed the main traffic artery through the city of Salzburg, Iuvavum, as the Romans called it, in the direction of today’s Bavaria. From Waagplatz, the row of houses in Judengasse grew westwards across Kranzlmarkt and Rathausplatz to Getreidegasse. In the 14th century, Salzburg was granted the right to stack goods and, from 1509, travelling merchants offered mainly iron goods in the Niederleghaus in Getreidegasse. The Getreidegasse became the first social address for citizens and an economic centre for upscale craftsmen, breweries, restaurants, surgeons and pharmacists. Getreidegasse is characterised by its through-houses, i.e. the houses with a public passageway. These were built when the Frongarten between the houses in Getreidegasse and the Mönchsberg was built over.
• Mozart’s Birthplace - Mozart’s birthplace, the so-called Hagenauer Haus, named after its owner and friend of the Mozarts, a five-storey town house with arcades on the courtyard side, where Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born on 27 January 1756 in a flat on the third floor and where several of his early works were composed, is located on at Getreidegasse no. 9. In 1880, the Mozarteum Foundation set up the museum, which still exists today, in the former living quarters, where musical instruments, works of art, compositions and original furniture are exhibited. Among the most famous exhibits are Mozart’s children’s violin, his clavichord and portraits and letters of the Mozart family. In 1917 the International Mozarteum Foundation acquired the building. The second floor of Mozart’s birthplace is dedicated to the theme of “Mozart at the theatre”. The history of the reception of Mozart’s operas is illustrated in numerous dioramas. On the first floor there are special exhibitions on the subject of Mozart.
• Schloss Leopoldskron - Schloss Leopoldskron is a castle with an extensive castle park and a pond, a standing body of water that was probably created before 1500 as a retention area for excess water from the Almkanal. The Almkanal is an artificial canal in the south of Salzburg, from which a collegiate tunnel leads through the Mönchsberg, which was used to supply the city with industrial, drinking and fire-fighting water. Prince Archbishop Leopold Anton von Firmian, who ruled from 1727 to 1744, had the palace named after his first name built as his personal summer residence on the Leopoldskroner Weiher pond and had the pond remodelled into part of the palace park. In 1918, the film director Max Reinhardt acquired the castle, which he owned until his expropriation in 1938. During the Reinhardt period, Schloss Leopoldskron was a meeting place for theatre makers, writers, composers, actors and designers. In 1920, Max Reinhardt founded the Salzburg Festival together with Hugo von Hofmannsthal and Richard Strauss.
• Schloss Hellbrunn - In 1615, Prince Archbishop Markus Sittikus had a so-called villa suburbana, a place of pleasure and enjoyment, built in the south of the city of Salzburg as a summer residence with water features in a walled palace park modelled on Italian architecture by the architect Santino Solari, who was also involved in the construction of Salzburg Cathedral. Prince Archbishop Markus Sittikus entertained his exuberant guests by the flickering light of candles and torches in grottos that could send visitors into eerie horror and delighted amazement. The deceptively real sounds in the Vogelsanggrotte, where 10 different bird calls could be heard from the walls, were a source of amusing amazement. In the fountain of the Neptune Grotto, guests were shocked by the Germaul, a tinny grimace which, powered by water, rolls its eyes and disrespectfully sticks its tongue out at the observer. What’s more, inside the grotto, jets of water repeatedly sprayed out of niches in the walls, terrifying visitors.

• Private transportation
• Bottled water
• Breakfast
• In-person licensed guide in English & German
• Tea and coffee
• Snacks
• Lunch
• In-vehicle air conditioning

• Alcoholic Beverages

Your guide is an artist who grew up in Salzburg and therefore has the relevant insider knowledge, e.g. where are really the most beautiful places, where can you take the best photos and where is the best place to eat. After a stop at Lake Attersee, your tour begins in the garden of Mirabell Palace, followed by all the other baroque highlights of Salzburg, such as the cathedral and the collegiate church. In between you will be treated to a Wiener Schnitzel in the restaurant of St Peter’s, which has been around since the year 803. Before leaving the center of Salzburg to see Leopoldskron Palace and Hellbrunn Palace in the south of Salzburg with its famous trick fountains, which even frightened the guests of its builder, Prince Archbishop Marcus Sittiikus, you will be visiting Mozart’s birthplace. Another special feature of this private tour is that your physical well-being will be catered for throughout the day, including a croissant breakfast at the start of the tour at 05:55 in Vienna.

• We can accommodate dietary restrictions such as vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, etc. If you have dietary requirements, please indicate them when booking.

For a full refund, cancel at least 24 hours before the scheduled departure time.