Austria - Day 1

Austria - Day 1, Today we visited another World heritage site, Hallstatt, a beautiful and very picturesque village nestled on a side of a lake with the same name.  Hallstatt is known for its production of salt, which they date back 7000 years.  We had a guided tour of the salt mine (which is the world's oldest and is still in operation today) which ticked all the boxes for the children, it was exciting and action packed, visually impressive and basically a day they will never forget.
The vistas were breath taking, both in the town and then 800 meters above where the salt mine was situated.  Thankfully we did not have to climb all the way up but got a lift on a funicular railway.

Interesting sites throughout the old town of Hallstatt, very "Austrian"

Caleb posing on a rock/fountain

Annelise after attempting the same pose, 
yes she fell in!!! 

(thankfully the weather was nice so she dried out before we got home, Annelise was very stoic after the initial scream)

Don't you love the garb we needed to wear inside the mine, so fetching - not!  

We decided we looked like crims.

We had to walk over 300 meters into the mine, thankfully the way out was a lot more fun, sliding down miners' slides and riding on a mining train,

Mineral salt crystals, the color is determined by the predominant mineral, the pinkish one - iron enriched, the whiter one - calcium enriched plus many other minerals.

Josiah inspecting old mine equipment.  They explained the history as well as dry mining and wet mining (which they use today)  Archaeologically a significant site with the find of a 3000 year old staircase, clothing fragments and shoes, tools (antler, bronze & iron) and even a human body (found in 1700's!) - all these well preserved in salt!

View of Hallstatt going down on the funicular railway - awesome way to get up and down a hill😵

Souvenir shopping - Yay!!!!