Breakfast was the same today. Unfrosted flakes, roll with butter and jam, egg, apple to go, apple juice, and coffee. I like my breakfast foods. We left the building at 8:20 and headed to the train station. Its about a 10 minute walk from the hotel. We got on a train to Salzburg. Once in the city, we got on a bus towards Berchtesgaden and Lake Königssee. We got to the town and the streets are lined with tourist shops. They are also big on rocks. All colors of rocks, rock necklaces, rock earrings, rock rings, rock lamps, rock decorations. Rocks rocks rocks. We were going to take a boat tour of the lake but Brandyn had to buy the tickets for us all first. We had some time before we could board but it wasn’t long before we got in line. The water is a greenish tint but it's clear. It's a super clean lake and the water was very cold. The boat was like a long flat boat with little bench seats in it. The view was full of pine covered mountains, waterfalls, snow capped mountains, rocky mountains with snow accents, and a lot of cliffs. It was gorgeous as all sites of Germany that we have seen so far are. The trees are changing colors which is my favorite. There were a lot of orange leaves floating on the lake together like a blanket covering the shivering water. That was an added bonus. When we were deep in the lake and surrounded by nothing but towering mountains, we paused. A trumpet player played a tune for us to hear the echo against the cliffs. It was silent except for his trumpet sound. What he played wasn't very good but the echo sounded cool. Honestly the lake surrounded by all the mountains is very unreal. I'm still not sure if that happened or not. It was so peaceful. So quiet. The sunlight peeked through the clouds and lit up the snow capped mountains and reflected off the water. We finally arrived at a piece of land surrounded by beauty. We were only staying at St. Bartholomew’s for a few hours. I ordered a fresh trout piece on bread for 4 euros. The trout was even smoked. It tasted amazing. We started walking along the lake. The water against the mountains is just perfection. The mountains just rise right out of the water and tower above the lake and are rocky but also covered in fall colored trees. I could’ve sat and stared all day. Unfortunately, it was rainy so the ground was wet. Otherwise, I would’ve plopped down for good. We took some pictures with the lake and then walked along it back through a forest. The forest was filled with bright green moss covered stumps and logs. The fallen leaves were yellow and burgundy. The forest was covered in a fresh rain and made it feel alive. It was a very quiet forest. Silently alive but you could tell it was a thriving forest. We saw mushrooms covering the fallen logs and there were pines throughout too. The forest was not quite like an enchanted one, but it had a fairy tale feeling to it. At one point, there was a wide open field and across the field were the tall snow covered rock mountains. It was so peaceful. We walked back to the boat. The boat ride back was pretty too but I was exhausted at this point. We made it back to the city to shop. There wasn't anything good to buy but a lot to look at. They had a lot of the traditional German clothing and then a lot of that rock based jewelry and decorations. I found a donut covered in chocolate shaped like a pretzel that was the size of my head so of course I bought it. We got on another bus to the salt mine. The salt mine sounds lame. But it was the coolest thing. We put on these jumpsuits and looked like mine workers. We got on the little train like at a zoo. It was about the same size but with a long seat down the middle that you straddle. We took the train deep into the dark mine, deeper and deeper into the ground. We picked up some pretty good speed and the chilly air blew past us. We went to a large cavern and saw a huge pit that used to be filled with water at one time. They used projectors to show us what the water would've looked like and how the salts were left behind. We had audioguides that talked us through the mine since our guide spoke German. The next thing we were able to do was slide down the huge salt slides. Three or four people line up and just lean back and slide down! It was exhilarating. There was a small tour of the machinery and facts of the mining process too. As we walked through the halls, there were black lights and it felt like a party down in the mines. We were able to slide down another slide and I went even faster on this one. I wanted to keep going down those the whole tour. Sadly, that was our last slide. We entered a large room with lit up salt rocks in the middle and then this projected show started playing and moved locations around the cavern so you had to move around the room to keep watching it. It was trip. It kind of seemed like a mine club or something haha. We rode a boat across a water filled cavern next. They fill the cavern with water and then drain it to extract the salts. There were light shows everywhere across the low rock ceiling and across the rock wall. We could taste some of the clean water from a fountain that contained the salt. If you drank it, it would’ve been terrible. I just tasted some on my finger and it was pretty salty for water! I just pretended I was tasting a salty food. It wasn’t bad when I thought of it like that. We took a slanted elevator up out of the mine. We rode the train back to the top. We took a jam packed bus to Salzburg. It took 40 minutes and we had to stand like sardines the whole time. We ran to catch a train to the hotel and ate Pan Asia again. It's too good not to eat there repeatedly. I journaled a little and then we went to bed after a pretty exhausting day!

Fun Facts: People like to cut in line here. They don’t really get the concept of waiting their turn. There were some cows that arrived on a barge to Berchtesgaden. It was funny to watch cows just floating on the lake. The weather was kind of drizzly for part of the day and then sunny the other part. The weather is pretty unpredictable here.

Shoutout: Ansley I miss you. I can’t wait to come home and visit you. LOVE YOU SIS!