The name Salzburg means “salt fortress,” which is a fairly blunt summary of how the city got rich and why it looks the way it does. The salt came from the mines near Hallein, just upriver, and the money funded a long line of prince-archbishops who ruled Salzburg as both church and state. Several of them, most ambitiously Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau around 1600, set out to rebuild their capital as a northern Rome, with Italian architects, piazzas and a cathedral to match. Plenty of the stops on this walk are something one of them commissioned, and the old town was compact enough to survive in one piece, which is why it’s now a UNESCO World Heritage site.
If you’re travelling through Austria, Salzburg is easy to skip in favour of Vienna or the Alps, and it’s worth resisting that. The historic centre is small enough to cover on foot in a day, with a fortress above it, a river through the middle of it, and more baroque architecture per block than you’d expect from a city this size. Mozart was born here. But for a lot of us, the real highlight is seeing where The Sound of Music was filmed in 1964.
This guide covers one day, from morning to night, in an order that keeps the walking efficient and gives each stop its context. Where hours, tickets or booking details matter, they’re included alongside the stop, with a note to confirm before you go wherever things change seasonally.
The route runs from the station through Mirabell’s gardens and the old town to the fortress, finishing in a beer hall. Open the walking-tour map to see every stop.
The best way to spend 24 hours in Salzburg is to arrive early in the morning, ideally on an overnight train from your last destination (ÖBB’s Nightjet serves Salzburg; check routes). You’ll save a night’s accommodation and can splurge a bit the next day. Overnight trains in Europe are excellent and are an experience everyone should have once in their life.
After stepping off the train, make your first stop a local café. Mirabell Coffee Bar is right across from the Mirabell Gardens and a short walk from the Old Town. Order a coffee and the Salzburger Nockerl, Salzburg’s signature sweet. The Nockerl is a soufflé of whipped egg whites, yolks, sugar and a little flour, baked to order and served with a fruit sauce. Legend credits it to Salome Alt, whom you’re about to meet at Mirabell, though no early records back that up. The Nockerl is an acquired taste but worth a try if you’re looking to dive into Salzburg’s historical cuisine.
After grabbing a few pastries and a coffee, head to Mirabell Gardens, a 10- to 15-minute walk from the station. Here you can sit and enjoy your Austrian breakfast in one of the most elegantly designed baroque gardens in Europe. The gardens are free and open daily from around 6 am until dusk. For centuries this was a private pleasure garden for the prince-archbishops, a serene retreat, and it became a public park only in 1854.
NOTE: The hedge theatre and dwarf garden close for winter, and the Orangery garden is closed for redesign until December 2026.
The palace that serves as the garden’s backdrop was begun in 1606 for Prince-Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau, who built the white palace as a gesture of love for Salome Alt, his partner and the mother of his fifteen children (ten survived), and called it Schloss Altenau. He was deposed in 1612 and imprisoned at Hohensalzburg, and his successor, Markus Sittikus, sent Salome and her family away and renamed the palace Mirabell, Italian for “wonderful” and “beautiful.”
In 1721 Prince-Archbishop Franz Anton von Harrach had the palace redesigned by the baroque architect Johann Lukas von Hildebrandt, who by 1727 had gathered the scattered buildings into one self-contained complex. His Angel Staircase, with sculptures by Georg Raphael Donner, is the best reason to go inside. A great fire on April 30, 1818, took much of the interior, and the restrained neoclassical exterior you see today dates from the repairs. The garden was redesigned around 1690 to plans by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, and wherever you step out of the palace you’re greeted by clipped greenery and bright flower beds.
The Mirabell Gardens are a preserved treasure of a bygone age. The Hedge Theatre, created between 1704 and 1718, is one of the oldest hedge theatres north of the Alps, and it’s the same one that appears in The Sound of Music, where the von Trapp children run through it during “Do-Re-Mi.”
Tucked into the old bastion off the main garden is the Zwergerlgarten, or “dwarf garden,” the oldest of its kind in Europe. Most visitors pass right by it, so make a point of exploring. In the early 1690s, under Prince-Archbishop Johann Ernst von Thun, a workshop led by Ottavio Mosto and Bernhard Michael Mandl carved 28 exquisite yet grotesque figures from white Untersberg marble, based on caricatures by the French printmaker Jacques Callot.
Nowadays we might find the statues slightly offensive, and so, as it turns out, did the Enlightenment: the figures fell out of favour and in 1811 all 28 were auctioned off. The city began buying them back after 1919, and 17 originals now stand in the neighbouring Small Bastion Garden.
The oldest surviving part of the garden is the Grand Parterre, a symmetrical swirl of beds framed by a marble railing and vases, with a view through the garden to Hohensalzburg Fortress on its hill.
As you circle the perimeter, you’ll notice towering white statues acting as the garden’s guardians. The four groups around the large fountain were carved by the Italian sculptor Ottavio Mosto around 1690 and show the Rape of Proserpina, Paris carrying off Helen, Aeneas carrying Anchises and Hercules wrestling Antaeus. These scenes of lust, triumph and pain are not as refined as the finest work of Italy’s Renaissance masters, but they are wonderfully powerful all the same.
When you’ve finished with the gardens, leave toward the Salzach River and follow the pedestrian path along the water’s edge, a pretty stretch for admiring the cake-topper pastel baroque townhouses that dot the riverside. Soon you’ll reach the Mozartsteg footbridge, a great place to stop and watch the tourist boats putter by, much as the salt barges once travelled up and down this same river.
The Salzach’s name means “salt river,” and salt is the reason Salzburg grew wealthy. The mines at Dürrnberg, near Hallein and roughly 20 kilometres upstream, had been worked since Celtic times, and the prince-archbishops built much of their power on the trade. The city’s name, first recorded in the 8th century, comes from the toll charged on those salt barges, and Salzburg means “Salt Fortress.”
Once you’re across the bridge, head to Mozartplatz, or Mozart Square, named after Salzburg’s most famous resident, you guessed it, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The bronze statue in the middle of the square was made by the sculptor Ludwig Schwanthaler and unveiled in September 1842. It had been meant for the 50th anniversary of Mozart’s death in 1841, but the date slipped when workers digging the foundations turned up a Roman mosaic.
Mozart wasn’t alive to see it, but his two surviving sons were there as the square filled with people to honour their father’s work, and his widow, Constanze, who had lived at No. 8 on this very square, had died only months earlier. Take a minute to sit and admire the surroundings, including the Antretter house at No. 4 (a family friend of the Mozarts), which now holds the University of Salzburg’s music institute.
Residence Square is right next door. Prince-Archbishop Wolf Dietrich laid it out from 1587, and to make room he had a cemetery abandoned and, reportedly, 55 medieval houses torn down. Today it’s framed by the Residenz and the New Residence of the prince-archbishops, Salzburg Cathedral, various aristocratic townhouses and some famous cafés. In the middle stands the centrepiece, an enormous baroque fountain attributed to Tommaso di Garona, built between 1656 and 1661 for Archbishop Guidobald von Thun and still considered the largest baroque fountain in Central Europe. Four horses burst out of a rocky mound, snorting and rearing as water shoots from their mouths. Above them four stocky giants hold up a large bowl, three dolphins balance the upper basin on top of that, and Triton stands at the summit blowing a jet of water from a shell. (Maria splashes the fountain’s horses in The Sound of Music, too.)
While you’re on Residence Square, look into the courtyard of the Residenz, where the prince-archbishops lived and held court. You can also explore the interior, whose state rooms trace two centuries of style from the Renaissance through the baroque to neoclassicism, but this might be better left for a more extended stay. The rooms are part of the DomQuartier, which was open daily except Tuesday from 10 am to 5 pm at the time of writing, with admission listed at about €15 (parts of the complex are under renovation, so worth confirming before you go). From the exterior, you can still see where the rulers of Salzburg lived and get a glimpse of their lifestyle.
Next, it’s over to the famous Dom zu Salzburg, or Salzburg Cathedral, for some spiritual awakening and awe-inspiring architecture. The first Christian cathedral on this site was begun in 767 under Bishop Virgil and consecrated in 774, and at the time it ranked among the largest sacred buildings in Europe. Remnants of that church, and of the Romanesque cathedral that replaced it, can still be seen in the crypt beneath the current building. A fire in 1167 destroyed the original, and Archbishop Conrad III rebuilt it about ten years later as the mightiest Romanesque church north of the Alps.
That church stood for more than four centuries until another fire, in 1598, destroyed large parts of it. Prince-Archbishop Wolf Dietrich, who had grander ambitions in mind, had what remained pulled down and commissioned the Italian architect Vincenzo Scamozzi to plan an enormous replacement. Those plans were never carried out: Wolf Dietrich was deposed in 1612, and his successor, Markus Sittikus, brought in Santino Solari, who scaled the design back considerably and began building in 1614.
Prince-Archbishop Paris Lodron consecrated the new cathedral in 1628, and it is considered the first early baroque church north of the Alps. Its imposing Untersberg marble facade is framed between two towers with green copper domes, and four statues look down from it: Peter and Paul with a key and a sword, and Salzburg’s two patron saints, Rupert and Virgil, holding a salt barrel and a model of the church. An aerial bomb damaged the dome and part of the sanctuary in 1944, and the cathedral was reconsecrated in 1959, which is why the gates carry three dates: 774, 1628 and 1959.
Out in the square stands the Marian column, a figure of the Virgin Mary made of marble and cast lead by the brothers Wolfgang and Johann Baptist Hagenauer between 1766 and 1771. She is surrounded by allegorical figures of an angel, the devil, truth and the Church, and even on the coldest day she seems to draw the whole square toward the cathedral doors.
Three doors let you into the church, each one representing a theme: faith, hope and love, with the middle door of love slightly larger than the others. The interior is both minimal and elaborate at the same time. The structure is painted a soothing and peaceful shade of white, yet ornate stucco in baroque shapes is worked into the walls, columns, archways and ceiling, and brightly painted frescoes along the roof stand in sharp contrast to all that white.
The church can hold about 900 people, and it’s worth knowing that a preservation fee (listed at €7 for adults in 2026) is charged at the door, with an audio guide available for a few euros more. In November the cathedral is open Monday to Saturday from 9 am to 5 pm and on Sundays and holidays from 1 pm to 5 pm, but it closes to sightseers during services and the daily noon organ concert.
Near the entrance is the bronze baptismal font, dated 1311 and resting on lions that are older still, where both Mozart and Joseph Mohr, who wrote the lyrics to “Silent Night,” were baptized. Be sure to take a moment to study the magnificent organs. Mozart played them, and the cathedral still uses them for its Music at Noon concerts, held daily except Sundays and public holidays for an additional ticket.
Now, I bet you’re getting slightly hungry after all this walking, so it’s time to start searching for something to eat. Walk over to the Alter Markt, where you have various options. The square was laid out in the 13th century as the town’s marketplace, and the weekly market only moved to Universitätsplatz in 1857. A fountain has stood in the middle since 1488, when it replaced an old draw well. Its wrought-iron fence dates from 1583, the octagonal marble basin from the late 1680s, and the statue of St. Florian (the saint invoked against fire) on top from 1734, with Salzburg’s coat of arms on the fountain column. The square is ringed by baroque buildings, and the old court pharmacy has stood here since the end of the 16th century.
There are many cafés to grab a bite at, but if you have a few extra euros to spend and want an exceptional experience, try Café Tomaselli. It is Austria’s oldest surviving coffeehouse, tracing its roots to a licence granted in 1700 to sell coffee, chocolate and tea. It moved to this address in 1764 and has been run by the Tomaselli family since 1852. According to tradition, Mozart used to come in here to drink, of all things, almond milk.
The café is full of history, and the cakes and pastries are carried around on big trays. The stories this place could tell if only the walls could talk. But this atmosphere comes with a price. If you still want a chance to visit but are short on cash, simply order a coffee and split a simple pastry with a friend. Opening hours have been listed as 7 am to 7 pm on weekdays and 8 am to 7 pm on weekends, but worth confirming before you go.
By this point you’ve probably earned a sit-down, and Sternbräu is well placed for it. The main entrance is at Griesgasse 23-25, and the complex runs back into a courtyard that opens onto Getreidegasse, so it’s a short walk from Mozart’s birthplace without being on the tourist conveyor belt itself. It’s one of the oldest places to eat in the city, and the date that holds up is 1542, when it was first recorded as a brewery (listings claiming “over 600 years” or a Mozart meal in 1777 are harder to confirm, and the city’s own beer-route guide says only that Mozart is said to have enjoyed dancing here). The building is newer than the history suggests: a two-year reconstruction ended with a reopening in October 2014, and the result is several traditional dining rooms and an Italian trattoria (which you can ignore) under one roof.
For lunch, the Schweinsbraten with Semmelknödel and Speckkrautsalat suits the hour better than dinner, and the schnitzel or tafelspitz (boiled beef, and a fair test of a kitchen with nowhere to hide) are the standards, best with the house unfiltered Sternbier. In warm weather the beer garden under the old chestnut trees is the better seat, entered at Getreidegasse 36. Hours, prices and seasonal changes are worth confirming before you go: one listing gives 9:00 to 22:30 daily, I couldn’t verify current menu prices, and reservations are sensible in high season (+43 662 842140). The Sound of Music dinner show is an evening affair with an extra charge, so it doesn’t touch a lunch visit.
Lastly, if you’re looking for something really, really inexpensive that’s just as delicious as it is authentically Salzburg, you have to check out the Balkan Grill. It occupies a tiny booth of less than four square metres in the Stockhamer Durchhaus, a passage reached from Getreidegasse 33, and it has been serving sausages since 1950, when the Bulgarian-born Zanko Todoroff opened it after selling his first ones at the Augustiner brewery. There is nearly always a line-up, and it’s part of the experience.
The menu centres on one thing, the Bosna: two grilled bratwursts in a toasted white bun, covered in your choice of onions, fresh parsley and a secret blend of curry-like spices. Tell them the number that matches the version you want, since the basis is always the same and everything else is up to you. There is something about the fresh parsley that really brightens up the rich sausage. Opening hours have been listed as 11 am to 6:30 pm daily, but worth confirming before you go.
Once you have sated your hunger, take a few moments to explore Getreidegasse. The name looks like “grain lane,” and it’s usually translated that way, but it actually evolved from Trabgasse, a name first documented in 1150 that comes from a dialect word for “in a hurry.” It is Salzburg’s most famous shopping street, most recognizable for its tall and narrow houses, which seem to lean over the sidewalk below, with windows that shrink as they climb. Look for the archways at street level too. These public passages, known as Durchhäuser, cut through the houses to Universitätsplatz and Griesgasse, and one of them hides the Balkan Grill.
Ornately designed wrought-iron signs hang off the sides of the buildings. The usual explanation is that these wordless guild symbols helped medieval citizens who couldn’t read find the baker, the cobbler or the butcher, and a local locksmith’s shop still makes them by hand. Modern shops have adopted the style, so the signs now carry the logos of familiar brands, but they have kept their antique look.
One building worth a second look is No. 9. This is Mozart’s “Geburtshaus,” or Birthplace, and its golden-yellow exterior makes it unmissable as you walk along the street. Wolfgang was born here on January 27, 1756, and the Mozart family lived on the third floor of the “Hagenauer House,” named for the family who owned the building, from 1747 until 1773, when they moved to larger rooms on what is now Makartplatz. Mozart spent his childhood in Salzburg, developing his incredible musical talent. Inside is a museum run by the International Mozarteum Foundation, with instruments, portraits and other objects connected to the family and an exhibition on how they lived. It has been listed as open daily from 9 am to 5:30 pm (last admission half an hour before closing), but hours and ticket prices change, so check the Mozarteum’s website before you go.
From Getreidegasse, slip through one of the passages to Universitätsplatz, follow Wiener-Philharmoniker-Gasse to Max-Reinhardt-Platz, and you’ll find the slender tower of the Franciscan Church, or Franziskanerkirche, rising above the square. In some ways it is the architectural opposite of the Salzburg Dom. Whereas the Dom is bright and white, the Franziskanerkirche has a dark Romanesque nave that opens into a taller, lighter, GOTHIC choir! I love both for different reasons, and both are worth checking out.
The first church on this site was erected in the 8th century and was lost to fire, and the Romanesque nave that replaced it, begun in 1208 and consecrated in 1221, is among the oldest buildings in Salzburg. After 1408 the master builder Hans von Burghausen began work on a larger Gothic choir to replace the Romanesque one, and Stephan Krumenauer completed it after Hans died in 1432. Throughout the choir you’ll find slender, purplish columns that reach up to the sky and open into a star-ribbed vault, like a pair of hands whose fingers open to the heavens. The high altar is a baroque addition by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach.
Continue onward to St. Peter’s Cemetery, which, together with the burial ground at Nonnberg Abbey, is the oldest in Salzburg. The abbey’s graveyard was first mentioned in a document from 1139, and the oldest surviving tombstone is said to date to 1288. Looking at the gravestones, they don’t appear so ancient, but take a look behind them, along the rock face, to see where the real history lies. Carved into the Mönchsberg are the so-called catacombs.
They weren’t really burial places, and the abbey says they were most likely early Christian meeting places of late antique origin. If you decide to go inside, you can climb the steep stone steps up to the Gertraudenkapelle, which was consecrated in 1178. A small fee applies, and the catacombs have been listed as open daily from 10 am to 12:30 pm and 1 pm to 5 pm from October to April (until 6 pm from May to September), though worth confirming before you go.
Back on the ground, you can see several crypts flanking the nearby church’s exterior, their elegant wrought-iron fences protecting the resting places of some of Salzburg’s wealthiest families. They inspired one of the iconic scenes in The Sound of Music, when the von Trapp family hides from the Nazis during their daring escape, although the film recreated the scene on a studio set rather than shooting here.
To end your walking tour, head to the Festungsbahn, the funicular that climbs from Festungsgasse to the crowning glory of Salzburg, Hohensalzburg Fortress. The ride takes about a minute, and the railway has run since 1892, which makes it Austria’s oldest funicular still in operation. It is scheduled to be closed for maintenance from November 9 to 13, 2026, and again from January 11 to March 14, 2027, and during those periods the fortress stays open but can only be reached on foot, a climb of roughly 30 minutes, so confirm the current status before you go. The fortress is open every day, and from October to December the listed hours are 9:30 am to 5 pm.
The first fortification on this site was begun in 1077 under Archbishop Gebhard and was little more than a bailey with a wooden wall. It was built high on the hill during the Investiture Controversy, when Salzburg’s archbishop sided with the pope against Emperor Henry IV, to serve as a lookout and a defence against imperial troops.
Over the years towers were built, stone walls were added to fortify the site, and the fortress grew in size, until Archbishop Leonhard von Keutschach gave it its present appearance around 1500. Unlike many castles across Europe, Hohensalzburg has never been taken by foreign troops, and it is now the largest fully preserved castle in Central Europe. According to legend, rebel peasants besieging it in the 1500s gave up when the starving garrison paraded the same bull along the walls, painted a different colour each day, which is why Salzburgers are still nicknamed the “bull washers.” This treasure of the past is truly a unique experience to walk through.
Inside, you’ll get to see the Gothic state rooms Keutschach began installing on the third floor in 1498. The Golden Hall and Golden Chamber still hold their original furnishings, unchanged since 1501 and 1502, including a ceiling of gold stars on an azure background and one of the most ornate tiled stoves you’ll ever see. In addition to exploring the life of the prince-archbishops, there are various exhibits displaying the might of their army, including an armoury full of armour and weaponry. Tickets come in several combinations with the funicular, and the Salzburg Card includes one free admission and ride, so check the fortress website for current prices.
After exploring the fortress, take advantage of the vantage point on the hill and walk along the Mönchsberg path toward the perfect dinner destination. Where the trails fork near the fortress, follow the branch that runs along the ridge, then descend by the Mülln route, which passes Mönchstein Castle (or the old fortification wall) and Mülln Church on its way to the Augustiner brewery at the foot of the hill. As day turns to dusk, you’ll have a wonderful view of the city’s lights. Dusk comes early in the colder months, and since the Mönchsberg has steep cliffs that aren’t all fenced off, stay on the marked paths in fading light.
The Augustiner-Bräu is an old beer hall frequented by locals and tourists alike. Augustinian monks founded the brewery in 1621, and today the Bräustübl is the largest establishment of its kind in Austria, with about 2,400 seats spread across five large halls, three smaller rooms and a beer garden under chestnut trees. One of the halls, the Abt-Nicolaus-Saal, added in 2017, is the historic marble hall from Salzburg’s main railway station, moved here from the place where your day began. If you arrive on a colder night, don’t be surprised if you walk in and think it’s closed (that’s just because all the action is happening downstairs, as the beer garden is only open in the warmer months).
But first, you’ll need to know how the place works. The rule is simple: drinks have to be bought from the Bräustübl, but food can be brought in or picked up from the stalls. You can have beer brought to your table, but the better way is to go straight to the bar and watch it being tapped from wooden barrels into stoneware mugs. The beer is as fresh as it gets, and in November and December the seasonal Bock beer is on.
The food is traditional Salzburg and Austrian fare. Small stalls along the Schmankerlgang sell everything from Leberkäse and roast chicken to cheese dumplings, spicy Liptauer cheese spread, bread and radish specialties, which is perfect for whatever you’re craving. Once you’ve got your food and your beer, find a table and make some new friends. We witnessed friendly Austrians singing happy birthday to a group of tourists to welcome them into the country.
No doubt this tour has worn you out, but after a few Austrian beers, all you’ll feel is the warm fuzziness that comes from good company and a long day in a beautiful city. You began by wondering whether Salzburg deserved a day or two, and you’ve now walked from the train station through the gardens, squares and churches that salt money and a handful of ambitious prince-archbishops built, past the birthplace of the composer who made the city famous, and up to the fortress that none of its enemies ever took. Whether you have just 24 hours or a little longer, Salzburg earns the stop, and if you spend them this way, even the beer hall where you finish has a piece of the station where you started.
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Such a good post! I'm heading to Salzburg for 2 days in October. Can't wait!
2 days is a perfect amount of time to explore Salzburg! October will be such a lovely time to visit with the changing colours from Summer into Fall!
This is such a great article on Salzburg and it really helped me in my plans. Thank you very much!
Wonderful to hear that Meijia! :) Thanks for reading.
Great article.
Do check out my blog on Salzburg as well
https://frozenbeauty04.com/salzburg/
Hi there! Thanks for sharing. Through working at <a href="https://propertysaleaustria.co.uk/ ">Kristall Spaces</a> I have been able to visit Austria many times. However, I have never visited Salzburg! Your tips are very interesting and I will use them for any future trips!
We are taking a day trip to Salzburg from Munich in October. Thanks for the tips!