greenroads: Day 12 Sat. June 4/11 Melk, Austria

When we woke up this morning we were in Melk Austria a town in the Wachau Valley, one of the most beautiful stretches of the Danube.

Melk, once a fortified Roman Post, is a charming little town with towers and cobblestone of course, but the main attraction is the grandest of all the Baroque Monuments, the Benedictine Abbey. We took a short bus ride to the Abbey for an early morning tour and as we went through the court yard and made our way inside, the grandeur of this place was astounding. I actually gasped when we entered the Cathedral and I thought I had seen it all!

In the 11th Century Leopold lll turned over his castle to the monks and they converted it into a fortified abbey. It is still in use and houses monks and a school. It is one of the few ecclesiastical institutions that reports directly to the Pope with no bishop as a middle-man. There is an amazing library with ancient books. There are 80,000 volumes with one room alone holding 17,000! There is an interesting museum that displays religious relics and uses the latest technology to enhance displays.

We saw several optical illusions often used in Baroque interior design such as an endless staircase and mirrors that give the illusion of endless height in various rooms. The Fresco room before the outdoor balcony seemed to have moving walls.

Wine making was a way that monastaries supported themselves and they still do. You could buy the wine in the gift shop. The early monks took on a life-style that was extremely harsh and lived only about 30 years. This is so contradictory to the opulance that we saw here!

Approaching the Abbey

One of the many courtyards on the way in.

Nice!

Entrance way.

Endless immaculate halls.

Just missing the Pope!

Amazing relics. Is this an illusion? I don't remember seeing the white cross here.

A replica of the Abbey. Good thing because it is so large you would need to be in an airplane to see it all.

Frescos and illusions making the heights seem more than it is. I think this may have been a dining room.

Room with a view.

Balcony overlooking Wachau Valley.

Some old books in the library.

This is heavy!

Frescos in the library.

An ancient manuscript. I can just imagine the scribe.

Gasp!

The gold alter.

The organ at the back.

Courtyard looking out to balcony.

Garden shed!

Roses galore.

Another illusion.

The back of the Garden House which is also a restaurant.

A view.

Mirrored tables would have made it interesting to eat here. You could look at the fresco while eating.

Steps to town on the way down from the Abbey.

You can see the top of the Abbey towering over the town.

We walked down from the Abbey on our own through the town. A brass festival was beginning and it was neat to see bands warming up along the pedestrian street. It would have been nice to spend more time but we had to be back at the River Queen since we were setting sail at noon.

The day was hot and we really wanted to take our lunch up on the top deck to enjoy more views of the Wachau Valley. There was a big wind but we managed to do it taking shelter behind the wheel house. This section of the Danube reminded me of the beauty of the Romantic Rhine but with less castles. The vineyards were horizontal rather than vertical as in Franconia. It was remarkable again to see grapes growing on the most impossible looking slopes!