WACHAU

The Wachau is the landscape in and around the Danube valley between Melk and Krems an der Donau in Lower Austria, around 80 kilometers west of the federal capital Vienna. In 2000, it was added to the UNESCO World Cultural and Natural Heritage List as the Wachau Cultural Landscape with the Melk and Göttweig Abbeys and the old town of Krems.

SALZBURG

Salzburg is the capital of the province of the same name in the Republic of Austria. It is located in the Salzburg Basin and is the fourth largest city in Austria after Vienna, Graz and Linz. The city is characterized by the city mountains, the Salzach river flowing through the city and the Hohensalzburg Fortress, which can be seen from afar. The northwest of the statutory city of Salzburg borders on Freilassing in the Federal Republic of Germany (Free State of Bavaria, district of Berchtesgadener Land), the rest of the city borders on the district of Salzburg-Umgebung, commonly known as “Flachgau”.

STIFT MELK

Melk Abbey, officially Melk Abbey, is a Benedictine abbey in the province of Lower Austria in the town of Melk on the right bank of the Danube. The current baroque building was constructed between 1702 and 1746 by Jakob Prandtauer. As a landmark of the Wachau region, it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It has been described as the “most emblematic and dominant baroque building”. It is also home to Melk Abbey Grammar School, the oldest school still in existence in Austria. It is the landmark of the town of Melk and the Wachau region, and is considered one of the most beautiful baroque churches in Austria.

HALLSTATT

Hallstatt, also known as Hallstatt am Hallstätter See, is a market town with 741 inhabitants (as of January 1, 2024) in the Salzkammergut in the province of Upper Austria in Austria and is located on Lake Hallstatt. Together with the Dachstein and the Inner Salzkammergut, it is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site Hallstatt-Dachstein/Salzkammergut. After discoveries in an extensive burial ground above the village, a period of the early Iron Age (800 to 450 BC) is referred to as the Hallstatt period.

BUDAPEST

Budapest is the capital and largest city of Hungary. With almost 1.7 million inhabitants, Budapest is the ninth largest city in the European Union and the fifth largest city in Central Europe (after Berlin, Vienna, Hamburg and Warsaw). According to the British market research company Euromonitor International, it is one of the twenty most frequently visited cities in Europe by tourists. The unified municipality of Budapest was created in 1873 by merging the previously independent cities of Buda, west of the Danube, and Pest, east of the Danube. The name Budapest itself did not appear before, Pest-Buda was the common name. The banks of the Danube, the castle district and Andrássy Street are now UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

PRAG

Prague is the historical capital of Bohemia and was an important royal and imperial residence in the Holy Roman Empire, especially under the Přemyslids, Luxembourgs and Habsburgs. The settlement, which had been inhabited since early history, was elevated to a royal city around 1230 and became a political and cultural center in Europe during the reign of Charles IV in the 14th century. Charles University, the first university in Central Europe, was founded in Prague in 1348. The Conservatory and the Technical University are also among the oldest of their kind in Europe. For centuries, Prague was a city in which Czech, German and Jewish cultures came together. The historic center of Prague has been recognized by UNESCO as one of the Czech Republic’s 16 World Heritage Sites since 1992. Today, the “Golden City” has a cohesive cityscape characterized by Gothic and Baroque architecture. Sights such as Prague Castle, Charles Bridge, the medieval town hall clock, the Jewish cemetery and the oldest active synagogue in the world make the city a popular tourist destination. With almost nine million tourists a year, Prague is one of the 25 most visited cities in the world.

Source: Wikipedia