Melk Monastary

The week before Easter, my head teacher invited me to come with her on a day trip (during the week, no less!) to Melk, where she was going to participate in a history conference for the province that we teach in. They had a morning session about the new Matura (the test that all graduating seniors have to take in order to graduate from high school- they take the Matura exam in many subjects...kind of like the SAT, but with oral comprehension too.) and I got to explore the town of Melk, Austria.


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We drove up in the morning, and got to Melk at about 8am. There was no one around the famous Monastery, so we went and took a look around before I went down in to the town. Here are some pictures of the Monastery. It is now a school, and in former times was a partial Imperial residence as well.



Here are some pictures of the town...

The Monastery from down below...

When I went back up to the monastery, Birgit and I had lunch at the cafe on the grounds of the monastery. It was really nice, and of course, I had a nice piece of apple strudel while I enjoyed the sunshine...

The afternoon came to a close as we were given a tour of the monastery (including the private areas for the Monks, where normal tourists don't get to go. The Monk who took us on the tour had all the special keys and codes to get into every room, including the underbelly of the monastery, where the oldest document in Austria is kept...it is from the 1st Century...pretty amazing!

This was the view over Melk at the top of the Monastery...it was a beautiful day!