Enjoy your meal, dear readers. As for me, I can still breathe the aroma of our freshly baked bread including delightful cream cheese with local herbs & home-made blackcurrant jam … the farm, more than 100 years old, the oven, more than 60 years old, the crispy bread emerging from it, the expectations of us 24 “aspiring bread bakers”: Kathi, our head chef, is managing it all with a smile. Supported by her daughter and friends and the many hands who have come to help: Cutting the herbs, separating nettle leaves from their stems, preparing the cheese, forming the bread dough, mixing the blackcurrant fruit with sugar, cooking them, filling them into (hot) glasses for jam, cutting the bread, serving our home-made spread, eat … eat ?! Is that all we do in creative travel, over and over again here in Austria?
Well, yes. Actually. Participating in a tasty bread-baking course such as the one offered by the “natura.kreativ” creative workshops here in Altenmarkt, Salzburg combines all the virtues of a creative travel experience: Ambiance. Atmosphere. The aroma. Learning something new. Making contact with the locals. Delightful tasting experiences. Success and achievement. And then .. EATING !! After all, the smell of fresh bread, thick with home-made herbal spread, is simply divine. We would have reached heaven on Earth. And even walked on the Path of the Moon after singing in the mountains. … yes! 😀 Let me tell you.
Kathi (her apron saying “Witch’s Garden”!) receives us radiant in her old farm house for a bread-making lesson.
Don’t you love it, too? This is how beautiful – and tasteful! – fresh BREAD can be.
First of all, we learn what makes up the dough, which conditions it needs to mature before baking in the oven. Second to that, we are preparing a home-made herbal spread to put on our freshly baked bread … simply delightful.
Another team is responsible for making blackcurrant jam to put on the bread … Kathi, our “head chef” and local baker, patiently answers all our questions and even adds: “If you are back home and you still got a question, just call me!”
Dear Gudrun, you’ve got it figured out! Fresh jam in a jar here in Salzburg.
Fresh bread is just heavenly … Make sure you get to see (and smell!) it one day, as we did during our creative travel experiences here in Altenmarkt, Salzburg.
Cutting the bread and passing it around with local, home-made spread & jam prepared by all of us participants … this is how I like to travel, always with the locals, always with a good taste of the local traditions in sight.
Happy girls: Gudrun and I with our very own, fresh piece of bread. Well, actually we have helped more with photography and talking, but it is the passion that counts … isn’t it? 😉
Path of the Moon & Power of Music: The “natura.kreativ” creative workshops here in Altenmarkt fill us with song and ancient knowledge of the area.
Did you know that the Austrian world cup ski arena in Zauchensee offers a new moon path besides its established ski hotels and famous Austrian ski star Michael Walchhofer? “Just cross the cattle stop and turn left at the lake”, is what you hear asking for directions at the tourist information. Easy, right? We drive up to almost 1.400 metres above sea level: Up here, the air is fresh and clear, mist is rising from the valleys unveiling a most precious lake – the “Zauchensee” – so beautiful that it … gets liked & shared lots on Social Media. 😀 As online travel writers, we really like that, too!
Walking the Path of the Moon is a good half-hour walk through the local forests, complete with interesting stops talking about the forces and mythological character of Earth’s moon.
From a herbal garden to learning about the different moon phases and its effects on growing plants, trees and even tides: The Path of the Moon is interesting and stimulating.
Afterwards, we take a walk by the Zauchensee lake … really idyllic and so calm here on a wonderful Wednesday morning.
Singing in a choir = Making magic from song. Annelie shows us how and inspires many a new talent.
Singing in a choir simply fills you with magic. And it most certainly does not matter if you don’t hit the right chord all the time. “I don’t know how to sing” is simply invalid here. Can you imagine just how many people join a creative workshop such as painting or wooden crafts but say first of all: “I don’t normally do this. Actually, I have always been told I cannot sing or paint.”
And this is the beauty of it: In creative travel, this is absolutely not what matters. What does matter is getting a sense of achievement, the joy of success and being flooded with warm feelings of happiness. Making 15 people sing “I will follow him” in three voices and even performing during the evening event of the “natura.Entfaltung” in front of about 100 guests: It did feel like a miracle, and I still remember the joy and the goosebumps. Thank you, Annelie! You have proven us all wrong. And right in assuming that YES, WE CAN do this! 😀
My word of thanks also to you, Sue, for teaching us vocal training and physical exercises designed to loosen up your whole body. I can really recommend a workshop with her here in Altenmarkt.
Last but not least: Annelie, our wonderful musical instructor who lives in her very own, beautiful world of music & song, inspiring us to achievements we did not even think we could do. Or would I have guessed to sing in a choir and draw nude paintings by the end of the week “just like that”? Very cool. I must really do (even more) of this creative travel … 😀 It really moves you deep within.
Singing together … What a wonderful memory of this creative trip to Altenmarkt, Salzburg.
Happy to hear more about creative travel here in Salzburg? Check out further emotions & photographs of “my favourite creative workshops” including acrylic painting, watercolour technique, nude, baking bread & making jam, singing in a choir & vocal training, photography, plaiting and a lot more. Enjoy! 🙂
Disclaimer: We have been invited by the destination Altenmarkt-Zauchensee to travel to the natura.kreativ creative summer destination in Salzburg. All opinions are my own.