Events

Parking at the Volksgarten is limited, and on ice hockey match days there's none at all, so come by bus. You can add a public transport ticket when you book your seats online. Arrive a little early and eat on site before the show.

The performance is in German, and the shepherd children speak and sing in broad Salzburg dialect, so pick up the program booklet in the foyer and read the story before the lights go down. Stay for the very end: the Andachtsjodler, a quiet devotional yodel, is the moment the audience joins in.

For the Falkenpass run, wait on the Alter Markt: the route loops from the Festspielhaus through the Getreidegasse. With small children, watch from a few steps back, because the Krampuses carry chains and switches. The gentler version is St Nicholas with his children's Krampus at the Christmas market on the afternoon of St Nicholas Day.

The cross is one stop on the DomQuartier circuit, a walk of about 1.3 km over three floors and through five institutions on one ticket, so plan at least an hour and a half rather than popping in for the cross alone. Don't arrive just before closing: in the last 20 minutes the museum can't guarantee access to every section.

Private fireworks and firecrackers are banned in Salzburg, so midnight belongs to the cathedral bells and the display on Hohensalzburg Fortress. Take your place on Kapitelplatz well before the countdown, and come back on New Year's Day for the waltz and live music at a much gentler pace.

Get the combined ticket with Mozart's Birthplace on Getreidegasse: it's valid for 48 hours from when it's first used, so you don't have to fit both houses into one day. Plan about an hour for the Mozart Residence itself.

The Mozarteum's Großer Saal is known for its acoustics. If you only catch one concert, make it a chamber programme in that hall.

Rose Monday is the big day: the Trommelweiber, drummers in white nightgowns and nightcaps, drum their way through Bad Aussee, Altaussee and Grundlsee from the morning, and Ebensee holds its Fetzenzug, which can take two hours or more before it breaks up at Rathausplatz. If you stay for Shrove Tuesday, be at Kurhausplatz in Bad Aussee in the afternoon, when the Flinserl arrive, children recite their four-line verses and get nuts and sweets in return.

Get the Altstadt Events app before you go. You can build your own eat & meet timetable in it, and it reminds you a quarter of an hour before each event starts. Read each event's description early, since some dinners and workshops need registration and list the contact for it there.

It's a smaller, more exclusive affair than the summer Festival, and the audience dresses for it. Book early; the opera nights go first.

Full bloom only lasts a few days, so go as soon as you see the first pink on the trees. Then step into Holy Trinity Church at the top of the square, Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach's church with its drum dome, and finish with a walk through the Mirabell Gardens nearby, where you'll find a few more magnolias.

Bartoli usually builds the programme around a single theme and often sings herself. It's a small festival, so the handful of performances sell out fast.

Leave the car behind: a visit to the Dult includes the trolleybus ride to and from the Messezentrum, with the free ticket you download on the Dult website, and lines 1 and 8 stop right at the grounds. Pick Whit Sunday if you'd like to catch the fireworks.

Not running? The finishing straight into Max-Reinhardt-Platz and the bridges over the Salzach are good places to watch. Expect road closures across the centre on race morning.

Start at SZENE Salzburg on Anton-Neumayr-Platz, opposite the Mönchsberg lift: it's the festival's home base and has its own restaurant, the SZENE Lokal, open late on Fridays and Saturdays. The free accompanying events are the easiest way into the program, since they're built for conversation between artists and audience.

Doors open at 17:00 and singer Ina Regen plays the opening set, so the evening starts well before Sting walks on. Have an early dinner in the Old Town, then come over for the support act and settle in on the square while it's still light.

Pair it with the Fest am Kajetanerplatz 2 weeks earlier, a neighborhood festival run by the local cultural association with a program of artists from Salzburg. Between them you see two corners of the Old Town celebrating on their own terms rather than one big city party.

Leave the car at the hotel: the free festival shuttle leaves from the back of Salzburg Main Station on Lastenstraße roughly every 20 minutes and runs straight to the grounds and campsites. It pauses between 05:00 and 08:00, so if you're sleeping in town, catch a bus back before 05:00 or plan for the early-morning gap.

Tickets for the marquee operas go through an order-and-allocation system months ahead. For a spontaneous trip, aim for a concert or a Jedermann ticket on Domplatz, which are far easier to land.

Keep your count card with you after you've booked it. It doubles as a ticket for every bus and train in the Salzburg transport network, valid from six hours before your event until the last service, so you can leave the car at the hotel.

For a calmer start, come on a Saturday morning: the breakfast concerts show concert highlights from the festival program, and you can add breakfast in the restaurant tent on the square. If you'd like dinner during an evening opera, reserve a table in the tent ahead.

Come in the late afternoon, when the lights come on and the beer tent fills up. Dirndl and Lederhosen are optional, but you'll blend right in.

There's no fixed seating and no entry fee, so the trick is to wander. Grab the programme, then drift between venues and let the city's acoustics do the rest.

The Saturday-night fire and light show on the Salzach is the highlight; grab a spot on one of the bridges before dusk. The centre is closed to traffic, so come on foot or by bus.