Hallein's old town is a small grid of narrow lanes between the Salzach river and the railway, lined with painted three- and four-storey houses dating from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The wealth on display was generated by the salt mines above the town, which made Hallein the second-richest place in the Salzburg archbishopric for several centuries.
The Stadtpfarrkirche (parish church) sits in the centre, modest by Salzburg standards but with a notable tomb of Franz Xaver Gruber, the local schoolteacher and organist who composed the music for "Silent Night" in 1818. The small Stille Nacht Museum at his old house tells the story. Allow an hour to walk through.