4th of October - Vienna, Austria
We had exactly two days in Vienna before we planned to meet ourmoms in Prague for Jen's 30th birthday. Vienna is an expensive city,
and we wanted to see as much as we could without blowing our budget.
We ended up staying at a hostel that was quite interesting, it was just an old
apartment, with one room that had mattresses strewn about the room. The
price was reasonable, so we decided that two nights there would be OK,
despite the lack of privacy of any kind or any organization to the
place. It worked out fine, except for the second night when the
Aussie's staying there decided it was OK to stay up all night playing
drinking games just outside of our sleeping area.
We had a very rigorous schedule of visits to museums, operas, palaces, churches,
cafes, and other sites to see in our two days there. We had to split up one
afternoon just to make sure we got them all in. Vienna is a beautiful
and immaculate city, with an amazing amount of old architecture that is perfectly
restored. It's flawless compared to many of the Eastern European
cities we have visited, which is impressive, but it seems a bit
unnatural. Every building is either in perfect condition or is
undergoing repairs and there are so many historical treasures
everywhere you look. The streets are very orderly, and we noticed that
people did not dare cross the street when the Don't Walk sign was lit, even if
there were no cars anywhere to be found. The entire city also has ample bike
lanes, and cyclists get very upset if you accidentally intrude on
their bicycling space. So, after we got the hang of the rules, we set
out with a map and a plan.
We saw the Hapsburg's summer and winter home, we saw three art
museums, we saw Parliament, Parks, small neighborhoods, the city
center, and just about every part of the city that you could walk to
from our hostel. We were exhausted both nights we were there, which
made sleeping through the drinking games that much easier. The
highlight for us was making it to see an Opera. The Opera House in
Vienna is world famous, and costs 10 Euros to see during the day on a
tour of the interior, but we found out that it is possible to buy
standing room only tickets for Operas the night of certain
performances for 2 Euros. We went to see Verdi's Simon Boccanegra. It
was such a fantastic place, with 6 levels of seating, busts of all the
famous Viennese musicians like Beethoven, Mozart, Haydn, and Schubert, and a
grand entrance where people loitered for intermission. Even in the
standing room only section each person had their own personal super
title screen, which allowed us to choose the language we wanted to
read the words in. We only stayed for half the Opera, as standing room only after walking around for 10 hours was a little too much and it was really hot in the nose bleed section, but it was a great experience. We also didn't want to be seen
at intermission, as people were all dressed up, and we were looking
like tattered backpackers.
We went to the Belvedere Museum to see Gustav Klimt's famous painting
The Kiss, and caught an informative and innovative exhibit on
Austria's history (good and bad moments in the country's past). The
museums in Europe are much more engaging than the museums in the
States, they incorporate technology, art and interactive design to
provide an enveloping experience for visitors. We went to
Hundertwasser's KunstHaus (thanks to a recommendation by our friend
Agi in Budapest), which is a shrine to this architect/graphic artist
and we were both impressed by this man's accomplishments and
progressive ideas. We had to have a Weiner Schnitzel and giant beers
in Vienna, so we went out of our way to find a typical Wein style
restaurant that served up enormous portions of this world famous
Viennese dish. Jen was interested in Viennese cafe culture, so she
found a traditional cafe where she could sip a very expensive coffee
(3.5 Euros) one afternoon in order to hang out with the arty crowd and
admire the 19th century fittings and decor inside one of these temples
dedicated to the worship of caffeine. We walked all over the ring and
the inner city to see St Stephen's Cathedral, the Hofburg, Otto
Wagner's Art Nouveau buildings. We went to the Leopold Museum to see
an exhibit from Musee D'Orsey of Impressionist paintings, but even
more impressive was the Egon Schiele permanent collection. Finally,
Jen just couldn't get enough of Klimt, so she went to the Seccession
Building, where his Beethoven Frieze is displayed in the basement to
get a look at his larger than life tribute to the arts.
The city is full of so much history, it was the center of the world
not all that long ago. The Hapsburg summer palace was another mind
blowing experience, to see how much wealth was amassed and lavishly
spent on nothing in particular, besides showing off to the rest of the
world. It was interesting to learn that Marie Antoinette was a
Hapsburg daughter married off to the French to help ease tensions
between the two empires, as well as to help expand the Hapsburg
horizons. It is no surprise that someone brought up like she was in
Vienna would utter those famous last words "let them eat cake." Also
learning about how Mozart played in front of the queen at age 4, and
was internationally known at age 6 brings the whole concept of child
prodigy into focus. We were very impressed by the amount of history to
be learned, and the culture to be experienced in Vienna. Although a
little too orderly for us, it was the first city we've visited on the
trip that felt like a true world class city. From the easy to use
subway, to the Indian, Thai, and Vietnamese restaurants, to the
shopping districts filled with styles from haute couture to The Gap,
to it's high price tag on everything, it is a top flight destination.
posted by The Blaus @ 4:58 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home