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Saved: September 15th 2021
As I mentioned in my last blog,
Another quickie in Slovakia, arriving in Vienna was a shock to me. I've stayed in two hostels here, and both were really different from anywhere else I've stayed too. The bones of the hostels doesn't really change much, but the people here can change everything. Since arriving in Vienna, I've found myself wondering where all the 'real' backpackers have disappeared to. Most of the people here seem to be North Americans on term breaks from studying or teaching in Europe, and their experiences in Europe seem to be solely based on each other. It's a bizarre world, and so different from the way I travel.
The highlight of my hostel experience in Vienna was definitely the all-you-can-eat breakfast for €3.50, and the espresso with chocolate. Travelling through Europe with a nut allergy is depressing sometimes, because you have to skip all the sweets and chocolates and bakery items. So to have espresso with drinking chocolate in the morning satisfied a sweet craving that I have had for several weeks (although I did take a chance on a plain, dark chocolate in Poland, and it was amazing).
After returning from my brief visit from Bratislava, I
hopped over to the Belvedere (which is basically across the street from Sudbahnhof) to see the art exhibit. I opted to only go to Upper Belvedere, to see Gustav Klimt's "The Kiss." I don't dislike Art Nouveau, but I would never have called myself a fan. But there is something so captivating about that painting. I walked into the room it is in, and first of all was blown away by the size of it--it is practically life size. There was another painting, by an artist whose name I can't remember, of a field of poppies. I stood in front of it and could see them blowing in the breeze. Another painting was of lost souls, and the ghostly colours perfectly captured the place between worlds.
The gardens of the Belvedere seemed sad--the water has been drained from the fountains, there are no flowers left, and some of the beds have actually been torn up to be rebuilt. But the leaves in all the shades of gold made a fantastic backdrop for the statues and sculptures, which are gleaming white.
There is so much to see in Vienna, and I spent six (exhausting) hours exploring the Inner Strasse
one day, plus a few hours the next day. It was cool to take the U-Bahn to Stephansplatz, and come up into the square with the massive cathedral filling the sky. There was a special mass inside, so I had to wait to go in, but that meant hearing the organ, which was amazing.
Before I left for this trip, I considered seeing as much of Vienna as I could in one day, and I had a plan to do it. The list of places I wanted to see was accidentally left at home, which is actually a good thing. After visiting Stephansdom, I decided to start wandering and just see where I ended up. After a couple of hours I was getting tired and grouchy and needing a quiet place to sit for a bit. I stumbled into Burggarten, part of the Hofburg complex, just when I was getting ready to scream. I took a deep breath and felt better immediately--there was green grass, massive trees in all shades of red, orange, and yellow, a still pond, and quiet. It was amazing, and on the way to Schmetterlinghaus, which was incredibly humid. It took about ten minutes for
my camera and glasses to stop fogging up enough for me to see and take photos, but for the first time in at least three weeks, I could breath easily without any coughing. I stayed as long as I could (until I started perspiring), enjoying every breath I took.
Schonbrunn Palace is massive, and the gardens are impressive, even with the statutes covered and the fountains turned off for the winter. The paths were carpeted with leaves, and I spent a couple of hours exploring the grounds. When a cold wind blew in, first it stirred up the leaves and they rained down on everything, and then actual rain came. Everyone abandoned the gardens for the tour of the Palace, which meant massive queues--too much for my patience. Instead, I went back to the Inner Strasse and visited Karlskirche.
Karlskirche has a huge dome, covered in murals, and there is an elevator 35m up to a viewing platform, with stairs from there right into the cupola. The platforms and stairs are made of scaffolding, with warnings about the maximum number of people on each part. But there is no way of knowing how many people are already there,
and not everyone tries to pay attention to the numbers, so that if you try to wait and count, more people will just go up in front of you. It was dizzying, and at times very shaky. My over-active imagination was having a hey-day picturing the whole thing crashing to the ground and me dying in a Baroque church in Vienna. Obviously that didn't happen, and there probably wasn't really any danger of it. Who knows--maybe in the busier tourist season, someone is actually paid to count the number of people visiting the two platforms. Then again, it is Europe, and everything you do is at your own risk, so maybe not.
I slowly made my way back to Stephansplatz to get the U-Bahn to the hostel, past the workers busy getting the streets and squares ready for the Christmas season, with stalls for the markets, and lights like chandeliers hanging over it all. In front of Stephansdom was a group of Mexican Indians. One of them was on a soapbox about something, while the others set up headdresses and banners behind him. I didn't quite figure out what they were on about, although it had something to do
with Hitler, the invasion of Austria in 1938, and the Mexicans. Who knew Mexico had anything to do with that! It was bizarre, but I was enjoying the best 'street dog' I've ever had--bratwurst with cheese in a bun.
Sadly, I didn't make it to any concerts in Vienna. My cough was at its worst here, especially in the evenings. I had no interest in being the person coughing through an entire concert. It is a really good reason to come back to this city some day. The people here are so friendly, and it is such a clean, easy city to visit.
I try to buy a Christmas tree ornament in every country I visit, but nothing really caught my eye in Vienna. Nothing, until I went into the Swarovski store. Anyone who knows me well knows I have a weakness for colour and light and reflections and sparkles, so it shouldn't be any surprise that everything in the shop caught my eye. And so I now have a beautiful Swarovski snowflake to remind me of my brief visit to the beautiful city of Vienna.
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Hello
Great photos! Elegant, colourful, artistic but not overly so - keep it up mate! I loved Vienna, I spent three weeks there visiting a friend, your blog brought back nice memories.