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Published: March 1st 2014
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A week ago i was writing from the snowy village of Lech in Austria. A lot has changed in a week, with us leaving Lech to visit Vienna and then onto Hungary.
We had a day off skiing on Saturday and decided to get the bus to St Anton's to see what the village was like. We ended up just strolling through the village and then having lunch at a tiny bakery where Matt said he had the best coffee so far (which is a huge thing for him now that he's addicted to coffee...) St Anton is much bigger than Lech but also much lower so the snow isn't as good. I don't think I would go there to ski, would probably stay in Zurs if we ever go back.
Our visit to Lech ended with a couple of days of skiing what's known as the "White Ring" which is a 22km map of runs that leads the skier from Lech to Zurs to Zug to Oberlech and back to Lech. We didn't end up doing the connection to Zug but did all 22km of runs in the end. The White Ring is an annual downhill skiing race
but is also know as one of the best sight seeing tours and it certainly did not disappoint! It starts with this highway of snow with mountains all around and breath taking views. It then opens up to views of the village Zurs. These two days of skiing were better than the first two in terms of views, quality of runs and enjoyment! We also had lunch at a restaurant u the mountain that had panoramic views all around - just spectacular!
As you come to the runs into Zurs there was what was called a BMW Drive Lounge which was a couple of BMW seats in a chair lift set in the side of the mountain with breath taking views. The seats were heated with music and we sat and enjoyed the view for a while. We also took some photos that linked to our lift pass - so were able to have a photo together for once!
We left Lech at 6am in the dark on Tuesday to get a train from Langen Am Arlberg to Vienna. The train took all morning with us arriving at 12:30pm. We found our beautiful hotel, Hotel Capri quite easily
on the metro which is clean and easy and then set off to walk around the city.
Vienna felt very similar to us to somewhere like Turin - it wasn't overly touristy and didn't have lots of people trying to scam us but still had that European City feel. We went to St Stephens church and viewed the catacombs underneath the church, where there are not only tombs for their special religious members, but also mass graves from the 1700s where bones are just stacked one on top of the other.
We went to a restaurant that evening called 3/4 Takt which was a recommendation from the concierge. Matt had what he is now calling the best beer ever - better than his favourite beers in Australia - which was on tap. He also had a Wiener schnitzel the size of his dinner plate. The schnitzel was so big the sides came separately... I had the breaded cod and ended up with a similar situation, four pieces of fish and sides separate. It was a fantastic place for our Austrian experience! The weirdest thing for us is that everyone smokes over here, so restaurants have smoking areas... Seems
so backward to us!
On our second day in Vienna we went over to the Belvedere which was one of the palaces but now houses museum and art. We went for one specific reason, and that was Gustav Klimt. I don't think Matt is any wiser - he thought "The Kiss" was nice but didn't see what was so exciting about it. I, on the other hand, have loved this painting for a long time so couldn't wait to see it. For me, it's as exciting as most people get when they see the Mona Lisa. And let me tell you, this painting is way mitt impressive than the Mona Lisa! It's displayed on a black wall and in a black frame, which only makes the gold more stunning. Definitely been the highlight of my Viennese trip!
That evening we went to a place called Zinas which was like a taste of the mediterranean with a very quirky menu - rather than pastas etc, she had a bunch of smaller options you could mix and match, or a number of random mains. Everything was served on wooden bread boards with home made chips and side dips that were
very different! It turned out to be a wonderful choice for under and somewhere we could see on King St.
On our last day we went to the Schonnbrun which was the palace for the emperors and has acres and acres of gardens around it. This palace was an excellent day trip as it gave us some insight into Austrian history which we never learnt about before. We certainly didn't know that they still had emperors well into the 20th century! It was also quite exquisite as the rooms are all restored so in each room we were given an understanding of what the room was for. We even learnt that the Emperor liked to eat Wiener schnitzel and kaiserschmarrn! After we had a look around the gardens we returned to get the 4pm train to Budapest.
On another note - we've been trying the mcflurries in each city, something we did last time and determined that Switzerland had the best version. So far Switzerland is still ahead - Austrian mcflurries don't rate!
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