It means nothing to me...Oh Vienna!!!

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Ok I should be embarrassed by the blog title I know but you can't blame me... it had to be done. I've always wanted to visit Vienna and finally made it by a long train journey from Munich. A well air conditioned, comfortable train journey didn't prepare me for the wall of heat that hit me the minute I stepped off the train. The heat was so intense that it literally took my breath away. I got a taxi to my hotel and had the strangest conversation with the driver. Rather than be the welcoming face of Austrian tourism he started on this made onslaught about how I have to be careful in Vienna as there are tons of pick pockets, con artists and other criminals and they are all from Eastern Europe, South America and various Arab countries. He clearly wasn't the spokesperson for immigration and made me wonder what the hell city I had come to. I dumped my stuff at the hotel and then negotiated a local bus which took me to the Opera building. My first sight of classical Vienna as I expected it...stunning building. I was able to pick up the hop on hop off tourist bus here and planned on using this to give me a good overall view of the city and what to look at in more detail. Vienna itself is everything I wanted it to be and more. So many stunning palaces, monuments and churches. I did a full lap of the bus route and from there I got off and began walking the same route so I could see things closer. The main art gallery and Natural history museum are my absolute favourite buildings, grand and opulent with beautiful fountains in front, and we all know how much I love a good fountain. What I find odd about Vienna is that normally a city is built up around the river, and particularly one as famous as the Danube. However, the river is split off into a canal, a separate arm of the Danube to control flooding and then the main river itself and it’s away from most of the main centre…still grand though. The next day was a full on, heading to the Schonbrunn palace which is simply magnificent and then the arsenal and war museum and finally the beautiful Belvedere palace, smaller than Schonbrunn but more beautiful. I met some of the nicest people here, apart from the taxi driver. In a café the campest waiter in the city served me and was so good at English that he spent his break sat at my table having a chat and gave me a free drink and piece of cake…bless, he was melting in the heat and was so over dramatic about it. I love how many of the main roads end in the world ‘ring’ and was amused by a metro going to, ‘simmering’…is that as opposed to boiling? I secretly wanted someone to have done some graffiti and changed a street name to ‘fingering’. Alas…no. Oh yes and a popular café chain is called, ‘anker’….. Oh they are just asking for the letter W being added aren’t they?

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