Vienna Fences…

From the sublime...

To the ridiculous...

From up high...

To down low...

Vienna Fences for Friday's Fences.

The Vienna I thought I knew…

So this is the Vienna I thought I would see replete with Hapsburgs on horses and fantastic buildings.

   

We got a nice tour of the Schönbrunn Palace but as is usual with these places, I was not allowed to photograph the inside.  It was lovely though.  You’ll have to take my word for it.  

Then Evan and I went off to the Belvedere to see Klimt’s The Kiss.  Oh, boy!  That was a thrill!  And the Belvedere, which was once the summer palace of Prince Eugene of Savoy, is just beautiful.  After we went through the gallery and saw a few Klimts and other wonderful works of art.  We took a break in the café where I had a slice of Klimt Cake.  They wouldn’t let me take photos of the original but I got a few bites of the reproduction.  

In the Belvedere Gardens.

My Klimt cake.

We took the subway back to Stephansdom and visited St. Stephen’s Cathedral and went on a Catacomb Tour.  The parish of St. Stephen’s dates from the 1100s.  The striking thing about the interior of the building is the solid colored stained glass windows that wash the walls with mottled color.  Just beautiful!  But we found the Catacomb Tour very interesting as we got to see metal containers that held the innards of the old Hapsburgs (their hearts are in silver containers in another location) and bones from many who succumbed to the Plague piled in vaults in the walls.  

Here’s Evan at Schönbrunn Palace doing the royal wave.  I have to give him a lot of credit.  I thought he wasn’t too good with directions but I was wrong.  He can read a map with the best of them and has a way with subway systems that would rival any city dweller.  Had it not been for him, I might have taken a wrong turn somewhere and would be wandering the Russian steppes at this point.  Thanks, Evan!

Floating Down the Danube, Part 2…

Evan and I got on the train in Budapest and about three blissful hours later, we were in Vienna.  You gotta love those European trains!  We checked into our hotel room and cast about for what to do first.  Well, we loved the boat rides in Budapest so much we took the same one twice.  So why not take one in Vienna?

Seems I should have done more homework on Vienna.  Here are a couple of things I didn’t know when we got there that I know now.  Vienna is on the (not so blue) Danube River but it is not oriented to the river like Budapest is.  I’m not sure why, but in Vienna the Danube seems like an afterthought.  Another thing about Vienna that I didn’t know is that it has got to rank up there on the list of the most graffitied cities in the world.  Along the waterfront, the graffiti is nothing short of spectacular.  We learned later that it is not illegal for taggers to tag along the river and so with no holds barred, the river walls are colorful, exciting examples of Street Art.  That is the subject of the blog today.  Later, I will show you the Vienna that I thought I was going to see.

One of the interesting things about travel is meeting people.  On our boat ride in Vienna, we happened upon the delightful Jennifer from near Melbourne, Australia.  Jennifer was taking a seven week trip through Europe at her own pace going where she wanted when she wanted.  Boy, I admire that!  We yakked the whole way up and down the Danube.    Here’s a photo of Jennifer with our waiter who was from South Africa.   Lying in bed this morning, I was thinking that I would like to calculate the number of miles we all had to travel to get to that place at that time, but I’m afraid my math skills are lacking.  But I think it ends up being quite a lot.

By the way, I don't know what's up with  blogger but these white lines seem to be  a permanent fixture on my page.  I am not sure how to turn them black.  And the fonts and spacing seem to have lives of their own all of a sudden.  Oh, well...