Prague Is Magic - Day Twelve

Goodbye, Vienna. The city where there is something beautiful everywhere you look.

We had to do laundry, so we'd gotten up at 7am and hauled our clothes in our suitcases to the nearest laundromat, a few block away from the hotel, less than a ten minute walk. For the washing machine setting we selected "normalwasche" thinking it would be a typical half hour cycle. But we noticed a timer on the machine was counting down from 120 minutes. So, you've been warned. "Normalwasche" was a two hour cycle for us. I don't know how long the other settings would have been. We did laundry in Italy that was comparable to our American machines, so I don't know.

Realizing that we would be spending much more time than anticipated on laundry, we went back to the hotel and ate breakfast. We ate our last Viennese meal in the cheery breakfast room at Pension Kraml. This is what my typical breakfast plate looked like.

My kind of breakfast. I usually had coffee, too.

After breakfast, Hubs went back to the laundromat and swapped everything to the dryer while I got ready and packed. Then we checked out of the hotel and went back to the laundromat where we had to run the dryer an extra time to get everything dry. Leave yourself an entire morning to do laundry in Vienna.

We boarded the 12:30 pm train to Prague, loading up on sandwiches from Spar for the ride. Tickets were 65 euro each and the trip was just under five hours. After arriving at the train station, we got on the subway and transferred to another line, and got off to find our hotel. The subway escalators are the longest, steepest, and fastest I've ever been on.

Aparthotel City 5 was a short block away from the subway, extremely convenient. When we entered the warm lobby, we were greeted by Crisitna, the friendliest woman in Prague. She directed us to sit in the kitschy breakfast room, made us a cappuccino, and laid out a giant map of Prague in front of us. She marked entire routes for potential walking tours and highlighted all of the main sites that we should see during our visit and informed us of visiting attractions. She also lent us a Rick Steves guidebook.

Cristina asked us what our favorite European city was. Hubs and I exchanged a look and agreed on Paris. She scoffed at us, in a fun, friendly way and replied, "Prague is magic."

Cristina clearly adores the city she lives in, and her enthusiasm gave us more energy for the evening. We went next door and ate dinner at The Thirsty Deer, since it was the most convenient option and we were starving. Fortunately, the food didn't feel convenient at all. I had venison goulash, which was so rich and so good.

Hubs had spicy pork strips which ended up being a stir fry with a rich sauce.

Both meals were really good. We also each had a huge mug of Staropramen non-filtered.

The Staropramen brewery is directly behind the hotel, so many Prague eateries serve Staropramen, but there are a few different varieties of the beer. The non-filtered is the best. So, so good. One of my favorite beers in the world.

2 large beers + 2 entrees + tip = 500 Kr. At the time of our trip, 20 Kr = $1.

Completely stuffed, unable to finish all the delicious food, we followed the Vltava River up to the St. Charles Bridge. It was a 20-30 min. walk to the bridge from the hotel.

Every angle seemed to present a different, spectacular view of the palace and cathedral overlooking the city.

It was breathtaking.

And insanely romantic.

The Charles Bridge wasn't overcrowded at night.

The bridge offered yet another view of the castle and palace.

Maybe Prague is magic.

Illegal Photography and a Night at the Opera - Day Eleven

I consider myself to be a humble, law abiding citizen most of the time. I try to stick to 5 mph over the speed limit (10-15 on the freeway, which is usually impossible) and I don't litter. But when we went to The Spanish Riding School at the Imperial Palace, I broke the rules.

Inside, photography was strictly banned. Announcements kept running over the intercom asking us to respect the performing horses. I get it, flash photography is distracting to both humans and horses, and it could easily become an Olympic Stadium during the opening ceremonies in there on a cloudy day. But it wasn't a cloudy day, and I know how to turn my flash off. So boom. There are a couple guards there whose sole purpose is to catch people taking photographs and scold them. Since these men have a large area to patrol it's fairly easy to avoid them.

My photos aren't great, since I was trying to hide my camera while taking them, but I mostly wanted photos of the beautiful facility. It's looks like grand dining hall, strewn with chandeliers, but instead of tables there was a dirt floor.

The Lipizzaners were so beautiful. Some were completely white, some still had hints of grey, and others were completely dappled, still in their youth. The evening shows with the horses were expensive, so we chose the cheaper alternative, to see a warm-up session in the morning. The session lasted for 10am-12:30pm and you could come and go as you please. The seats are a little sparse, but if you're willing to wait it out, you will get a seat. I think we arrived around 10:30, and decided that arriving at 11:30 would've been perfect. By then, many people had cleared out, there were lots of open seats, and an hour is enough time to get your fill of the Lipizzaners.

This young one was being taught how to trot in place.

The exercise session had about 5 horses in the stadium at a time. The riders wore dress coats and gave the horses a good workout for a half hour, practicing dressage moves while classical music played. After the half hour, they would line up, dismount, and the next group of horses and riders would enter.

If you're expecting the fancy moves that they advertise the shows with, leaping through the air and rearing up and such, you will be disappointed. They save that for the show. This is just warming up, seeing skilled riders giving the horses a good work, being able to see the beautiful stadium, and admiring the gorgeous animals. The tickets were 14 euro each and it was money well spent.

After at the Spanish Riding School, we walked up the street for lunch at Esterhazykeller. This restaurant was cozy, and we wound around a couple corners before sitting at our table. We ordered the mittagsmenu which started with soup, a broth with sliced "noodles" that were more like crepes. It was interesting and tasted good. The main course was a hot dog type sausage that had been perfectly deep fried for a crisp outer layer and was served with creamed vegetables and fried potato disks.

It was a good meal for a great price. 2 soups + 2 entrees + 2 waters + tip = 17 euro. For dessert, we had a coffee at Cafe Griensteidl, right across from the Spanish Riding School. Marble tables, burgundy upholstery, and lots of natural light filled this lovely cafe. Another great place to write. I had a verlangerten and Hubs had an einspanner.

It was a glorious bright day with fluffy clouds patching the sky.

We walked back to Spittelberg to check out the jewelry stores I'd eyed on Sunday.

I ended up buying an amazing red leather cuff at Atelier Jan.

I feel like Wonder Woman when I wear it and love that it can be dressed up or down. The cuff was handmade by Tamara Brabenec, she has created all sorts of interesting leather jewelry available in the shop. Her husband, Jan, makes all the leather wall art.

Artist Initials

If you're looking for a unique piece of art or jewelry for a souvenir, definitely check this place out.

My cuff was 25 euro, completely reasonable.

After my souvenir, we walked back up past the opera house. It was 4pm and people were already waiting in line for standing tickets, but the line wasn't long. Yes, we were cautious after being bitten yesterday, but waiting for three hours seemed excessive. So we stuck with our plan to get more ice cream at Eis Greissler. I got a double scoop of butterkeks, one of the best flavors of ice cream I've every had. It translates to "shortbread" which doesn't do the flavor justice. Vanilla, cakey, with chunks of chocolate wafer cookies. Amazing.

We snapped a couple photos of Graben since the sun wasn't as harsh in the late afternoon as it was our first visit. And then we walked back to The State Opera House. So here's the deal. The standing room tickets are off of Operngasse under the colonnade. There were about 30 people waiting in front of us when we arrived at 4:45 pm (the show started at 7:00 pm). There are three kinds of standing room tickets. The "Parterre" tickets are 4 euro each and are directly behind the orchestra section seating on the ground floor. "Balcon" tickets are in the balcony on the side and "Galeria" are in the center, but they are even higher up. Both are 3 euro.

We were seeing ANDRE CHENIER and since we had never heard of this Giordano opera, we thought we had a good chance of getting the Parterre tickets. A little after 5:30, tickets went on sale. After purchasing our Parterre tickets, we lined up inside the opera house and waited near the staircase that led up to where the Parterre section was. After waiting for another half hour, we were allowed inside.

Filing in, we were instructed to hang something on the bar in front of us to save our spot. So bring a scarf or coat that you don't mind parting with, and then you're free to wander. We took some photos of the stage and balconies from our view. The standing room patrons were the only people in the auditorium. The admission price is worth it just to see the opera house. We wandered out to the lobby and took more photos.

Clearly, our view for the actual Opera was phenomenal. We stood just behind tickets that cost hundreds of euros. We could see perfectly, the acoustics were great and we even had little monitors on the support bar in front of us that translated into English. The performers were great. The story itself wasn't the greatest, but the voices behind the characters were full of bravado, and the music was beautiful.

One of the performers was feeling under the weather. Just before the performance continued after the intermission, a man walked onto the stage and announced that the performer was sick, apologized, and asked for the audience to bear with him. The actor sounded just fine and was uproariously applauded during every song for the rest of the show. A ruse, perhaps?

There were two intermissions, which were welcomed. It was a long time to stand and our legs and lower back were stiffening. It would've been nice to take a stroll outside, but it had started pouring right after the show began and didn't let up. In the end, it actually worked out better to miss CARMEN. It would have been impossible to be outdoors at a heurigen in that weather.

During the intermissions, we chatted with a middle-aged couple who were halfway through a six-month biking excursion through France, Austria, the Czech Republic, and then up through Denmark and ending in Amsterdam. They're going to be grandparents a few months after their trip ends, and it was inspiring to see an older couple doing such rigorous, physical traveling.

We had walked by a cute restaurant named Spekh on Sunday and decided to get a drink there after the opera, whichever night that would be. The night had come, the opera was over, the rain had lightened, and we were there. Unfortunately, the kitchen closed early and the only food available was the Oriental Plate, a moderate-sized plate with a dolma, hummus, caponata, tzatziki, and roasted vegetables. They also gave us a large bread bowl which we completely went to town on and combined to become the perfect amount of food. We finished our beer and went back out into the rain.

I'm so grateful the opera ended up working out. It was a truly unique Vienna experience. And the rain held off all day for us. It was pretty much a perfect last full day in Austria.

Marie Antoinette Had a Rough Life - Day Ten

No, I doubt her death was very pleasant, but Marie Antoinette did live a blessed life, at least when it came to housing. After breakfast we took the subway to Schobrunn Palace, Marie Antoinette's childhood home. The Palace was actually designed by Maria Theresa, Marie Antoinette's mother.

As you can see, the Palace was beautiful. We couldn't take photos of the interior, but the decor seemed authentic and, though opulent, gave me a sense of what it must have been like to actually live in the estate. There are different options for the rooms you can see. We paid the less expensive 11.50/person to see 25 rooms and felt as though we'd seen plenty. The grounds are free, but seeing the inside of the palace is definitely worth the price of admission. It's always fun to pretend to be royalty for an hour.

The most interesting thing I learned was that Maria Theresa had a favorite daughter named Maria Sophie and she was the only daughter who was allowed to marry for love and not political/diplomatic reasons. I guess if you were a rich young lady back then it was important to be momma's favorite. Yikes.

The grounds are quite beautiful.

Palaced-out, we went back to the hotel to change clothes, thinking we would attend the opera later in the day. We took the subway, getting off near the opera house and ate lunch at Zwoelf Apostellkeller. It was touristy, but so cozy inside. Just look at that ceiling. We were definitely transported back a few centuries.

And the food was good, too.

We shared an Apostel meat plate and cheese plate, and it was too much food for us.

Meat and cheese plate + bread + water + tip = 27 euro.

Stuffed, we walked to Cafe Alt Wien to have a coffee. The smoking room was the cutest, every inch covered with stickers and posters, but it was filled with smokers and I didn't want to reek at the opera later. So we sat in the larger room in the back. It also had a good atmosphere, with lots of posters of upcoming music shows covering the walls and some strange art. I liked this piece with the chair coming out of it.

I ordered something with "chocolade" and thought it would have coffee in it as well, but it was just a hot chocolate.

Hubs finally got his kleiner brauer which was espresso so strong you could taste the roast on the beans. I loved it, my kind of coffee.

Continuing with my misguided ordering, we stopped for gelato at Zanoni & Zanoni and ordered "melange." I thought the brown bits were pecans and was expecting butter pecan (my favorite), but they were raisins and, of course, I was stuck with rum raisin (far from my favorite). A scoop of mohn softened the blow, though. That mohn scoop was good, sweeter than Eis Greissler's. And at least the mohn was on the bottom, so after I got through the gross rum raisin, all was good. Much better than the other way around, that would've been a disaster. These details are important.

Reluctantly licking away at the rum raisin, we walked up the street to the State Opera House. CARMEN was starting at 6:30. I'd read about the standing room tickets at the State Opera House and knew that you had to get in line early. I also knew that there are over 300 made available every night and they never sell out. We weren't worried about having the best view, we just wanted to experience the opera house affordably. Being up in the rafters was just fine. We walked through the line and five people ahead of us, they sold out. An old man lurking about offered to sell us those same 4 euro tickets for 25 euro each. We thought about it for a bit, longer than he would have liked. It was CARMEN, after all. But the whole point of standing is that the tickets are cheap, and spending 50 euro on the opera wasn't in our budget. And we still had one more night in Vienna, so we still had another chance, though not with CARMEN.

So, much like Don Jose, we said goodbye to CARMEN. I was annoyed at all the scalpers who I felt had stolen our seats. I was mad at myself for trusting the internet and not getting there earlier. I was just pissed. The State Opera House has an even cheaper way to see the opera if you don't want to stand inside. There is a screen and benches where the opera is played live every night during a performance. This also involves arriving very early if you want a seat. There weren't any benches left, but we decided to sit and watch the opening of the show on the ground, since there was still one mat open. I needed a few more minutes of pity party before we moved on.

We had been planning on going out to Nussdorf to Schubel-Auer Heuriger the next night, but quickly flip-flopped our plans and climbed on the trusty tram. Unfortunately, Schubel-Auer is closed on Sun. and Mon., so we went to Mayer instead. The patio was lovely with vine-like trees growing over our heads. An accordion player serenaded the patrons.

We had a glass of red and white and shared an order of spargel (asparagus) cordon bleu which was a perfect small meal for us. Spargel, spargel everywhere in the springtime.

Small spargel cordon bleu + 4 glasses of wine + tip = 25 euro.

We took the tram back to central Vienna, about a 20 minute ride, and got back just in time to see the end of CARMEN at the State Opera House. The building is always beautiful, but it is glorious at night.

I was in a better mood. The bitterness was mostly gone, and I snapped a couple photos of the screen setup outside the opera house.

After Carmen's demise, we went back to Zanoni & Zanoni for another scoop of gelato. Earlier Hubs had gotten a scoop of biscotto and it was amazing and I wanted a scoop of my own. It was vacation. Sometimes you eat gelato twice a day even if you're not in Italy.

With our biscotto cones, we walked around the National Palace at night and Hubs took some photos. The empty streets were a quiet, more mysterious Vienna than we'd been used to. I'm glad I got to see this version of Vienna, if only for an hour.

A Cemetery, a Ferris Wheel, and How to Get Eaten by a Cat - Day Nine

Today we took the tram out to the Central Cemetery. It was a huge place and we only saw a very small percentage of it, but we were there long enough to take a stroll and see what we came for, the composers' monuments.

In the middle of the cemetery were monuments for Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Strauss, Brahms and probably many others that I've forgotten, or was unaware of. All of them were beautiful and striking and all in the same small section at the edge of a main road. Here are a few.

We browsed and photographed. There wasn't a huge crowd at the Mozart monument, but it was hard to get a photo without a person in it.

In contrast, the rest of the huge cemetery was empty. Visitors just come for the composers and leave, and that's basically what we did, as well. Near the composers' monuments, we stopped in the church. It was either new or had recently gotten a facelift. I've never been in a church with a dome that felt new, so this was a little surreal. I loved the bright blue in the ceiling.

From there, we walked down a long, shady road so we could leave the cemetery from the opposite end that we had entered, giving us a better overall feel of the place. The wind blew through the grassy fields bordering the graves. It was a beautiful place.

When we reached the other end, we waited for the next tram and went back to central Vienna. I mentioned it before, but I loved taking the tram in Vienna and seeing all the different parts of the city. As a tourist, it's the best way to see all the sites, cover a lot of ground and still be able to have a good view of everything while saving your feet.

We took the subway to Hundert Wasser House, an apartment building painted in wavy blues and oranges.

It felt like something Gaudi might have built. From every angle I stood, I noticed something different. A new paint color. A small window. The serene garden in the center.

I wonder what it would be like to live there.

Probably noisy.

For lunch, we went to Kuchldragoner. To be honest, the food was forgettable. But I highly recommend it for affordability and it's wonderful atmosphere. Take a seat outside, and you are in the most peaceful little square, completely tucked away. It was the most picturesque restaurant setting of the trip. It felt like a secret. The only foot traffic was people trying to check out the quaint, very old church right next to the restaurant.

Have a beer or two, maybe some snacks. It's the perfect place to chill out for an hour. 2 entrees + 2 large beers + tip < 35 euros.

After lunch, we rode the tram to Spittelberg to visit the cute, baroque streets. Besides the walk up and down the streets there's not much going on there, but they are pretty. We were also there on a Sunday so it was very quiet and all the shops were closed, which made me sad. I saw some promising looking jewelry stores, so I think we'll have to squeeze a trip back in during the week when they're open.

In Spittelberg, we decided to try a modern coffeehouse for a change of pace. Das Mobel was a cool space with modern wood furniture and light fixtures of wire and paper dangling from the ceiling. Everything inside was for sale. I loved the table we sat at. You could see all the natural markings in the wood.

To drink, I wanted something sweet and not coffee and accidentally ordered chamomile tea. "Kamille." Yeah, it kind of makes sense after the mug of tea arrives at your table. Hubs tried to order a coffee and somehow got a terrible fruity beer. So while the setting was good, our German ordering was a bust. Language barrier fail.

We took the subway to Prater Park to see the old ferris wheel, the Wiener Riesenrave.

The cars were large and red, almost like small train cars. The park was filled with picnics and playing children.

Prater Park has an elaborate carnival. This girl on the pony rides was the happiest person I've ever seen in my life. Every time she went around, her smile kept getting bigger and bigger.

Right next to the ferris wheel was a rickety old roller coaster. It's one of those rides that doesn't seem bad in theory, a ride that your friend would coax you to go on despite your better judgment. It's just a throwback to your childhood, you think. But as soon and it creaks and bumps to the top and you start the rocky decent, you know you've made a terrible mistake and your neck is going to be sore for a week. It was loud and screechy, everyone in the cars over fifteen had a pained expression on their face. They were also eaten by a cat.

Soon after, the sky opened up and we ran to the bumper cars for shelter, not having an umbrella. When the rain let up, we hustled back to the subway, to the hotel, and changed clothes for a night out at Gurtel, a group of clubs underneath the subway tracks.

THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE BOSNA DOG IN THE NIGHTTIME

On the way to the clubs, I ate another Bosna dog. It was gigantic, and I couldn't finish it. As soon as we got to Gurtelbrau, the cute bar we decided to have our first drink at, I felt really ill all of a sudden. The warmth and candlelight was making me dizzy. I tried to fight it. I drank water and we moved outside to a table in the cool night air, but nothing was working.

After dashing to the bathroom and expelling every ounce of the Bosna dog from my system, I felt better. I tried to be a trooper. I had a couple sips of my beer, but a sheet of exhaustion settled over me and I couldn't kick it off. So our romantic evening out was cut short by a damn hot dog. But I was lucky, I had no other side effects and I felt perfectly normal when I woke up in the morning. And would this ever make me think twice about eating street food? Hell no! This was just a little bad luck, nothing more.

It's okay, Bosna dog. I forgive you.