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.

A Flea Market and Trekking for Wine - Day Eight

We woke up to a cloudy sky but the rain had stopped. After breakfast at the hotel, we walked to Mariahilfer to find a US adapter. Ours was left in an outlet in Salzburg, but we easily found a small hardware store for a replacement. The price was so reasonable that we bought a backup that will never leave my luggage. We will never be adapter-less again!

After that, we walked down to the flea market next to Naschmarkt which is only on Saturdays. There were tons of people browsing stand after stand of collectables. It was hard to move through the swarms.

Hubs bought an old magazine with neat photos and fashion ads for one euro. I found a spoon with Leopold's Church on it for 5 euro. My official Vienna spoon. I also bought a yellow bag that I liked the writing on for 8 euro. It might have been a Levi's knockoff, since it says "Eevi's" all over it, but I was drawn to it, nonetheless.

As we left the market, it started pouring. We had umbrellas, but it was to the point that we decided to wait it out next to a building huddling under a roof overlay. After the downpour eased, we went in search of a restaurant for lunch. Much to our dismay, all the restaurants in the area that we had flagged were closed for Saturday lunch. So we went back to the hotel to regroup.

We decided to head back out to our next destination, St. Stephen's Cathedral, and find lunch somewhere along the way. We took the subway and got out at the nearest stop to St. Stephen's and ended up eating lunch at Cafe Englander. We had the mittages set lunch for 15.80 euro/per person, which included three courses. First, a cream of asparagus soup that was more butter than anything else.

The main course was roasted pork with root vegetables. The meat was very tender.

Dessert was strawberry ice cream over rhubarb and strawberries with whipped cream. The ice cream tasted of fresh strawberries, but it was so frozen it was hard to eat. We were hungry and the food was good, a lot of it. 2 3-course meals + tip = 35 euro. The mittages menu anywhere is a great deal and should be taken advantage of whenever possible.

After lunch, we walked a couple more blocks to St. Stephen's which was a tourist mess. I've never seen so many active horse carriages in my life. Despite the massive crowds, the church was beautiful. Gothic steeples with yellow and green tiles covering the roof made it truly unique.

Little windows dotted through the tiles every now and again. I wonder if the nuns live up there.

Down the street was Graben, also swarming with people on a warm Saturday afternoon. It was a large, white plaza with a golden fountain surrounded by large stores. It felt a little like the Water Tower on Michigan Avenue, just larger and a lot more people.

In the area, we waited in a long line at Eis Greissler for ice cream. But don't be too intimidated by the line, it moves fast.

Hubs had caramel, which he liked, but was too sweet for me. I had graumohn (not as sweet as the mohn I had in Hallstatt) and butter-something, which was amazing. It reminded me of real cake batter, not the artificial, overly sweet cake batter flavor that cake batter ice cream/fro-yo usually has. It was so good. 3 scoops = 3.80 euro.

Onward to Heiligen Kreuzerhof, the oldest apartment block in Vienna. It was in a quiet neighborhood, just far enough away from St. Stephen's and Graben. Lots of cute restaurants nearby.

I wanted to get some journaling done, so we went to Kleines and had a verlangerter.

Kleines was another location in BEFORE SUNRISE, the cafe where Ethan and Julie were sitting outside and the gypsy woman approached them.

But we weren't outside because all the tables were full on this gorgeous day. But the inside wasn't too shabby.

I didn't get much writing done because we wanted to get to Sirbu, a heuriger at the edge of the city. It was later than we thought.

Getting to Sirbu involves a long tram ride on the D Line, but it's fun because you get to see many parts of the city that you otherwise wouldn't if you're only staying for a few days like we were. We got out at the last stop and started up the hill.

Heurigen are wineries located within the Vienna city limits. They serve their own wines and many of them also serve food. We were drawn to Sirbu because it was on a hill overlooking the city. However, it was a much longer/harder hike than I thought it would be. It wouldn't have been so bad if we could've taken our time, but we were racing the setting sun. We wanted to see the Vienna views from the top of the hill before it got dark.

That meant we literally had to run. We were pretty sweaty by the time we got up there. We did have some beautiful views on the way up overlooking the city from the vineyards.

When the sun set we were cold, so another layer would've been useful. But as the city lights turned on and we sipped our wine, it was all worth it. Leopold's Church, the church on my spoon, sat on the hill next to us.

Another angle from our picnic table.

On the way back down the hill, we could see the ferris wheel among the city lights.

The hike down was much easier and we could take our time. The quiet suburban streets were a nice change of pace and I enjoyed seeing different styles of apartments and houses. The architecture was much more modern and casual than in the heart of Vienna.

Romantic Phone Conversations and Scootering as a Water Sport - Day Seven

Goodbye, Salzburg, and your fortress that overlooks every angle of the city. I loved the time we spent here, but Salzburg didn't feel entirely unique to me. More like a little Bruges meets Brussels with a little Paris thrown in. Not that that's a bad thing, it's just not a place I feel I need to go back to.

We took the #1 bus to the train station, but somewhere en route it turned into a #4 bus. Ah, language barriers. We ended up going pretty far out of the way and turning around before we realized what was going on and could get off at a stop to change buses. But we made it eventually.

After buying our tickets to Vienna, we went into the Spar at the station and bought pre-made pimiento and cheese and salami and cheese sandwiches for lunch on the train. Spar was a good friend to us on the trip. The stores were always conveniently located, and their pre made stuff was always pretty fresh, as if it had been made earlier that day rather than the week before. I also bought a macaroni salad with spicy chicken that didn't fail me.

We ended up on Jet Rail train, which was more of a high speed train than the local trains we'd been used to. 2 tickets = 108 euros. More expensive, but faster, and more comfortable seats.

When we left the train station in Vienna, we walked out onto Mariahilfer Stausse, a busy shopping street filled with a lot of familiar stores. The shopping, combined with the architecture, reminded me of San Francisco, and I was a little worried I wasn't going to like Vienna as much as I hoped. Not that I don't like San Francisco, but you don't go to Vienna to feel like San Francisco.

My fears were quickly eased as we turned off the bustling street and headed down some quiet, more residential streets towards our hotel. Everything started to feel much more Parisian and I breathed a sigh of relief.

Pension Kraml, the hotel we stayed at in Vienna, ended up being the perfect base camp. I would stay there again in a hot minute and recommend it to anyone going to Vienna. It was close to the subway, walking distance to Mariahilfer, the train station (15 min. walk), St. Charles Church, and the Naschmarkt, which you will be eating at if you go to Vienna. It was also a ten minute walk to a laundromat, which we were in desperate need of. The beautiful room was spacious with high ceilings.

There was no TV or wi-fi in the room, if that sort of thing concerns you. There is a separate TV/game room on the ground floor if you need wi-fi. Pension Kraml is popular and there aren't many rooms with private bathrooms. We ended up only able to get a room with a private shower, no toilet. But there were two bathrooms on our floor, and I don't think I even saw anyone else in the bathroom during our entire trip. So don't let the shared bathroom thing scare you (we were a little nervous). There are enough toilets to go around.

This place was a bargain at 66 euro/night. And that included breakfast in their adorable, cozy breakfast room. I don't think there's a better deal in Vienna, and the same man was there everyday, it's clearly family run. Okay, enough about the hotel. Obviously, I was excited and blessed to have found this perfect place. It doesn't always happen.

And now...Vienna!

After checking in, we needed a pick me up. Time for some famous Viennese coffee. We had made a list of potential coffee shops to visit, figuring if we were were in the neighborhood and in the mood for coffee, we'd stop in. The one on the way to the St. Charles Church happened to be Cafe Sperl.

Ah, just look at it. Above was the view from my seat. It's so beautiful. I did some journaling here. How could I not? If I lived in Vienna, I would be a regular here. The perfect place to read and write. And so romantic.

This is where they shot the scene in BEFORE SUNRISE where Ethan and Julie are having pretend phone conversations with their loved ones describing each other. I love that movie. I love the sequel even more.

Oh, yeah, and there's coffee. And it isn't an afterthought. It's damn good.

Even a non-coffee drinker couldn't resist this. Rested and caffeinated, we walked over to the St. Charles Church and sat at the pond in front of it, admiring its beauty, its reflection in the near-smooth water.

Kids were scootering around the shallow rim of the pond and managing to stay mostly dry, whizzing right by us.

Another little girl was wading in the pond, picking anything that might be of value from the bottom.

After the church, we were hungry. Eating is not cheap in Vienna. We walked around near St. Charles trying to look for something appetizing at the right price and weren't finding anything. We ended up back at Naschmarkt, which is an awesome market filled with stall after stall of food vendors. Some are more full-fledged restaurants than others. But whatever you're hungry for, and whatever your price point, there is a stall for you. We walked around for a bit. I think I was too hungry, to the point where I was just crabby and nothing looked good, when at any other time everything we passed would have looked amazing. That's always the worst time to be trying to find food. Poor Hubs.

A Mediterranean restaurant named Neni was hopping. There was one open table, so we took it. Honestly, I wasn't sure about my choice at first. It looked newer and brighter than many of the other restaurants with its turquoise walls and light wood, I thought the food might be lacking and it was packed because of the fun atmosphere and rainy weather. Um, no. How about some amazing hummus with mushrooms and cumin sauce?

I am picky, picky, picky about hummus. My neighborhood Mediterranean restaurant, Carnival, has the most amazing hummus and it's cheap, cheap, cheap. I can't eat anything else when it comes to hummus, but Hubs wanted hummus and I obliged. Lucky for me, it was awesome. Perfectly balanced, not too garlicky, not too lemony. And the mushrooms were divine with the cumin sauce, and I'm normally not a cumin fan. I love being pleasantly surprised. The rest of our meal was good, too. We had sweet potato loaves, which were like a sweet potato falafel over a well dressed salad. Delicious.

And, lastly, we had fried chicken and fries.

The fries were really good. The chicken was nothing special but it became a good hummus delivery system when we ran out of bread. Add in two Ottakringer Rots and we finished off our much-better-than-expected meal. 2 beers + hummus + sweet potato loaves + chicken and fries + tip = 35 euros.

We've since tried a mushroom hummus from our beloved Carnival. It wasn't as good as Neni's. Something special in that cumin sauce. I tried to make something like it myself, but it can't be replicated. At least not by someone with my cooking talent.

After dinner, we walked back to our hotel and it began to rain and continued to pour all night.