Euro Trip : Day 6 & 7 (Austria – Vienna )
Having enjoyed the Hallstatt Ice caves, we embarked on our journey to ‘The capital of Austria’ - Vienna. We had planned to have relaxing 2 days in the city of music. As usual, the drive through Austrian countryside was amazing. While it was a sad realization that we were travelling away from the enchanting Alps, we were looking forward to experience the architectural grandeur of Vienna. Soon after we reached Vienna, we crashed at our Airbnb place for a few hours to recharge ourselves from the travel exhaustion. We had a quick chat with our Airbnb host gave us some local’s tips on the local attractions and going around the city. Vienna is renowned for its museums, palaces, music halls and cafes. So we decided to explore Vienna a bit differently than other places. We left our car at the Airbnb and headed out by public transport and walk. A quick ride on the local train took us to the city centre. We aimlessly roamed around the city where Mozart and Beethoven once performed, walked across the Danube canal, took some stunning photographs, had a tasty dinner at a local Greek restaurant and headed back to our den late in the night.
A significant inflow of calls from friends and family kept me busy around midnight. Yes, you guessed it right, it was my birthday!! No idea when I dozed off to sleep, I still woke up early since I was super excited to be exploring a new place on my birthday and not be working like the previous years. Yesterday’s aimless exploration had made us realize that there is so much history in Vienna and covering the entire place on our own in a single day was almost impossible. We wanted to experience the local attractions and food and we were also very keen on learning about the history of Vienna. A practical solution in such cases is: the hop-on-hop-off buses. We booked the tickets for the very famous Big Bus tours of Vienna. It included 2 routes, audio commentary for almost every other place of interest the bus passed by, free Wi-Fi onboard and a small walking tour around an hour and half long.
We took the Red route first. The tickets were stamped, headphones and guidebooks were handed over to us and we boarded the double decker bus and were glued to our own window seats. Majority of the places on this route were museums and on a short trip like this, it is not practically possible to visit each one of it. So we continued to listen to the audio guide carefully while clicking some pictures from the interesting vantage points of our bus windows. The places we passed through were Opera house -> House of Music -> Museums Quartier -> Museums/Hofburg -> City Hall -> Votivkirche -> Augarten -> Prater -> Pier 3 -> Blue Danube Cruises and Danube tower -> Old Danube-> UNO CITY / DC Tower -> Danube Island -> Danube, Canal -> Stadtpark.
Vienna is a place that was heavily destroyed during the World War II. Considering how it was back then, it has undergone a massive reconstruction. Every museum here carried its own grace and unique character with its own numerous stories to tell. Albertina which is located in the heart of the city houses the arts from the world and it was a private Habsburg residence. Hofburg is a fabulous palace that houses many museums. It was rebuilt multiple times and now houses the imperial treasury. Another amazing master piece was the oldest court of Vienna ‘Votivkirche’. This church was under repair when we visited since it needed regular maintenance since it was built with sandstone in 1879. Augarten was a beautiful 125-acre, oldest baroque park and houses many beautiful buildings. Danube River has been an important means of transportation for Austrians forever 2000 years. The Danube rivers originates at Germany’s Black Forest and flows through Germany, Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Romania. Danube canal was created in 19th century for flood control. It is called as Little Danube and flows past the Old city. With 252 mts tall Donauturm tower is one among the 100 tallest towers in the world. It is a viewing tower which offers unforgettable 360 degree panoramic view of the city. The constant information in the audio commentary was too much overwhelming at some point of time. So we decided to step out and take the walking tour at 11.30am.
At 11.30 sharp we met our guide Charles at the Opera and were all set to explore the pages of a fairy tale. Charles took us around the most important historical parts of the city and explained to us the charming aspects of the beautiful buildings around. This city has a mixture of both Gothic and Baroque architectures built during the reign of different kings. There are a few highlights which actually are still fresh in my memory and one of it is the story of Maria Theresa. Maria Theresa was a renowned and perhaps the only female ruler in House of Hofsburg who ruled the Holy Roman Empire for around 40 years. She was a revolutionary of a unique kind who reformed institutional, financial & educational scene of Austria while promoting commerce and the development of agriculture, and reorganized Austria's ever-so-weakening military. This revamped Austria’s international stand which if we retrospect now, was very vital to how the whole European and also global history plays out. She gave birth to 16 children, of which 10 who survived to adulthood were strategically married by her to keep the Austrian empire secure. Back to the architecture, the intricate stone work and the grandiose view everywhere on the roof of the city will definitely leave you mesmerized. The Spanish riding school makes it a UNESCO world heritage site.
As we all know, Vienna is also called as the ‘City of Music’ and it houses number of opera houses and theatres. It has played host to many great composers like Mozart and Beethoven. The most famous theatres are Burgtheater, Akademietheater and Volkstheater. There are many opera houses which host concerts aimed at tourists to feature the classical Viennese music. We visited Hofburg Palace and its vast open courtyards that further lead to Austrian Parliament buildings and some large statues and monuments dedicated to renowned people from Austrian history.
We now headed to the last place on this walking tour: The St. Stephen’s Cathedral. On our way we saw an interesting monument dedicated to Plague. Yes, you read that right. Back in those days, many major cities were always hit badly by epidemic of plague. One such epidemic was the Great Plague of 1679 that drove the masses to such a despair that the then Hafsburg emperor Leopold I who by the way himself fled from the city had pledged to dedicate a holy trinity tower if the plague ended. The plague finally ended and now we have this beautiful baroque structure which is said to be one of the most ambitious architecture in Europe. Moving ahead, we reached the grand gothic styled cathedral towers - St. Stephen’s Cathedral. The 450ft tall towering architecture was built in 12th century when people believed: taller the towers, closer to the God. The roof is a sight to behold: It is intricately designed with over 200,000 multi-colored glazed tiles and every bit of it looks stunning. I am so glad we took this walking tour!
Vienna is a place which is rich in history and every part of the city had its own spectacular story to tell! A walking tour such short 1.5hrs gave us enormous amount of information without which we would never understand the importance of a place like Vienna. I am enthralled by its charm and elegance.
You see we were lucky to have a fantastic guide like Charles. Along with the history of Vienna he also gave us tips on where to find the original oldest Sachertorte of Vienna. Soon after the walking tour, we straight away headed towards the legendary Café Sacher Wien. When you are at Café Sacher, oh boy you’re in for a treat! It is the same old traditional restaurant selling the world famous and the original Sachertorte. They are well known for their invention of Sachertorte in 1837. Sachertorte is a unique Viennese treat which has layers of light chocolate cake separated by apricot jam, layer of chocolate ganache on the top and served with whipped cream. It was an incredibly delicious treat along with our cappuccinos. Fun fact for the coffee lovers: It is said that cappuccino was actually invented in Austria.
We then headed back to our bus tours to explore the Blue route. The places we passed through were Museums/Hofburg -> Aqua Terra Zoo -> Mariahilferstrasse / Ibis Hotel -> Schönbrunn Palace / Schloss Schönbrunn ->Main Train Station -> Belvedere -> House of Music -> Museums Quartier. I loved 2 main attractions in this route: one was the main train station and other Schönbrunn Palace. The main train station of Vienna which is also called as Hauptbahnhof surprises you with the amount of traffic it handles. Once this station was fully functional it could handle 145,000 passengers and 1000 trains a day! Yes, that is not a typo! It also gave rise to new businesses and has underground parking facility with spaces for 600 cars and 1000+ bicycles. When you are on this route, the most beautiful palace which will catch your eye is the Schönbrunn Palace, former summer residence of the Hapsburgs. It is a baroque palace with 1441 rooms and was built during the reign of Maria Theresa. There are so many concerts which are held on daily basis since a very long time. It dates back to the time when Ludwig Van Beethoven used to work here.
There was one place which we missed visiting it was ‘Hundertwasserhaus’ which is a real funky place built under the idea and concept of Austrian artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser. It is a set of houses of unimaginable shapes and colors where close to 200 people live. The roof has vegetation and the floors are uneven. Sun was down long back and the night was young. We had our dinner, strolled through city and enjoyed every bit of its loveliness at night. Vienna gets yet more beautiful by night; wish we had more time here.
If you are a history lover, then take my words you will never get bored in Vienna. The places to visit here are so many that it would take months to cover. What a unique & memorable way to enjoy a birthday