The Vienna Weekend

Me at the Schonbrunn Palace

So a couple weeks ago now, we had a nice 4 day weekend which we decided to spend in the beautiful city of Vienna. Here's the great thing about living in Europe: access to many amazing cities just a short bus/train/plane ride away. We took an overnight bus to Vienna on Thursday night and arrived bright and early at 5:00 AM. Well, it was early but I don't think we were feeling so bright at that time of day after little sleep on the bus...

So after checking into our hotel at 5am and taking a 2 hour nap on the couch in the lobby, it was time to set out to see the city at 7am on a Friday. During our 3 days in the city, we saw some beautiful and amazing sites. I have to admit that I didn't actually know that much about Vienna before visiting. I really didn't know what to expect from the city. But I was certainly impressed. The best word I can think of to describe the city is: grandiose. There are amazing palaces, beautiful government buildings and ancient cathedrals galore and everything is big and impressive. And it’s a city of music! Obviously so many great composers have come out of Austria (Beethoven, Straus and Hayden to name a few….) and that history is still very present in the city today.

We spent our time in Vienna walking around taking in as much of the city as we could. We were on the go basically non-stop from morning till night during our full 3 days there. We saw too much for me to remember or even tell you about. But some of the highlights include:

St. Peter’s Church

Taking in a classical concert with an orchestra, opera singers and ballet dancers

The amazing gardens of the Schonbrunn Palace

The Great Hall of the National Library

The copula in the State Hall

And to me, the very best was our first night spent wandering around the city. Outside of a beautiful government building we found a great circus that had set up some semi-permanent attractions. I really wanted to see the circus (it looked so inviting!) but we decided against it… maybe if they would have had elephants it would have been a different story. :)

But anyway, the circus had a great tent with lively music set up right outside a beautiful white building with a great clock tower. And outside of the tent there were stalls set up selling ethnic food from all different regions of the world (although they had hamburgers as the food from Mexico. Hmmm, not really what I would call Mexican food). We dined on some great Indian food and got to do some good people watching.

After dinner we wandered on to see some more of the city at night. We stopped into a church in the center of town, which was hauntingly still and silent. There were just a few other people sitting in the pews in the dark candlelit room, listening to the recorded chats playing from the alter. If you know me you know that I am not a very religious person, but this experience was moving even for me. It was so peaceful and seemed like such a wonderful refuge, it had a perfect atmosphere and I could feel the spirituality in the room.

Leaving the church, we wandered through the streets and happened upon a lone violin player, filling the quiet streets with his music. We stopped and listened to him play a few songs. I couldn’t imagine anything better. After that, a nice glass of wine sitting outside a café was the perfect way to end a perfect day.

Karls Church