This morning the early starts began. I was thoroughly enjoying curling up in my comfy bed, listening to the rain… wait, rain? And then my alarm went off and our day began at a crisp 7am. Our annoying bath with a hand held shower head made things tricky and both Julie and I succeeded in getting water absolutely everywhere in the bathroom. There was also much frantic towel drying of hair – wet hair plus cold rainy days, didn’t prepare for that!
Our tour activities were very few today – we met at 8.30am and took a trip into the old city for a quick orientation walk. This included a visit into the St Stephansdom – two changes here since 2005, the scaffolding is no longer covered in bank advertising and they have covered all the windows in some sort of cellophane to give a rather cool and rather unauthentic mottled light effect. And then we were on our own for the day. Everyone split up very quickly, leaving a little group that was was our company for the day. Hamish from New Zealand (who designed the ‘V’ can many years ago), Marissa from Australia, Julie and William Williamson from England (a 77 year old grandfather who is very cool).
Julie and I had both been in the city before so we were pretty relaxed about where to go. The general group consensus was that a trip to the Schoenbrunn was in order so off we went. It was really lovely to be back there, even if the weather was grey and miserable (there was much dancing in a random five minutes of sunshine). We bought our tickets and then wandered around the very big and impressive gardens for 45 minutes until we were allowed in the summer palace itself. I had done the palace tour before but didn’t remember much of it, excepting the Grand Gallery and the room where Mozart played his first concert to royalty at the age of six. The rooms were very grand, there was lots and gold, lots of Chinese decorations and too many portraits of people whose names we forgot. There was quite a lot about Empress Sissi, a huge icon here, who we decided was really a bit of a bitch.
After walking through the palace for about 40 minutes we headed out for lunch at the nearby cafe. For Julie and I this was bread with spinach, tomato sauce and feta, with an aperol on the side (I took great pleasure in introducing this drink to everybody). Then it was dessert time – the cakes here are amazing, even if they are mass produced (you can find exactly the same cake menu in almost every cafe). I had a cake with square of strawberry and chocolate mousse and enjoyed it very much.
We were back in central Vienna just in time for the 3pm Opera House tour. We all really enjoyed this, the tour guide was very interesting and we learn a lot about the general day to day runnings of the theatre, plus some history (including why its bad luck to whistle backstage). The inside of the Opera House was akin to everything else in Vienna – big and grand with gold trimmings and statues. We got to sit in the 200 Euro ticket seats and watch them set up the stage for the night (they have different performances on every evening = lots of set moving).
After the Opera House we had a little bit more time to kill so we walked over the road to the Albertina, one of the big art museums here. I’ve seen a lot of art galleries already on this trip (with many more to come), but I really enjoyed walking around this one with people and getting to discuss the art a little. There was a big private collection on display, ‘Monet to Picasso’ which had some very good artworks indeed.
A little bit of time to purchase a rubber duck dressed up as Mozart (known as Wolf Duck, Wolfyduck or Duck Duck Wolf), who has now become our tour mascot. By this time it was pouring with rain and after a brief meeting for hot chocolate at St Stephansdom, the five of us ran off to find somewhere for dinner. We headed to a Schnitzel place recommended by our tour guide to find it completely packed – no worries, we put our name down and then huddled in the nice, dry Austrian wine bar across the way. About 40 minutes later we were sat at a table and ordering the most giant schnitzels we have ever seen. Marissa, Bill and Julie opted to go thirds on one, but Hamish and I couldn’t resist the challenge, tackling a whole one each. And after much groaning, the Schnitzel was conquered!
I had a little moment at dinner, as we sat around chatting and laughing, eating Schnitzel and drinking wine whilst it poured with rain outside – this is what makes these tours amazing, the food, the company the atmosphere. I was very content.
At about 9pm, Bill headed home (kudos to him for staying out so late with us slightly tipsy young people) and we headed off to a wine bar along the river. Here we…drank wine and had many jolly conversations, including one where Hamish tried to guess our ages and was a good ten years out (apparently Julie and I are both mid thirties like him). At one point, we met another Australian and a guy from Russia and the fun conversations continued.
Hamish continued out with the other two boys and Julie and I got back to our hotel around 12.30pm. There was a brief attempt to be productive, but very soon we were both sound asleep.
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