Vienna really did wait for me, Billy Joel.
***I have omitted all umlauts from this post. Though I live in Germany, I don't have a German QWERTZ keyboard and constantly hitting the code for an umlaut sucks.
Vienna was a twice failed trip before we finally visited.
Because we cancelled twice earlier in the year for reasons due to scheduling conflicts, I knew if we cancelled a third time, I wouldn't bother booking a fourth time around.
Vienna became a 'do or forget about it' trip.
We drove to the outskirts of Vienna from our home in Germany on a Friday morning; arriving around 4pm.
We wandered the area around our apartment {Auhof, Wein-Penzing for future visitors with cars}; discovering a fabulous mall, huge grocery store, a Toys R Us, and good restaurants.
It was kind of nice to get there and not have huge plans right away. I've learned many things from traveling Europe over the past two years, one of the most important being that when you rush around places, you burn out fast and don't enjoy it as much.
Saturday morning, we hopped on the train and headed to my #1 must-see in Vienna: Schonbrunn Palace and Gardens.
We planned to stay the entire day in the area, but that didn't go as planned...
The main garden behind the palace is quite beautiful. I enjoyed standing around, taking dozens of pictures of flowers, though I'm purposely leaving them out of this post.
Our next order of business was to check out the gorgeous and large Neptune Fountain. This fountain is up there on my favorites list now!
From the fountain, we hiked up to Gloriette; The big structure of arcades in the garden that many people think is an Austrian National Monument.
It's not, but might as well be!
Once we were out of breath from going up hill, we made our way down to the Schonbrunn Zoo that sits inside of the grounds.
Fun fact: This is the world's oldest zoo!
I cannot tell a lie. Zoos aren't really my thing.
Never cared a whole lot for seeing caged animals.
This was the third zoo I have visited in Europe, and if I had to pick between the three {Barcelona, Nuremberg, Schonbrunn}, Schonbrunn wins, hands down.
I wanted to visit because it is the world's oldest, not because it's just another zoo.
As far as zoos go, it didn't let down.
Hofburg Palace was a biggie on my list.
Hofburg Palace is the birthplace of Marie-Antoinette, and I can't help but find her life fascinating. Because I've followed her steps elsewhere in Europe, especially in France, I needed closure in seeing where it all began.
And done!
Not only were we thrown off trying to find the ornate, baroque library hall, we encountered a few other people that had the same issue, too! We all ended up scrambling trying to find the place together.
For those that want to visit the baroque portion of the library, put this name into your phone's GPS:
We saw a good majority of what we came to see, so we called it a day around 5pm and headed back to our apartment. I was actually surprised at how much we did in one day's time, and without rushing.
Sunday morning, we headed out again, hitting up Karlskirche first.
I kind of/ sort of forgot in the moment that it was Sunday morning, so when we walked inside, we found ourselves stepping into a Sunday mass. Oops. We quietly and quickly backed out to avoid being yelled at. Because of that, I didn't take any photos inside.
Call it odd, but after visiting the Rathaus, we grew a bit bored.
We were booked to stay in our apartment until Monday afternoon (it was Sunday morning in the above photo), but a last minute change of heart changed our mini-vaca.
From the Rathaus, we headed back to our apartment, and took off for home. I wasn't reimbursed for Sunday night's stay, but we were done with Vienna.
Sure, there were a few things we could have visited to fill time, but like I said in a previous post, I'm kind of over doing stuff just to do it. I have to want to do it.
My only regret is not visiting the city's main cemetery to see some famous dead folks, but that's a day trip of it's own out of the center.
Or maybe if we spent more time at Schonbrunn's grounds on Saturday, many things would've been done on Sunday instead, filling two days of our time rather than one. I'll never know.
I have an acquaintance who visited Vienna a few years ago from the United States. Not as a student, not for work. Just because she felt like it. She is not Viennese. She has no family or cultural ties to Austria.
How she spent two whole weeks strictly bumming around the city center without getting bored as hell?
I'd really like to know!
It only took us a day and a half to feel as if our visit was complete. It was worth it, don't get me wrong!
Well, moving on...
I have been handling life's randoms since my kids started school.
There is always an activity, function, fundraiser, concert, whatever. Some days feel non-stop, while others are slow. Those slow days have been dedicated to finishing up a historical fiction novel I am working on, cleaning, grocery shopping, running errands, purging my home of useless junk, etc,.
I guess I took Billy Joel's 'Vienna' lyrics closer to heart than I had thought:
"Slow down you crazy child
Take the phone off the hook and disappear for a while"
So if you have noticed this blog off and on as private, or my Instagram account being MIA, I am alive. I've just needed to disappear for awhile.
It is well for my soul.
Next post?
I have absolutely no clue. It only took me a month to write this one!
***I have omitted all umlauts from this post. Though I live in Germany, I don't have a German QWERTZ keyboard and constantly hitting the code for an umlaut sucks.
Vienna was a twice failed trip before we finally visited.
Because we cancelled twice earlier in the year for reasons due to scheduling conflicts, I knew if we cancelled a third time, I wouldn't bother booking a fourth time around.
Vienna became a 'do or forget about it' trip.
We drove to the outskirts of Vienna from our home in Germany on a Friday morning; arriving around 4pm.
We wandered the area around our apartment {Auhof, Wein-Penzing for future visitors with cars}; discovering a fabulous mall, huge grocery store, a Toys R Us, and good restaurants.
It was kind of nice to get there and not have huge plans right away. I've learned many things from traveling Europe over the past two years, one of the most important being that when you rush around places, you burn out fast and don't enjoy it as much.
Saturday morning, we hopped on the train and headed to my #1 must-see in Vienna: Schonbrunn Palace and Gardens.
We planned to stay the entire day in the area, but that didn't go as planned...
The main garden behind the palace is quite beautiful. I enjoyed standing around, taking dozens of pictures of flowers, though I'm purposely leaving them out of this post.
Our next order of business was to check out the gorgeous and large Neptune Fountain. This fountain is up there on my favorites list now!
From the fountain, we hiked up to Gloriette; The big structure of arcades in the garden that many people think is an Austrian National Monument.
It's not, but might as well be!
 |
| Obviously a bit of photoshop. I was bothered that the structure was covered with scaffolding on the right hand side. And a few extra clouds never hurt. I just realized the photo is a tad bit crooked. Oops! |
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| There are awesome views from the hill where Gloriette sits. |
Once we were out of breath from going up hill, we made our way down to the Schonbrunn Zoo that sits inside of the grounds.
Fun fact: This is the world's oldest zoo!
I cannot tell a lie. Zoos aren't really my thing.
Never cared a whole lot for seeing caged animals.
This was the third zoo I have visited in Europe, and if I had to pick between the three {Barcelona, Nuremberg, Schonbrunn}, Schonbrunn wins, hands down.
I wanted to visit because it is the world's oldest, not because it's just another zoo.
As far as zoos go, it didn't let down.
 |
| One of the original menagerie houses on the zoo grounds. |
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| An original animal cage from the zoo's early years. It is tiny as all hell, and thankfully no longer in use. |
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| The original bear cage from the Imperial Hofburg days. |
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| These aviary cages are also original, and still in use. |
 |
| Everything I knew about bats was thrown out the door after meeting this guy. Broad daylight and he put on a show for us. |
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| They have a corpse flower. It wasn't in bloom during our visit. I'm almost sad about that. |
The day of our Schonbrunn visit was particularly warm, so we began to overheat with the sun beating on our backs.
We left the zoo around 2pm, then wandered through the palace property toward the ginormous glasshouse. The plan was to go inside, but we skipped it.
I figured we had too much to see and do in Vienna's city center that visiting the glasshouse wasn't such a big deal.
Now I wish we had gone in...
We hopped on the S-bahn to Westbahnhof, caught the U3 bahn, and were directly taken to Vienna's city center.
We stepped out of the metro and the first thing we were greeted with was St. Stephen's Cathedral, so naturally, we ticked it off the list first.
From there, we walked around visiting whatever came our way.
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| St Stephen's Cathedral. I didn't get many photos of it's exterior for one reason: Scaffolding. Boo. |
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| St. Peter's Church |
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| The prettiest Chanel store I ever did see. |
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| Hofburg Palace |
Hofburg Palace is the birthplace of Marie-Antoinette, and I can't help but find her life fascinating. Because I've followed her steps elsewhere in Europe, especially in France, I needed closure in seeing where it all began.
And done!
We literally walked around the palace complex to find the Austrian National Library.
It was a cluster-duck of a jolly good time!
Not.
I'll say this for future visitors: Do not follow GPS or signs that point you towards the building in the photo below. If you arrive here, you are at the main entrance of the library that is ONLY for patrons of the library.
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| Backside of the main library. |
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| Nice photo op of Vienna's Rathaus, or 'town hall' for those who don't speak German. |
For those that want to visit the baroque portion of the library, put this name into your phone's GPS:
Prunksaal der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek
Yeah, it's awfully long, but that is where you want to go!
On Google maps, the 'Austrian National Library' is seemingly located in the same area as the above, but I promise you, it's not when you are physically trying to find it. I know for a fact.
 |
| Located in Josefplatz, this is the door to enter, then take a left once inside! Voila! |
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| I was excited to finally see this place after trying to find it for 20 minutes. |
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| Totally worth the 20 minute search! This library reminds me soooo much of the Beauty and The Beast library. |
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| Wider view of Hofburg Palace |
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| The main strasse in Vienna. Loads of shopping! |
Sunday morning, we headed out again, hitting up Karlskirche first.
I kind of/ sort of forgot in the moment that it was Sunday morning, so when we walked inside, we found ourselves stepping into a Sunday mass. Oops. We quietly and quickly backed out to avoid being yelled at. Because of that, I didn't take any photos inside.
I had one final destination to visit:
The Rathaus.
It wasn't on my list before visiting, but once I saw the grandeur of the building from afar, I knew I had to see it up close.
We jumped back on the metro (or U-bahn) and made our way there.
Oh, and for the first time, EVER, in the history of our travels, we had a subway car to ourselves! The kids had fun bouncing around inside, swinging from the handles and poles.
I know, I know. Maybe it wasn't the safest thing to do, but hey, YOLO.
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| The boy child is seen in the far back sitting down. |
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| Street side of the Rathaus. |
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| Side view of Rathaus from the festplatz side. |
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| It seriously is {IMO} the most beautiful building in Vienna. |
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| The Burgtheater across the street. |
We were booked to stay in our apartment until Monday afternoon (it was Sunday morning in the above photo), but a last minute change of heart changed our mini-vaca.
From the Rathaus, we headed back to our apartment, and took off for home. I wasn't reimbursed for Sunday night's stay, but we were done with Vienna.
Sure, there were a few things we could have visited to fill time, but like I said in a previous post, I'm kind of over doing stuff just to do it. I have to want to do it.
My only regret is not visiting the city's main cemetery to see some famous dead folks, but that's a day trip of it's own out of the center.
Or maybe if we spent more time at Schonbrunn's grounds on Saturday, many things would've been done on Sunday instead, filling two days of our time rather than one. I'll never know.
I have an acquaintance who visited Vienna a few years ago from the United States. Not as a student, not for work. Just because she felt like it. She is not Viennese. She has no family or cultural ties to Austria.
How she spent two whole weeks strictly bumming around the city center without getting bored as hell?
I'd really like to know!
It only took us a day and a half to feel as if our visit was complete. It was worth it, don't get me wrong!
Well, moving on...
I have been handling life's randoms since my kids started school.
There is always an activity, function, fundraiser, concert, whatever. Some days feel non-stop, while others are slow. Those slow days have been dedicated to finishing up a historical fiction novel I am working on, cleaning, grocery shopping, running errands, purging my home of useless junk, etc,.
I guess I took Billy Joel's 'Vienna' lyrics closer to heart than I had thought:
"Slow down you crazy child
Take the phone off the hook and disappear for a while"
So if you have noticed this blog off and on as private, or my Instagram account being MIA, I am alive. I've just needed to disappear for awhile.
It is well for my soul.
Next post?
I have absolutely no clue. It only took me a month to write this one!
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