After a splendid last night in Prague when we went to Reduta, a famous jazz club, for a night of Billie Holiday music, we headed out of the city for Vienna.
But first, we stopped at the Dancing House (Fred and Ginger), the famous Frank Gehry architectural landmark, to take a few pictures.
On the way to Vienna, we stopped at Lednice to visit the castle and garden and to do a wine tasting in the wine cellar of the nearby Castle Valtice.
We were shown around the Lednice Castle by one of the ancestral family members, cigar-smoking, horse-riding Wendy, who amused us with her expression that she was 400-per-cent positive that she would let us in again if we ever came knocking at her door. How nice!
We arrived in Vienna at a good time and checked into our lovely new home, Hotel Regina, located right in the Ring circle which gives us excellent access to many of the key sites including St. Stephen’s Cathedral and surroundings and the Parliament Buildings and the exquisite rose gardens which were at their peak and looking spectacular in full bloom.
For our first whole day in Vienna, we toured the entire city and got a very complete overview of all that it contains. The architecture and neighbourhoods were delightful and we all enjoyed the thoroughness of our city tour.
Next we visited the Mozart House, located just behind St. Stephen’s, and saw where he did many of his famous works. It was a thrill to see his apartments and where he lived with Constanza and the family and where he entertained illustrious visitors such as Haydn.
I like to imagine Mozart playing the violin or piano to amuse Haydn and the neighbours shouting up from the street: “Mozart, keep it down, you’re making such a racket!” Never happened.
From Mozarthaus, we went to the Schonbrunn Palace where we toured the sumptuous interiors with all the opulence money can buy and we also had time to see the garden. Some of us took a horse and cart ride around the garden which slowed us down to a gentle 18th century clip-clop pace. Cool.
The next day, we travelled out of Vienna to the city of Bratislava in Slovakia.
It was short ride, through one of the windiest corners of Europe where they have erected acres of wind turbines to generate electricity.
On entering Bratislava, our bus driver got a ticket from aggressive police for parking where he shouldn’t have to let us off for a 10 minute picture break as we met up with our city guide. The new mayor has made it law that buses are allowed to stop for 10 minutes and no more where we stopped by the Danube. We were stopped for no more than seven minutes but we got a ticket nonetheless.
Bratislava turned out to be a very friendly, affordable and beautiful city and the old town where we spent most of our time was gorgeous and we had a lot of fun shopping and eating at the restaurants. We saw the castle and the views and laughed with the guide that key areas are being named after famous U.S. places such as Beverley Hills and Manhattan. (Come on, Bratislava, you don’t need that reference. Trust me, you can call them whatever you like and we tourists will love them.)
Back in Vienna, we stopped to see the community area designed by the artist Hundertwasser also known as Hundred-Waters. It is a very organic neighbourhood with trees growing out of windows of homes and balconies and the whole complex painted in bright colours.
For our last day in Vienna, we were all free to do whatever we wanted.
Many of us headed to the art galleries to see wonderful paintings by Klimpt and Bruegel and many others including Van Gogh, Caravaggio, Durer, Monet and Van Hals.
Vienna is an immensely sophisticated city with wonderful coffee houses and schnitzel restaurants and so much more. We all adored walking the streets with their charming architecture and shopping at the exquisite shops with their eye-catching displays.
Homelessness is not an issue in Vienna because the citizens have so much pride in their city, they insist that people be given a place to live with dignity for only 1.50 euros a day. It is a remarkable achievement and the city looks wonderful for it.
As well, many of the older buildings, such as St Stephen’s Cathedral and the Votive Church, have been cleaned and look fantastic as they glisten and beam in the sunshine. Vienna is now definitely one of my most favourites destinations because of the art and music and beauty of the streets and refinement and generosity of the people. I want to return here again and again.
For our final night, we went for dinner as a group to private party section of the famous Cafe Central where upstairs we then were treated to a classical music concert.
What a glorious end to a spectacular tour.
swhysall@shaw.ca
