That Vienna Day Where We Did All The Things

Day Two Vienna. 13th June 2012

After a relaxed morning, we headed out. We made the cafe Demel the first stop so that I wouldn't miss out! The Annatorte cake was divine and the coffee was good too. Which was good because the cost was fairly exorbitant. 

We went to check out the 'walls' – Greg thought we might be able to get up on them and have a bit of a walk around. But when we got there we seemed to be at the gothic Rathaus building.. it turned out on closer reading that the 'walls' of Vienna had been torn down at some point and replaced by architecturally interesting buildings. So we had a little look in the free areas of the Rathaus and also the setting up of the nearby university's gay pride fair next door...

Small beach at the Gay Pride festival

Greg confirming that the building in front of him was in fact, where the walls used to be.

  

The inner courtyard of the Rathaus building.

Next we jumped back on the underground and headed to a famous market street. We strolled through busy market stalls selling mainly fresh and cooked foods of all kinds interspersed with clothes and souvenirs. When we got to the end our tummies were telling us it was lunchtime, so naturally we dove back in in search of something suitable. In the end we settled on a Vietnamese place and had a surprisingly enjoyable meal including a Tapioca and milk pudding.

Drums of beer at the market.

Funky Austrian buildings on the market street.

Yummy lunch but puffy eyes!

Tapioca and milk dessert!

On the underground again, we headed back to the centre of town to visit the Royal Treasury. This was seriously cool, it was a mixture of royal jewels and crowns of impressive worth as well as religious regalia. There was a significant array of religious relics on display, including a sliver of the true cross, one of the actual nails from the cross, and random ones such as John the Baptist's tooth and a piece of the manger baby Jesus lay in. I definitely find all of it's authenticity fairly suss but it's still very interesting from a historical perspective as a Christian, in terms of what things people believe to be important and hold power.

Napolean's son's royal bassinet. 

Crown made as a gift for a European king by Turkish craftsman who didn't know how to make a crown because their rulers didn't wear them... 

"piece of the true cross"

More true cross.

Spear with true cross set inside of it....

I think this was a book of gospels?

John the baptist's tooth, apparently.

  

A piece of Christ's manger (in the little space inside the large jewel encrusted case...)

Feeling a bit dizzied by all the wealth we had just been casually perusing, we headed over to the Music Museum for some lighthearted fun. 

On the way, we passed the stairs going up to the Albertina, where we had gone the day before. They had been covered to look like one of Monet's water lily paintings!

The museum was realy great! An entire floor dedicated to interactive displays teaching about sound and how as humans we receive and create sounds. Angela we thought of you a lot while we were in that bit – you would have been finding it all hopelessly simplified no doubt but we could have used your expertise at times to explain things to us better! 

Then up the stairs there were rooms dedicated to Austria's various famous composers including Mozart, Beethoven, Strauss, Shubert, and then towards the end some more obscure ones...

Inside the music museum.

Haydn's Parrot (stuffed, but the actual bird apparently!)

  

Original painting of Mozart and family

Beethoven's door (?!)

Schubert's glasses.

The finale was a room where you get to stand there with a conductor's wand and attempt to conduct the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra... It was ridiculously difficult! They don't give you any tips about what will make them speed up or slow down! But it was fun. Greg tried to see how fast he could make them play and the musicians gave up on him and he got booed off hehe. I made it to the end of the song but it made for painful listening. The Asian family waiting their turn behind us still clapped enthusiastically.

As we headed away from the museum in the early evening, looking for the nearest underground or maybe somewhere for dinner, we noticed we were near the palace gardens, something we had been wanting to see. So we decided to stretch out one last mission for the day and take a look. Frustratingly it was a surrounded by a high wall without an entrance for a significant distance so major mission it turned into indeed!! It was beautiful once we were there and I was pleased we went. Greg wasn't so convinced it had been worth the extra legwork at the end of a long day!

We still had to go to the station to work out the time for the train the next day. While in the station we decided to pick up something cheap and chirpy for tea since we were so tired (usual story). We tried out a fish and chips chain Greg had seen around in Austria. We took it back to the hostel and nommed it in the dining room. We thought about using our free drinks in the hostel bar, but my eyes were becoming dangerously stratchy and neither of us were really in the party mood, so we called it a day.