Day 51: Vienna, Austria

We moved back west today; it was only a 3 hour train ride from Budapest to Vienna, Austria.

With all our efforts the last few days on Hungary, we didn't do a lot of planning for Vienna (we had to book our hotel from Brooke's iPhone at midnight yesterday). We were reading our travel books and listening to Rick Steve's podcasts on the train ride trying to figure out what to do and see.

We never really had a plan, but like in other cities, we picked a first destination to get to and figure out the city on the way. Our first stop was the Opera House since it was the city center landmark nearest our hotel. Then we moved on to a couple churches and walked in just in time for a free concert at the second one.

By now we had a feel for Vienna, and we really liked it. It's a clean city, not too big, not too small, efficient and convenient public transportation is available although we can usually walk. There's lots of good food, drink, history, and arts.

We walked to the sprawling Hapsburg Palace and near, but not in, the museums. At this point Kevin was feeling a little tourist fatigue. It was hot again and the energy to appreciate 15th century art wasn't going to happen. We took a beer break and planned our next stop to Rathaus (city hall), where we read there was usually night shows of some sort on a giant projector.

When we got there we found a few hundred chairs set up and a few rows of bleachers all facing a large screen placed in front the dramatic 5-peaked city hall. Behind the chairs were about 10 restaurants with summerfest-like stands and beer taps a plenty. The most prevelent beer seems to be Ottakringer, which makes a great dunkel (dark) and Helles (pilsner we think).

The chairs were basically empty when we arrived, but a slow trickle filled up the seats over a few hours. Then the big show, a video of a 20 year old performance of a Mozart symphony by the Berlin Philaharmonic. Yeah, doesn't sound that cool. But the park had a whole atmosphere about it, with a thousand people enjoying good food and beer with the city hall backdrop, watching a pre-recorded concert seemed about right. Similar to Jazz in the Park, it's not all about the music.

We spent about 4 hours hanging out at the city hall fest before retiring for the evening.