Adventures of David and Paul: Vienna

After our first day whirlwind tour of Vienna, our next two days were at a slower pace and were dedicated to exploring the city's museums and palaces before venturing to the Wachau Valley. Vienna is full of things to do and see - there are a lot of museums to choose from, tons of churches and several palaces and interesting monuments. This trip to Vienna isn't our first European rodeo, so we tried to seek out a few more unusual things and spent a bit less time looking at churches and art museums. The first stop of the day was the Hundertwasser House. This building, and a few more in the neighborhood, were designed by Friedensreich Hundertwasser. It's colorful and odd - almost fairy-tale-like.

The Hunderwater House was followed by a stroll and tram ride to the Belvedere Palace. This is a multi-building complex with an upper palace, a lower palace and a modern art museum set with gardens between. We originally weren't going to visit the art museum but it was a very hot day in Vienna (over 90*F) and air conditioning sounded pretty great so we caved and spent about 45 minutes inside the Upper Belvedere. The museum was very nice with a collection of Middle Age to modern art, with several 19th and 20th century Klimt pieces, which were very popular because he was Austrian.

Hundertwasser House.

Front of the Upper Belvedere.

Medieval piece with a motley cast of characters.

Napoleon being not short on a horse. This one is in lots of history books.

Obviously the museum was very palatial.

View from the upper towards the lower Belvedere through the gardens.

David having a good time in front of the upper Belvedere.

The lower Belvedere - we didn't go into this museum which was mostly special exhibitions.

By now it was way past lunch time, so we jumped another tram to grab some lunch near a brew-house that we marked on our travel map. After getting some bad Italian food at Pizzeria La Gondola, we made it to 7 Stern Brau. The pub had a nice backyard beer garden with automatic misters, which helped in the heat. Despite it being hot, most things in Austria weren't air conditioned, so sitting inside most restaurants or bars wasn't ideal and we avoided it for nearly the entire trip.

After having a beer we found a little Mexican shop and peaked inside. We're always curious what Europeans think of Mexico. Our experience has generally been that they have no idea about Mexican food or goods. The shop had a few craft beers imported from Mexico, lots of imported Mexican food products, and tons of hard taco shells - because white people. Overall this trip, we'd say we saw more Mexican things than in any other European trip. Maybe Europe is finally catching on to the joys of Mexico? Or maybe it's something about Vienna - there were more cuisine types from around the world here than in other places we've visited in Europe except London. Oddly enough, the woman working in the Mexican shop was Colombian. We chatted with her for a bit, since we'll be visiting Bogota later this year.

Beer vending machine, because why not?

Halfway decent beers.

Paul enjoying some beer in the garden courtyard.

Clearly Paul is a polyglot.

Cute little Mexican store.

After lunch, beer and shopping we walked through the MuseumsQuartier to visit the Kunsthistorisches Museum. This must-see museum features art and artifacts from Europe and the near-east spanning from ancient Egypt, to Greece and Rome all the way to 20th century art and sculpture. We spent several hours there, as it's a pretty huge building.

After visiting the Kunsthistorisches Museum, we walked to the nearby Rathaus (city hall) past the Austrian parliament (which was heavily under renovation). The Rathaus hosts a summer film festival and there were dozens of food and drink vendors in the courtyard. The vendors varied from Austrian, Italian, Greek, Mexican and various Asian cuisines. A huge screen and lots of seating were set up in front of the Rathaus and movies were played at night. It was a great festive scene but since we visited in the afternoon we didn't have a chance to watch a movie or grab a bite this time around.

Outdoor space in an old bus parking area in the MuseumsQuartier.

Kunsthistorisches Museum - a mirror image of the Natural History Museum we visited the day before.

Great collection of Egyptian artifacts in a more traditional setting than the Munich Egyptian Museum.

Tons of Roman and Greek statues.

A piece of art by Klimt to celebrate the Kunsthistorisches Museum.

Tower of Babel by Bruegel

Seating and vendors near the Rathaus for the Vienna summer film festival.

After heading back to the AirBnB for a bit of a break, we ventured out to find some dinner. We took a tram to a neighborhood north and west of the city center to a restaurant called Am Nordpol 3 (weird name, we know). The menu here was all in handwritten German and gave David a bit of a panic attack. After the waiter realized we were somewhat clueless she ran back with some printed English menus (phew). The restaurant is near a large park and has a huge outdoor seating area, good food and lots of drinks. We'd recommend this place if you're eager to get out of the tourist areas and try some Viennese cuisine with the locals.

After dinner we took the tram back to the innere stadt, got some gelato and took an evening stroll. Vienna is a very picturesque city and the innere stadt is especially walkable and delightful. Make sure if you visit you dedicate lots of time to just exploring!

In Austria potato is the only vegetable you'll find easily.

Of course there was gelato before bed. We're not savages!

A lot of the buildings are dramatically lit at night, including the main cathedral.

St. Peter's church.

Lots of plazas and shopping areas in the innere stadt.

A beautiful Vienna alley at night.

Friday was our last full day in Vienna. There were still a ton of things we wanted to see, but knew we didn't have the time. We also knew we'd be back for a few hours toward the end of the trip, so we decided to focus on one big thing and then attend a party for Nate and Mavish the evening before their anniversary shindig.

We started the day at Schönbrunn Palace, a UNESCO site on the south side of town. This impressive 1,400 room palace was the Hapsburg's summer home and was essentially Vienna's Versailles. Our audioguide tour was excellent and included 40 rooms - which was very manageable. The tour included access to some special sections of the massive gardens, which are otherwise free to enter as a city park. It was a rainy day so we didn't spend too much time exploring the gardens or the nearby neighborhoods. Overall, if you can only visit one palace in Vienna, we'd recommend you visit Schönbrunn. It doesn't take too long to see (unless you spend a lot of time in the sprawling gardens) and you can get a real sense of how the Austrian royalty lived. It was very crowded - make sure you book a time-slot at least a day ahead.

Hazelnut cake and a cappuccino in front of Schönbrunn.

One of the palace's side gardens.

Paul in front of the Gloriette.

Schönbrunn Palace and gardens from atop the Gloriette - worth the climb.

Avocado toast. I.E the reason older adults think millennials are poor.

After visiting Schönbrunn, we went to the Roman Museum, which was pretty close to our AirBnB. David loves Roman history, so we knew we had to give it a visit. The museum was small but included some exhibits on the Roman foundation of Vienna as a military base on the Danube (which was the far border of the empire). It also included some ruins from the fort under the city streets.

Part of the old Roman fort that evolved over time into Vienna.

Street scene near our AirBnB.

After heading back to the AirBnB for a bit of a break, we ventured out to meet Nate and Mahvish at Heuriger Feuerwehr Wagner Weingut Grinzing Wien. This place is a heuriger - which means they a tavern that makes their own wine. All along the northern edge of Vienna are lots of small vineyards. These vineyards mostly produce small amounts of wine that they sell in heuriger on the edge of Vienna. Weinguts are similar to beer gardens in that they have large outdoor spaces with seating and lots of trees and flowers. We spent most of the evening here drinking wine, eating tons of schnitzel and watching a world cup match under an awning when it started to thunderstorm after sunset. Most evenings in Vienna featured some thunderstorms and this night was the worst - with a few hours of rain and lightning.