Favourite 2013 travel photos. Vienna, Austria. September 2013.
Wiener Riesenrad
Austria
30 hours in Vienna: Monday
After a great first 12 waking hours in Vienna, we were ready for a mere 10 more hours in this stunning city. Nowhere near enough time to see everything, but more than enough time to put a dent in it and have some fun in the process.
08:30 We started the day with some traditional Viennese pastries for breakfast. We chose Kurkonditorei Oberlaa as our destination as they have something rather unique in Vienna – gluten free pastries. My wife was in heaven as she didn’t expect to be able to try any of these delectables. The gluten free pastries (left and top right in the pictures below) were really good. In particular, the one on the left below was very similar to a Québécois mille-feuille. I got one non gluten-free pastry as I had to try an apfelstrudel (bottom right below). That and a great espresso put me in a wonderful mood to start the day.
Gluten free pastry
Gluten free cake
Apple strudel
30 hours in Vienna: Sunday
Nothing focuses your energy quite like having only a bit more than one day in a city you’ve always wanted to see. When we booked our trip to the Czech Republic, we decided to stay in place in Prague and do a few day trips rather than being repeatedly on the move like our last few big trips. When we took a closer look at a map and saw Vienna a mere four hours away, we knew we had to do a quick trip into Austria to spend one night in the city of music. So what did 30 hours in Vienna look like? Here’s how we spent the first 12 hours after arriving just before lunch on the first Sunday in September.
12:30 Before going anywhere, we were in desperate need of a caffeine jolt. Across from our hotel was a coffee shop whose double espresso and lovely pastry got me ready to start exploring. With caffeine hitting our respective blood streams, we took a streetcar ride around half of the Ringstraße (ring road). If you envision the Ringstraße as a clock, we took a trip from 12 to 6 to get near the Vienna State Opera.
13:30 On my list of things to try in Vienna was the famous Sachertorte. Looking up from the map when we got off the streetcar, Hotel Sacher was right in front of us meaning it was time for the rich chocolate cake (with brandy!) and another double espresso.
The Sachertorte
Sachertorte & me
I loved this cake. The chocolate icing was almost fudge-like. I could have had a second piece, but I was well into a deep caffeine and sugar buzz. Plus, my understanding wife who can’t eat gluten may not have been so eager to sit and watch me wolf down a second slice.
Home is where my feet are
I’m first writing this from the evening train between Vienna and Prague (I think we’re getting close to Pardubice but don’t quote me on that). The swaying of the train, some good music in my ears, and the glow of small Czech towns passing by the window outside gets me to thinking pretty easily.
This trip has been a bit of a revelation for me. As I sit on the train, I feel like I’m returning to something in Prague. It’s quickly become home on this trip. Staying in an apartment has helped. Cooking a few meals has too. But it’s more than that. After visits to seventeen countries and with my passion to travel being fully explored as often as I can, I’ve grown in a way that feels suddenly tangible on this trip.
After a particularly nomadic few years, a singer/songwriter I listened to about ten years ago entitled her album “Home is where my feet are”. She explained that for her, happiness in her life came down to living to that mantra. Simple and profound, I adopted it as a personal challenge and a rallying cry to which to aspire in senses both literal and metaphorical.
I know I’ll remember this trip for a lot of the experiences and moments – my first European soccer match, a whirlwind thirty hour stopover in Vienna, tasting unfiltered and unpasteurized pilsner where it was first brewed, kissing my wife on the Charles Bridge, sampling all varieties of Czech food…. All of those memories and many, many more I’ll cherish forever. But what I’ll remember most from these two weeks is the sudden realization I had as I sat in a jet-lagged stupor in our Prague apartment on the first day of this trip. With every chance to feel foreign and out of place, I felt resolutely and entirely comfortable. For the eleven days so far, that feeling hasn’t wavered. Indeed, home is where my feet are. And from where I stand, I’m pretty proud of that.
More to come in the weeks ahead on what has been an outstanding trip.
This year’s big trip
I’ve been fortunate over the past few years to visit a number of interesting places. Many of those have been short stay, primarily work-related trips. But by tacking on a day or two of vacation I’ve been able to see some interesting things and have some wonderful experiences that I cherish. With that said, there’s nothing that compares to a “big trip”. For us, that’s usually a once a year thing when our work and vacation schedules can be aligned for a two week escape. Last year it was a four country tour of Scandinavia, the year before had us wandering around Switzerland and down to Milan. This year our big trip is a two week jaunt to the Czech Republic with an ambitious 40 hour side trip to Vienna thrown in because we’ll be “in the neighbourhood”.
The Czech Republic has been high on our must visit list for a while. We’ve rented an apartment in Prague for two weeks and will be exploring the city at a leisurely pace. What’s on our itinerary? A couple of day trips – one to Terezín to learn about its horrific history during WWII, another one (perhaps more of a pilgrimage for me) to Plzeň, the birthplace of pilsner beer. An AC Sparta Praha soccer match gets us to our first game after all our previous trips failed to align with European soccer schedules. There’s a night at the opera, some castles, a few museums, and a lot of leisurely exploring, hanging out in parks and cafes, and drinking in what will be spectacularly beautiful surroundings.
Our last couple of big trips were less about food and drink than normal. This one will be very different. I’m excited to try some traditional Czech cuisine – in particular, pork knee, roast goose, goulash, dumplings and the pungent domestic cheese, Olomoucké tvarůžky. As a beer lover, my travel map is littered with pins for hopeful visits to many tankovna pubs so I can sample the finest Czech beer at its unpasteurized and unfiltered best. In Vienna I hope to try some of the world’s best coffee, have a piece (or 3) of sachertorte, and spend an evening at a heuriger on the outskirts of the city sampling the young, fresh white wines produced on the hills of the Danube.
Here’s to this year’s big trip which can’t get here fast enough!
Bluenose Traveler 