Author’s note: This post covers the day of July 18th. I wrote it on the morning of July 20th.
It might be a little early to start ranking the days as to which one was best, but Wednesday was pretty awesome. We woke up around 8:30 and Mrs. Moran served us coffee, sausage, eggs, and banana bread for breakfast. IN-CREDIBLE!
After cleaning up from breakfast, I spent close to an hour posting all the blogs that I had written the day before while Smith planned out our day (dangerous, I know). We started by walking towards the city center. The first major building we came to was the Staatsoper, the opera house. The opera is off for the summer, as are many of the main attractions, probably because very few buildings have A/C, and it does get much hotter here than in the Netherlands. Plus, in the long ago before A/C existed, and without the summer tourist season, it probably made a lot of sense to have the opera offseason during the summer, and tradition has carried on.
But, an orchestral group gives concerts on a roughly every other night schedule, so we bought tickets for later that evening. I was so excited the rest of the day. I was going to get to see Mozart performed by an orchestra IN the Vienna Opera House! Turns out, a lot of people want to do the same, because the rest of the day we were accosted at all of the major tourist attractions by wigged and costumed men and women asking, “Would you like to see a Mozart concert? Interested in a Mozart concert?”
After the Staatsoper, we walked to the Stephansdom (read: Stef-ens-dome) and saw that. A nice cathedral with one impressive tower. I started with the camera and then gave it to Smith, but I thought it was funny that we both noticed that the banister on the spiral staircase up to the pulpit was topped with lots of small frog sculptures, and found these to be picture-worthy.
After seeing Stephansdom inside and out, well, the inside that you don’t have to pay for, we walked through more streets loaded with luxury brand stores to reach the Hofburg complex. The Hofburg complex is a very large series of buildings, some interconnected, some not, with gardens filling the extra space. There we purchased tickets to tour the Lippizaner horse stables, but not for the show, because once again they were on break for the summer. We then continued to walk around and see more of the Hofburg complex including the National Library where Hitler stood over 70 years ago and declared “the unification of Germany and Austria”.
From there we walked to the 2 nearby museums, Natural History and Art, and took pictures from the outside. We’ll see if we get to either of them. Then we walked through some more of the Hofburg complex gardens to get to a place for lunch over by the Stephansdom called Bettelstudent. It was recommended by the guide book we are borrowing from the Moran’s, and it…was…delicious! This place was near the Stephansdom, but just far enough away that it was basically all locals. I asked the waitress what she recommended between two dishes, and the one she recommended was awesome. It was thick, juicy, perfectly cooked pork (I hesitate to call them “medallions” like the menu did because they were so big), served with an amazing mushroom cream sauce and some multicolored noodles about the size of small shells. The beer was, of course, great too. Smith got a very solid wiener schnitzel as well.
After lunch we walked north and found the Café Central, a very beautifully restored early 20th century café. We had coffee (mine with orange liqueur, Smith’s with Mozart liqueur) and an apple struedel with vanilla sauce. Plate-licking good!
From there we walked to the Burgtheater and got there just in time for them to start their tour in English, so we jumped on that. We didn’t get to see inside the theater because it was being used for a play rehearsal at the time, but we did get to see the two impressive staircases replete with Gustav Klimt paintings. Besides, the staircases are the important part because they are original, the stage and seating part of the theater burned to the ground during World War 2.
After the Burgtheater we crossed the street to see the Rathaus, which is their government administration building. The center of its face is currently covered by a large white screen used for showing movies during their summer film festival. And the courtyard space between the Rathaus and the Burgtheater is filled with food and drink vendors as well. Mrs. Moran told me that this is where they have the popular Christmas market and other city events, so it sounds like this space is almost never vacant.
After seeing the Rathaus, we walked north to see a couple other churches, but might have gotten a bit greedy, because we found ourselves having to do a bit of powerwalking to try to get to the place we had picked for dinner so that we would have time to get ready for the Mozart concert. We ate at Salmbrau, which is a brewery-restaurant that the Moran’s recommended to us. I had a toasted bread covered with a pimento-sausage topping, and Smith had a ham, cheese lasagna kind of thing.
After a second beer each, we headed back to the Moran’s apartment. I ironed the pants of my suit, showered, and shaved. Smith was far more relaxed about this concert than I, so he went in a polo and jeans. It turns out most people treat the Mozart concert more like Smith than me, although there were a handful of other people that had dressed up for the occasion. We walked to the Staatsoper, getting there a little early so we could take pictures around the interior. Our seats were decent, high, middle but a little to the left when looking at the stage, and second row in our balcony section. The balcony partially obstructed our view of the stage, so we had to lean forward if we wanted to see the conductor and first violin.
I really enjoyed the show. I was burning up in my suit, so I dropped the jacket and tie. I was still sweating, but enjoyed it nonetheless. Smith enjoyed it too, but was a little more bothered by the overzealous tourists than I was. One lady walked down the aisle and stood there next to us watching for a bit until the one of the other spectators came down the aisle and told her to go back to her seat. They performed a variety of different pieces, some orchestral, some converted from piano sonatas, some opera with help from one female and one male singer that changed costumes to fit their part a couple times. My favorite was the performance of, what according to my iTunes library is called, Piano Sonata 11.
After the concert ended and we had to be ushered out because I still wanted to take pictures and bask in the post-Mozart glow. From there, we walked in the direction that Smith said would take us to the Rathaus. Turned out it was not. So, I insisted we hope on the U-Bahn, the underground metro, instead of trying to walk anymore as my feet were beginning to hurt after an entire day of walking and an hour of walking in dress shoes. We got to the Rathaus just as the opera they were showing on the big screen was ending, so we got to hear the final number as we bought beers from the Ottakrunger stand and scrounged what seemed to be two of the few spare chairs left. After the opera was over, they turned on the lights on the Rathaus and made the scene even more epic. It was a great end to a great day. A couple beers, including a kirschbier that tasted like someone had managed to expertly meld the flavors of an amber malty brew and a Dr. Murphy’s Black Cherry soda, the tunes of Mozart running through my head, and the amazing lit Rathaus in view. That was nice.
Unfortunately, we weren’t anywhere near home. Just after midnight we began our walk home. We used a streetcar for the final leg of the journey, but we still didn’t make it back until 12:45.
Then, we crashed. Exhausted, but incredibly content.
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