Conversations with Myself

This day was very  interesting.  We had no plans to go into Museums or castles.  We simply strolled in the streets.

We started our day early at St. Stephan’s Cathedral.  There was a service going on.  We just went on to light a candles and give some donations (ha! nothing much but few coins).  Muli was impressed by throwing in coins and light candles.  She started crying saying ‘daddy more money’.  Embarrassing!  To avoid being more embarrassed we let her throw more coins.  Seeing that we let her she now wanted access to the wallet so he can make sure that we threw in all the money.  I could have picked her up and ran out the door but the door was far and this girl can scream. 

We left the church with an empty wallet and a happy child.  Yikes!

We found ourselves in Kärntner Strasse.  The shops of the great luxury brands are clustered on this streets and the streets close by. 

We had our lunch in one of the restaurants here.  I had the best schnitzel with German potatoes and Cullo had Viennese Tafelspitz (boiled meat) with salad.  We shared all the meals between the three of us.  The servings are very large, you must eat on a three day empty stomach.  Food was delicious.

I like this busy street with horses, busses and trams.  Horse drawn carriages adds charm to the city.

 

The street leading to The Swiss Courtyard.

 

The Swiss Courtyard and lots of horses drawn fiakers (carriages).

We then took a local bus and had a view of the city from the window.  We jumped off close by Votive Church where tram, subway and bus routes cross.

Votive Church.

We still had a lot of time before we can return to our hotel.  So we thought of going to Prater.  According to our map it was not far.  The tram journey proved us wrong.  The tram was written Plater – meaning it ends at Plater, right?. And the map showed the last station being Plater.  It took us about 35minutes to get to where the tram route ends.  But we did not see any board written Plater.   We must have missed something in reading the map, ha!  We jumped off where the tram route ends.  There was a vey huge park with couples taking walks, people drinking and many cyclist. 

 

We sat on the benches and had some snacks.  We don’t know where was this place.  There was no Giant wheel which is the land mark of Prater.  No matter what this place was, it was lovely.  I felt cool breeze away from busy city centre.  After we had enough country breeze, we took a tram back to our hotel.

 

If you are not yet convinced about why I fell head over heels in love with Vienna, let me clarify it for you.  Besides the fact that we got the best hotel at a ridiculously low price, here are some reasons why I am coming back to Vienna.

• The resultants here serves in bigger size than in any country I have been.  If you have a travel bug like I do you know how much you can safe on food with those large servings. Sharing food duh!. 
• Many beautiful monuments next to each other.  Pushing strollers for half an hour to go see a monument that you might not even like is no fun.
• Have I told you about this cold tap water that we found in Hofburg.  I mean, just after we have emptied our water bottle in hot sunny day.  The water from the tap was cold, like water coming from fridge.  Super!
• Shopping, shopping, shopping.  Ok we were in a very expensive area, even at 75% sale those items were still way expensive, but for me to be able to buy some items that means I got a killer sale. 
• The last one is the vibe people.  The city is life and the streets are very clean.  I could not help it but wished for more years to live so I can come back.

 

Take care,
Nez