♫ I'll Dance with You in Vienna ♫ (Reprise)

So I messed up the days a little bit - the previous post talked about the National Library, but we actually went there on our second day in Vienna. It's no matter, though, because I can easily spend this entire post raving about Volksgarten and Vienna's best cordon bleu schnitzel and apfelstrudel. This morning we work up tired... by the time we were all ready, it was 10:25 and the hostel breakfast ends at 10:30. We were those people... much to the dismay of some of the hostel staff who seemed to make quite a show of cleaning up all the tables around us. Ugh, whatever, we needed food and we cleaned up after ourselves and still weren't the last people out of there. Our tour guide yesterday had mentioned a flea market that takes place on Saturdays near the hostel so we decided to check that out and maybe pick up cool souvenirs... I was thinking it'd be like a craft fair sort of thing... boy was I wrong. It kind of looked like overturned dumpsters with people sifting through to find something worth anything more than trash. Okay maybe it wasn't that bad... but at best, it looked like the world's largest garage sale. Piles of junk everywhere... and massive crowds (watch your wallet). We quickly realized that we wouldn't be getting any souvenirs there, so we moved on.

Flea market rubbish

A hunting bust (this kind of looks like our goat friend we met in Rothenberg...) and some running shoes anyone?

Besides the flea market, this post really is just going to be about schnitzel, strudel and roses... These are a few of my favorite things ♫ ♫ We walked to the cafe that was supposed to have some of the best apple strudel in Vienna according to our walking tour guide from the day before. The cafe was called Cafe Tirolerhof... and we have no idea if this was the best apple strudel in Vienna... but it was darn good! Viennese cafes have... I don't know how else to describe it, other than an entire culture all of their own. When you go to a cafe, you seat yourself... and you don't wave to the servers... they'll just come to you when they feel like it. If they're rude, that's normal! They're all rude... that's part of the culture. So we sat down at Cafe Tirolerhof and ordered Weiner Melange, strudel and Sacher Torte. Weiner Melange (Viennese blend) is like a larger cappuccino; it was described to us as coffee with steamed milk, but it was strong like it was made with espresso (that's a good thing!). I don't think you can get weak coffee anywhere in Europe, anyway. The story with the Sacher Torte is that it's a famous, traditional Viennese cake that you can get at most all the cafes in Vienna. However, the fanciest (and most expensive) place you can get it is the Sacher Hotel Cafe. All the reviews and opinions that we've heard and read said that this was an expensive and overrated place to get this mediocre cake... so we didn't bother. But we had to try it! Surprise... it was mediocre. Lol. It's this dry chocolate cake with apricot spread between the layers. It was fine. The strudel was far better! 

Feasting on cakes and strudel

Emily ordered a traditional yeast dumpling with plum filling covered in poppyseeds and swimming in butter. Sounds weird, but this thing was AMAZING. I looked it up later and found out it's called an Austrian Knodel (which is just dumpling). We didn't take any pictures of it because we all ate it before we could get a camera out... but here it what it looked like from a picture online (yes it's like as big as your face):

Afterward, we walked about 15 minutes to Volksgarten which is probably my favorite spot in any city that I've been to. There are thousands and thousands of roses of all colors and sizes... just as beautiful... if not more beautiful than I remember it. As you would expect, there was live music playing: two guys playing accordions wearing those crazy horse head masks. Besides the goofy masks, the music set a really nice ambiance for the whole garden. I tried to get Andy to prance through the roses like he did three years ago but he refused... I guess our prancing days are over. The boys parked themselves in a shady spot under a big tree while Emily and I wandered around appreciating all the hard work that went into the beauty of this garden (I hear roses are not easy to take care of). 

FLASHBACK: Andy prances, 2013

Another FLASHBACK: Sitting pretty, 2013

Sitting pretty, 2016 :D (same shoes!)

Boys like to stop and smell the roses too

Even Eric. 

Gorgeous shot with City Hall in the backdrop

The pictures don't do it justice

The perfect rose

I could have sat here all day... and I tried. They had to drag me out. When we were wandering around the area, I made sure we walked through the rose garden as many times as possible. This was actually when we went to the National Library... but I talked about that in the previous post! So skip ahead to dinner and we're on our final adventure of both of our epic European adventures, 2016 edition: the best schnitzel in Vienna. A little background: Emily and I planned our itineraries so that we could meet for two days in Vienna before flying back to Chicago. Their adventures took them to the Black Forest and Freiberg, Munich and Füssen, Nuremberg, Prague and finally, Vienna. They even managed to not accidentally take a hike down the mountain on a mud trail in Füssen, like we did (reference my old post called Off the Beaten Path), I'm so proud :P All of our adventures over the past ten days have all led up this final one... Vienna's best schnitzel: Schnitzelwirt. Walking there took us through a pretty cool shopping district that we had never been to (Neubaugasse) which had plenty more busking musicians to enjoy on yet another vibrant Viennese pedestrian street (there are so many). Andy always throws euros in the jars of the buskers playing the most interesting music :) He's even been known to buy a CD from time to time (Barcelona, Parc Guell guitarist). 

Someone let the secret out about the best schnitzel because there were no tables available outside!! Determined, we paced the block a few times... and then loitered until someone left. It took an awkward amount of time, but it was worth it. As soon as we saw plates of food go by, we knew it would be. There was plenty of seating inside, but it's always so hot and stuffy inside restaurants. Outside is the prime location and worth waiting for. Feast your eyes on our last European dinner before going home... perhaps it was the best :)

Cordon Bleu Schnitzel... basically it's a pork chop pounded thin, filled with cheese and ham, coated and fried. It doesn't get much better than this... haha. 

And that wraps up our trip... this is where I leave it... in Vienna, the city of love, life, music and schnitzel. One last really cool thing I want to mention! They changed all their pedestrian walk signs to be gay, lesbian and straight... which I thought was adorable. We saw all the combinations but here are pictures of the female couple pedestrian signs! We love the little hearts... this city makes my heart happy. 

Photo courtesy of Emily... it's somewhat questionable to be standing in the street taking pictures of the crossing signs before actually getting out of the intersection, lol. I'm glad she did it though!

<3 <3

Once we were back at the hostel, we had a drink at the local bar next door, since they had tables outside, before retreating into the hot hostel bar and amusing ourselves with people playing giant Jenga. We once again stayed up too late and sadly packed our bags because we had to leave for the airport at about 4:30am. 

Auf Wiedersehen, Wein... und Deutschland. Until next time... and there is always a next time. 

I am a Gentleman, Not a Soap Boiler

When you're home from a trip, does it ever feel funny to think about how the places you visit continue on in the same way as though you were never there? All the wonderful places you visit continue being wonderful even when you aren't visiting them... for example, someone is probably eating a hot dog in a pretzel loaf in Switzerland or sitting on the beach in Puerto Vallarta or having pancakes in Stockholm... even though I haven't been to any of those places or done those things in a year or more... someone else is. I don't know why I think about that because it usually just makes me sad :P Anyway, Vienna is exactly as I remembered it being as though it didn't skip a beat. I remembered it as the most vibrant and colorful city I've ever been to (and not just because they fly rainbow banners from City Hall). Between locals, students and tourists, Vienna's streets and parks are always overflowing with life; music can be heard around every corner and options for eating and drinking are endless from the hundreds of cafes to food trucks and Weiner stands. It's a city that feels more lived in than simply existing for history and tourist attractions. It's easy to immerse yourself in the hustle and bustle and become part of the city rather than just visitor. Vienna welcomes you with open arms and live music to live for two days or for forever... and when you're not there... Vienna waits for you.  (No I did not purposely work in that quote... it just worked out nicely, didn't it?)

I don't have enough good words for this city. Andy asked me once why I describe Vienna as my favorite city in the world, but I didn't really know how to answer. I said because the way it makes me feel when I'm there. My heart just feels lighter and the city just feels so alive that it's contagious. There really is music playing everywhere. Maybe that has something to do with it? I've also always had gorgeous weather when I'm there which creates this illusion (that I prefer not to break right now) that Vienna is 75 and sunny every day of the year.

We arrived late Thursday night by train through the beautiful German and Austrian countryside. From Nuremberg, it's four hours and about forty five minutes to get to Vienna... actually faster than driving, though. Our hostel is so close to Naschmarkt that you could fall out of your bed and be handed a free falafel by the workers (if you're lucky, they'll dunk it in hummus first). Unfortunately, it's a far walk from the train station and it was 10pm by the time we arrived, so we took the subway... only three stops but two different lines. Eric and Emily were supposed to arrive in the morning, so we figured we'd get a drink at the bar before bed... since it was gin and tonic night. How do you turn that down, right? TWO gin and tonics for €5.50... two! The night got away from us... as you'd expect on gin and tonic night. We made some great new friends at the bar - Maria and Hiasl from southern Germany. Hours of discussion ranging from school, engineering, language to politics... American politics... German politics, Austrian politics, French politics... several gin and tonics and maybe a pint of beer later... we were being kicked out of the bar. Ooops... Eric and Emily were supposed to arrive in like 4.5 hours... ehhh, vacation. Memories are more important than sleep (and everyone wonders why I say I need a stay-cation after my vacations... it's because we don't sleep).

We woke up groggily about 5 hours later when Emily messaged us that they had arrived. They came in on a night train from Prague (don't take night trains, we all decided they're a bad choice... lucky for Andy and I, we decided that before we ever booked one. hehe). Since we had a private room and check out wasn't until 10, we all took turns showering before heading in search of breakfast made up completely of apple strudel... and coffee. Don't forget the coffee. We dumped all our luggage in storage as we won't be able to check into our 4-bed room until later. We found strudel really close by inside Naschmarkt, snarfed it down and then headed back to the hostel for the free walking tour. Breakfast of champions.

This walking tour was great but it was looooooooooong. It was given by a guy who is extremely passionate about history, culture and most of all... the history and culture of Vienna :P We didn't do a tour the last time we were in this city, so I think we quite enjoyed learning about all the beautiful buildings were were looking at. Probably the most invaluable part of the tour was our guide telling us where to get the best ice cream, apple strudel and schnitzel at the end. And if you're wondering if we possibly made it to all three places... yes. yes we did.

Where was that schnitzel place again? How many engineers does it take to read a map... ;)

"Found it" ... just kidding, we were looking for the National Library.

This statue is rather violent

It wouldn't be Vienna without festivals, food and music around every corner

City Hall!

Parliament

National Library! This was our first time here, it's €7 to get in, which was a little high but we're glad we did it. Besides it being a massive, beautiful library with a ceiling adorned with frescos, the museum portion is dedicated to the life of Habsburg emperor Franz Joseph I

The library is located in Hofburg Palace which housed all the monarchs from the Habsburg dynasty... can you imagine living here?

This was our first time seeing this building too! It's another concert house that's also used by the University of Vienna. 

"hey guys turn around"

That night we went to the opera at Vienna State Opera (Weiner Straatsoper)... We had bought our tickets months ago for nearly $100 each for decent seats. You can pay maybe €3ish for standing room tickets if you want to wait in line, though! Real tickets range from about €30 to €200... we weren't messing around this time. If you've heard about my last trip to Vienna... we bought really questionable concert tickets from guys on the street dressed like Mozart (don't do that!). You can buy your opera tickets online up to three months in advance and then you just pick them up at will call one hour before the show (just bring your confirmation). We picked up our tickets and then went and ate "the best" ice cream (as recommended by our tour guide) while killing time before the show.

The opera we were seeing was Der Rosenkavalier by Richard Strauss which premiered in 1911. The opera is in German, but each seat had a small screen producing subtitles in either German or English. Some of the translations were so comical, you had to wonder how accurate they were... although Der Rosenkavalier is a satire. At one point the main male role says "You're talking to a gentleman, not a soap boiler!"

If we do the opera again, it'll probably be in winter... much like all the other buildings in Germany and Austria, the opera house did not have any AC running. We're SO used to AC, you really realize how hot building with a lot of people can get without it. We were sweating throughout the show... fortunately we could spend the intermissions on the rooftop terrace where it was significantly cooler.

FLASHBACK: Concert hall of tickets we bought from the Mozart guys on the street (2013)

Vienna State Opera, 2016 :)

View from our seats

Rooftop terrace

View from the terrace

More of the terrace

After the show we drank wine and ate Weiners in loaves (not a pretzel loaf though) in the square across the street. Our walking tour guide said that it gets swarmed after the opera lets out every night and many people (including the musicians) congregate there to drink wine and discuss the show. Sure enough, the line was super long by the time we got there but it was well worth it. We didn't meet any musicians though... 

It was nearly midnight by the time we got back to the hostel bar (it was rum and coke night... gross... every night should be gin and tonic night) and we didn't last too long before heading to bed. It was our last night to sleep in; I still had a rose garden to see the next morning and we still had the best apple strudel and schnitzel to eat. It was a wonderful night to be in the most wonderful city.

Weißer Spargel in the Rain

Nuremberg is gray and rainy and I already miss our car as we trudge through the mist to get from the main train station to our hostel... luckily it's less than a ten minute walk. The main street outside the station is jammed with tram and car traffic, so pedestrian traffic is funneled underground through the subway station. We exit on the other side through a corridor where what looked like a group of junkies were hanging out waiting for a fix. We made a note not to return to this station at night... or ever.

We arrived at our hostel and put our bags in luggage storage, and after consulting the guide book, we decided to visit the Nazi Party Rally Grounds (Dokumentationzentrum). This location not only hosted the Nazi Rallies, but it made Nuremberg the face of the Nazi party by drawing in thousands of people from all over the country for parades, dance festivals and various displays of military power. The museum here, Fascination and Terror (Fazination und Gewalt), is located in the unfinished remains of what would have been Congress Hall. I highly recommend this museum - it's extremely informative and has a lot details that you won't learn about in school history books. It's about a 10-15 minute tram ride out of the city center and we thought it was well worth the trip.

Front of Fascination and Terror museum 

 From inside the center of Congress Hall

 Congress hall from across the lake

These grounds were supposed carry extremely large scale venues where Hitler thought would host the every single olympic games following his win of WW2. That sounded absurd when I first read it, but maybe it's not such a bad idea now to have one location for the olympics... but that's a different story. The fantastically large Zeppelin Field is now used for music festivals like Rock in the Park which was happening June 3rd-5th (just missed it! so many good bands too... August Burns Red, We Came as Romans, Of Mice and Men... Red Hot Chili Peppers... VOLBEAT... okay I'm off track again). Anyway because of all the great bands in town, we couldn't see Zeppelin Field up close... and then due the cold rain, which was now coming down pretty hard, we decided not to complete our walk around the other side of the Congress Hall and down to the big parade strip and to the actual rally grounds. What's really just incredible is just the scale of this architecture. Much of it didn't get finished, but the museum showed detailed plans for what would have been a sports arena (for soccer/football and other sports) designed to hold 400,000 people... and that was just one arena in this vast complex. To help describe the sheer size of this entire area, this is what it looked like during a Nazi rally:

Once we returned the city, we went to Istanbul Restaurant for some tasty kebabs and hummus... the pitas at this place are to die for, and you get the cutest little glass of tea with every meal! Cash only though... that was embarrassing. We definitely meant to go to an ATM before getting food but we totally forgot and of course this place was cash only. Andy had to sit and sweat while I ran across the street in search of an ATM. Fortunately there was one close by! 

 Our post-meal tea!

We were able to check into our room soon after that and we proceeded to take a nap in the comfiest hostel bed (or maybe any bed) we've ever been in. The plan was to go to the German National Museum later because it just happened to be Wednesday and that museum is free on Wednesdays after 6! This was a good day for museums because this was another great experience! I'm sorry I didn't take any pictures of the square around it because it was really quite nice. It was also a nice change of pace to learn a bit about Germany history that didn't involve the Nazis. We left the museum around 9pm when it closed and went in search of some sort of night life... we found nothing except closed shops and a few rough looking characters walking around. Must have been the location... never stay in the museum/shopping district if you like nightlife. It wasn't the end of the world though, we just went back to the hostel and settled for a beer on the still-damp-from-all-the-rain terrace. 

The next morning we slept in and enjoyed that room and our late check out. Once we were all packed up, we checked out, threw out luggage back in storage and headed out to start the day right with cupcakes and cappuccinos for breakfast at Fortezza espresso bar and into Hauptmarkt... this is where the biggest Christmas market in Germany is every year! 

 In the summer it's a giant produce market! For €3.50, we bought these giant falafel wraps packed with veggies and falafel fried to order. SO GOOD. 

 Frauen Kirche

Inside the church

The constant rain/mist is getting kind of annoying but we carried on to go up to see the Imperial Castle. I guess we decided we had seen enough castles in Rheinland because we climbed up to where the castle was but didn't want to pay the entrance fee to go inside. Near this area is an art bunker that they used to safeguard many of this city's famous art pieces during the war. We didn't get a chance to visit it but learning about it made me really appreciate all the ancient relics of German history that we saw the night before in the German National Museum, as well as inside the churches throughout the city. Without this art bunker, who knows what would have been lost. Nuremberg was also fortunate (if you could call it that) that it was bombed later in the war so people working to protect the art pieces knew what to expect after the northern cities had already been bombed....

 Wandering around the Imperial Castle

 View of St Lawrence Church from the top!

We had lunch at Bratwursthäusle where we had, believe it or not, our first bratwurst on this trip and our first weißer Spargel ever! (White asparagus!) After lunch we went for a last walk to kill some time... we had a 4:30 to Vienna... so we walked around the opera house near our hostel and noticed the DB museum... Deustche Bahn or the German Railway museum. Too bad Edwin wasn't with us... I bet they had a few high speed train connectors in there! With that, we bid Nürnberg and its lousy weather farewell as we headed off to the actual train station to make our final stop in Vienna. 

 Bratwurst, Kartoffelsalat und weißer Spargel :)

 St Lawrence Church (St Lorenz Kirche)

Opera house: view from our hostel room

Pretzel sandwiches on the train!