DAY 98 - Vienna: The City of MUSIC (Part 1)

June 25 - My Favorite Composers all Lived Here

We walked down from our host's home to the train to Vienna and on the way we saw lots of big caterpillar bugs.  There were several squooshed ones and many others crawling around after the rain and subsided.

I don't remember ever seeing one of these before.

He really gets long when crawling out - eewww

When we got to the downtown area, I decided to start taking pictures of anything that was having to deal with music. 

Lots of souvenir shops since Mozart spent so much time in Vienna and died here.

A cool kind of Music Machine

"Unsere Garten" (Our Garden) - a functioning clock at the City Gardens

Johann Strauss was a good violinist and a great composer

A music guy, but oops...I forgot to write it down.

Strassenbahn - we enjoyed a pass on this system for two days to see the city

Schubertring - of course we've all heard of Schubert

Beethoven Park and here is the man himself

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832). He is considered by many to be the most important writer in the German language -- and one of the most important thinkers in Western culture.

Goethe Monument

So proud to stand next to my favorite composer - W.A.Mozart

A side view of Mozart's monument

Another lion?  They are in every city!

"How is your back?  After 300 years of this, I'm ready for a different job."

The Spanish Riding School

St. Stephen's Cathedral

Beautiful stained glass windows

We were hoping to hear an organ concert here, but we couldn't find it in time.

Another Medieval City in the middle of the city

We went to a cute little local cafe for lunch and had a delightful soup and I found a couple of children's books to read in German. "I love you" was this one.  Gazpacho soup originates from Spain and you serve it cold.  It is a tomato-based vegetable soup.

Gazpacho and a child's book to read....so good

The waiter and chef was so nice and spoke a little of English

Hungarian Goulash which is popular in Austria as well as Hungary.

Wiener Schnitzel & Potato Salad - a typical Austrian dish

And for dessert....we MUST have Apfil Strudel - FANTASTIC!

Schloss Schonbrunn- the former Imperial family's summer residence.  We took a stroll around the gardens and hiked up to the Gloriette.  We took several pictures from different views - simply breathtaking.
                                      
                                          

The Garden had some mazes that were very cool

DAY 96 & 97 - Surfin' On the Outskirts of Vienna

June 23 & 24 - Luxurious Time with Sigrid

Our gracious Host....Sigrid.  Her name comes from Scandinavia and means "beautiful victory"

She had a beautiful balcony overlooking some fields and into the sunset

What a pleasure it was to stay with her.  We had been in the Balkan countries for the past month and we had met some wonderful people, but their accommodations were not always 10 on a scale of 1 - 10.  Sigrid's apartment was definitely a 10.

Such a cutely decorated living room with a beautiful color on the wall that she did herself.

  We thoroughly enjoyed our time with her:   the knowledge she had of her city, her hospitality, being able to do laundry, and our first two days of rest while the weather was raining off and on.  We also did some couch surfing investigation for our next few weeks of European travel.  We had our own bedroom and it was so very clean.
          
























Her house was spotless with such nice decorations.  She had a top-of-the- line kitchen with such nice appliances and cupboards.  It seems that the white kitchen is what everyone has.  I thought I wanted a wood finish in my new house, but this white is looking better and better.

Sigrid loves her ovens - a convection oven and a different kind that I can't remember the name, but I want one!

 We ate most evening meals together.  We cooked two evenings...Rich's famous Kung-Pao chicken and a very yummy pot of vegetable soup with all kinds of stuff in it.

Our 1st meal - very light and refreshing

Rich made Kung-Pao chicken that we all loved

A hearty soup made from Odile's kitchen and Austrian spices - dee-lish!

 We learned a lot about the history of this area.  Sigrid had such insight.  She talked about the social "green" capitalism and how there was a definite wealthy and a definite poor in Austria now, unlike during the Communistic regime.  She had an interesting family background that encompassed everything.  Her grand parents were part of the end of the famous Austrian-Habsburg emnpire rule.  Her parents came from the Nazi Regime with her father being a member of the S.S., and she was on neutral ground, telling us "it's your responsibility to build your own identity.  Because of our birthrights, etc., we should not look back - we should only go forward."  I think we can all use that bit of advice.

Thank-you Sigrid for your words of wisdom - the world will be better off if we all believe it can be

We go to Vienna tomorrow....can't wait as it is "The City of Music" and you know how much I love Music!