Vienna, Austria

Halfway through my summer vacation already! Time flies when you’re having fun I guess but we had such a great time exploring Budapest and I think we were starting to get pretty tired. Vienna has a lot of things to see though and it’s much bigger than I thought it would be. Lots of pictures coming up because we saw a lot of things…

We stayed at the Holiday Inn Vienna City and I was pretty excited about it because there was a tub in our bathroom! I love taking baths and since my place in Madrid doesn’t have a tub, I get really happy about hotel bathrooms with tubs. Our room was small but the location was pretty good for walking to the center.

We decided to just walk around the city for our first day so we set off towards the center. Our first stop was Karlskirche, a beautiful baroque church just south of the center. I loved that Vienna had parks everywhere and there were people relaxing. After that we made our way to see the Vienna State Opera, St. Stephen’s Cathedral, Church of St. Peter, Hofburg Palace, the Rathaus, Parliament, and MuseumsQuartier. Along the way we got to walk through some lovely parks and see a statue dedicated to Mozart.

the beautiful exterior of Karlskirche (the inside is nice also!).

the Vienna State Opera House is supposed to be one of the best in the world.

not pictured, loads of people standing in front of St. Stephen’s Cathedral

Hofburg Palace is located right in the center of the city!

sitting in Volksgarten with a great view of the Museum of Natural History.

just thought you’d enjoy a statue of an athlete.

the Rathaus (city hall) in Vienna hosts a film festival all summer!

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and treble clef.

For dinner we decided to try traditional Viennese food. I found a restaurant outside of the center and it seemed to be filled with locals. I had the Wiener Schnitzel, which is a thin, breaded, and pan fried cutlet made of veal, and potato salad. I liked the potato salad a lot because it wasn’t mayo-y and the schnitzel wasn’t too bad either. It’s not paired with any sauce so I squeezed a lot of lemon on it.

my gigantic wiener schnitzel at our romantic dinner.

The next morning, we woke up early to go see and take photos of the Belvedere Palace. It’s nice to enjoy the sights without hundreds of other people with you. You can see the Belvedere and gardens in the photo above around mid-day. After photos we stopped for breakfast since we had an hour before it opened. I had found a cafe called 15 Suesse Minuten that served Kaiserschmarrn, a thick and buttery pancake that is cut up and served with jam. The pancake is pretty big and filling and i suggest sharing one for 2 people. After we returned to the Belvedere, we decided to only visit the inside of the Upper Belvedere, since the Lower Belvedere had temporary exhibits that we weren’t so interested in. In the evening we returned to the Belvedere to watch the sunset before heading back to the city center to walk around.

palace life. always chandeliers everywhere!

lots of art in the Belvedere but this Monet was one of my favorites.

the Hundertwasserhaus – just some cute, quirky, and colorful apartments.

Wednesdays at the Albertina are apparently a big deal – look at all the people!

The next morning we woke up early again to head out to Schonnbrunn Palace. Vienna is like princess paradise since it has 3 palaces! Schonnbrunn Palace and it’s gardens were the largest of all 3 and we spent a good amount of time there exploring. We started off our morning once again taking photos of the palace and gardens before people started arriving by the busload. After, we visited the inside of the palace and it’s definitely the favorite of all the palaces we explored on our trip. Unfortunately there are no photos allowed of the inside but the decor and wallpaper were gorgeous!