Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Vienna Day 2

Today is a sightseeing day! We tried to see as much as we could of Vienna!

We first took the underground metro to Schönbrunn Palace, we reached the palace around 9 am. The line wasn't bad at all because it was early in the morning before the tours arrived.  We went in and saw many well decorated rooms too bad photography was prohibited inside the palace so I can only described it with words.  We visited Versailles a week ago and my husband always compared all the palaces to Versailles so I'll try to be fair. In my opinion, Versailles is a lavished palace while Schönbrunn is a simple luxurious palace. Versailles' ceilings are filled with paintings while Schönbrunn's is filled with detailed wood carving patterns painted with gold.  I liked the simplicity but still very luxurious feel in the interior of Schönbrunn. 

After browsing through rooms, we went out to the garden.  The view of the palace from the garden was a great spot for photos!













We spent at least 2.5 hours in Schönbrunn and went back to Karlsplatz‎ for lunch. We ate at Nordsee, a fast-food chain like restaurant with all seafood menu! My husband is a huge fan for seafood so Nordsee was perfect for him. We had the shrimp wraps and sandwiches, both were yummy and fresh!





 After lunch, we walked to St. Stephan's Cathedral and there were a lot of horse carriages:






From St. Stephan's Cathedral, we walked to Hofburg Palace to take some photos:








Then, we walked to Kunsthistorisches Museum (Natural History Museum) but half of the exterior was under construction. So we continued to walk down the street to the Parliament building:



As we were taking pictures of the building, I noticed very colorful flowers across the street.  We went across the street and went into Volksgarten and was shocked! I have never seen so much and so many different kinds of roses in my life! The whole garden was filled with rose bushes, and each bush has a tag with information like when was the bush planted, name, and species.  I could literally spend the whole day here to photograph roses!











After spending at least an hour here photographing roses, we had to leave; many more places to see!  We passed by the Burgtheater:


Across from Burgtheater is the City Hall:


It might seem like we had walked a lot to see all those buildings but actually they were very closed by! Vienna is a very walk-able city! 

We decided to take a break at Cafe Central to have cake and Viennese coffee! The cakes were pieces of art!







After the short break, we walked back to Michaelerplatz and took more photos of the city:


Stairway at the Albertina Museum






Since we have time left, we went to Belvedere Palace, the palace is reachable by public transportation.  We didn't went in the palace because photography was prohibit inside and we wanted to save time so we can take some photos of the exterior and its garden. 









By the time we left Belvedere it was already 6pm so we took the tram back to Karlsplatz and had our dinner at....Nordsee again!




Don't be fooled by those seafood salads price is per 100 gram, they were much heavier than they look but at least they were yummy!

After dinner we went back to our hotel and that concluded our 2 wonderful days in Vienna! Vienna is a wonderful city with awesome architectures and they were very closed by.  I pictured Vienna as an alternative to Paris, if you like the look of Paris but without those people who always in a rush, Vienna is a great alternative!
Next stop and last stop of our trip...Munich!

2 comments:

  1. Hi! I chanced upon your blog while googling for Austria, Hallstatt! Your photos are very beautiful, and Austria is really very pretty! I'm heading Vienna/ Hallstutt/ Salzburg in this July, may I know if you mind sharing any recommendations for food and attractions in these places?:)

    Cheers,
    Clare

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    Replies
    1. Vienna - a tour of the Vienna Opera House, Schönbrunn Palace be there early to avoid crowds from tours, when tired of walking sit down have a piece of cake at Cafe Central, we like Nordsee - a seafood fast food. Dinner at Bettelstudent, the portion was huge so you can share one dish! Don't forget to try their chocolate cake!

      Hallstatt - rent a little boat and view the village from the lake, you can check out details in my blog as well. Hallstatt is too beautiful so you'll for sure enjoy every piece of it!

      Salzburg - go up to Hohensalzburg Fortress! Food there wasn't as good compared to Vienna or maybe we didn't went to the right place and it was expensive.

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