Vienna in German is Wien. Every time I read it in German all I see is wine. In German it’s pronounced “ween”. You say wine, I say ween. No, I say wine, you say red or white? And if we happen to be in Vienna I’ll say wiener until my head falls off from childish laughter.
It’s like that time I went to Hamburg and everyone was a hamburger.
Or when I’m in Berlin surrounded by Berliners (a Berliner is a doughnut. Mmmmm, doughnuts.)
(pic above from Dies und das.com)
Okay enough about wieners and hamburgers and doughnuts. Let’s get back to wine, I mean Wien, I mean Vienna. Christian and I had a little bit of time to explore Vienna before and after our trip to Croatia. After our first overnight in Vienna we headed towards St. Charles Church (Karlskirche), an 18th century church with a fantastic view of the painted dome.
(Pic above: What is this? A church for pigs-in-a-blanket? The building has to be at least 3 times bigger than this! Model replica of St. Charles Church and what I believe Zoolander would think about it.)
In order to see the painting on the dome up close, you have to take an elevator which leads to a catwalk which leads to a couple of sets of wooden stairs on a scaffold which could lead to an anxiety attack or a leak in your pants if you hate heights as much as I do. When we stepped off of the elevator I started moving slower then all of the old people already up there. I was literally grasping the rails lining the stairs with sweaty palms. The sweetest thing about Christian at this moment was that he didn’t push me. He didn’t get annoyed with me. I never felt insecure or rushed. He just kept reassuring me that at anytime I wanted to turn around, I could. But I didn’t want to miss out on seeing something I’d never seen before, so I kept climbing. Grandmas and grandpas were passing me on my flight upwards, but I eventually made it. And it was worth it. We were so close to the old paintings on the dome and we could also see a spectacular view of Vienna out of the dome windows.
After our visit to St. Charles Church we had a quick lunch at a sushi restaurant (being pregnant, nothing raw for me) and we headed towards Croatia.
On our way back to Germany from Croatia we had our second overnight stay in Vienna. The following morning afforded us a little bit more time than our first layover in Vienna, so we opted for a hop-on hop-off Vienna bus tour. We chose the Big Bus Tour simply because we had already used the same company when we vacationed in London. We grabbed our audio guides and took front row seats in the upper deck of the bus.
The audio guide always provides a lot of information and history about the city but the only facts that I could hold onto were about Adolf Hitler. We saw a hotel where he used to work and a place he used to live. That just blew my mind for the rest of the tour.
We were close enough to Budapest and Bratislava?! Gah, I need to learn my geography for this part of the world.
(Pics below: Danube River, or in German, the D0nau… Christian said he had no idea what a Danube was. I said I didn’t know what a Donau was. You say Donau, I say Danube.)
The architecture of Vienna is impressive. There are a plethora of sculpted buildings on every corner. Art buildings, government buildings, churches, theaters… you name it, the Wieners got it. And we fully enjoyed what the Wieners had to offer. Tee hee.
Gene-ious Travel 