Vienna

Sunny this morning so we took a walk to the old town. Sunday morning so no shops open, but a lot of window shoppers. We took pictures of St Stephens and were able to go inside, despite a service going on. Other churches specifically request that you not enter during the service, which seems quite reasonable. There was actually a small orchestra accompanying the choir. Bad sun angle for the photo. The roof was destroyed by fire in WWII, but the townspeople rebuilt it by 1952.

Then we walked down another of the major shopping streets to St Peter's church, turned a corner at Cartier and headed for the Hofburg Palace. Amazing place. In addition to the usual Imperial Apartments exhibit, they also had an exhibit of the Imperial glass, porcelain, and sliver. A lot of which the Empress schlepped around Europe with her in large wooden  chests. Some of the silver is still used for state dinners. No photos allowed in the apartments so I can't share. But these people clearly lived a different sort of life than you and I. Sorry about the reflections. I did not use a flash, but there were windows.

After grabbing lunch at the Hofberg Cafe, we walked over to the Judenplatz to the the Holocaust memorial. There is also a museum built over the ruins of a Medieval synagogue. It was destroyed in 1421, but they have found the foundations, shown here. There is a short film about the Community and the synagogue.

As we left the museum, the sky was darkening and we heard some rumbles so we hightailed it to the closest tram stop. This tram follows the inner ring so it's a good way to see some sights that might be too far to walk. By the time we reached our stop, the rain had let up enough to walk back to the hotel for a rest. And some chocolate gelato on the way. mmmm.

At about 4:45 we headed back out to the Natural History Museum. This museum was started back in 1748 and has over 20 million items. (The Smithsonian claims it has 3 million items.) It has one of the oldest collections in the world and it is housed in an amazing building, as you can see. The first photo is up the main staircase. The next one is from the second floor, looking out over the staircase. And the last one is me and a friend in front of the museum.

Michael found a nice restaurant near the hotel. He had weinerschnitzel and I had a pot au feu with guinea fowl. Prices are definitely higher in Vienna than anywhere else we've been.

Headed for Munich tomorrow for the conference. Next week, Prague.