The American Family Goerss: Vienna

We are overachievers, so exploring Petra and Wadi Rum wasn't enough for us. With a whole week off, we headed to Vienna almost as soon as we got back from the desert. There is an easy, direct flight on Austrian Airlines, and Jeff hadn't been back since his time there in university, so it seemed like it would be a fun experience for all of us.

We got in fairly late, so the girls were delighted to discover that the hotel elevator had little fold down seats.

We stayed at the Bristol Hotel, which is an older hotel, right next to the Opera House. The girls' room was more classically decorated, which was perfect for them, while ours was a bit more modern.

We were all pretty hungry, and luckily the hotel restaurant was still open, so we went down for some dinner.

Elena and I had the wiener schnitzel (of course!), and it was absolutely delicious. I don't know what they put on the potatoes in addition to the ample amount of butter, but they were some of the best potatoes I've ever had in my life.

For turn down service, we got a special Mozart chocolate with a little bio and the next day's weather. It was a lovely start to our Viennese vacation.

The next morning we went back to the restaurant to enjoy their fantastic breakfast spread. They had everything you could think to want for breakfast, including a self-serve mimosa station, and a chef who could make you everything from eggs Benedict to Nutella filled crepes. Everyone was VERY happy.

After filling ourselves up, we stepped outside and admired the Opera House.

Then we walked up a block to the Big Bus stop number 1, where we had our pick of seats for the morning route. We really like starting our city explorations with the bus. It lets us get a feel for the city, and Elena especially loves the narration. In between the narration, they play local music, and in Vienna, it was a real treat.

After spending the morning seeing the sights, we were hungry, so we went down the walking street Kärntner Straße and found a delicious Italian restaurant to fuel up.

We had a lot of fun on the street, mostly window shopping. We got a kick out of this store, because one of our favorite YouTubers has many theories about the Marvel version of Mephisto.

We did go into Benetton and found the girls some cute sweaters. They were a bit expensive, but after living in Malaysia for three years, the girls are definitely in need of clothing that is appropriate for cold weather.

All the walking and shopping made us hungry again, so we stopped at the cafe that Jeff used to study at when he was a student. We had to get the special chocolate cake, but we also got an apple one, because the girls like apples, and I got a wiener melange, which is the Viennese version of a cappuccino, and is absolutely delicious.

We weren't very hungry for dinner, and luckily there was a wurst stand (sausage stand) right outside the hotel for an easy dinner. For dessert, we had a new kind of turn down chocolate. This one featured Empress Sissi and had apricot in it, yum!

The next morning we enjoyed another delicious breakfast. we decided our favorite place to sit was in the enclosed patio. There was lots of light and good people watching.

We had a guided tour scheduled for the Hofburg Palace, and we were able to take our time walking over there. We stopped by St. Stephens on the way. The girls were proudly wearing their new Benetton sweaters.

Our tour of Hofburg was a small group tour of about 16 people. We had headsets and the tour guide spoke into a microphone, so we could hear her even if we weren't right next to her. It was a good system, but meeting up with her was a bit chaotic, because the entire circle in front of the palace was completely torn up and under construction. Jeff managed to get pictures with minimal construction interference.

The tour itself was really interesting. Our tour guide was very knowledgeable and hilariously opinionated about things. She hated Empress Sissi, who she said just used the country's money for her own indulgences, and if people stopped in the middle of the walking area to stare at the rooms instead of moving to the side, she let them have a piece of her mind. It was a lot of fun to go through the palace with her commentary in our ears. The rooms themselves were beautiful and carefully arranged.

Sissi was very proud of her long hair, and had a special exercise "machine" and ablutions routine.

While the interior was lovely, we also appreciated the nice park around the palace, away from the traffic.

We also enjoyed walking around Vienna and exploring the pedestrian only areas.

After a yummy lunch, we did a bit more bus riding, since we had a two day pass.

In the evening, Viv and I got an Uber to the suburbs to meet up with some friends of ours from KL who were at the American school out there. The parents are teachers, and their daughter is friends with Vivian. She was in a school production, so we went to see it. There are lots of vineyards out there.

After the show we went out to a local heuriger.

We had the "new wine" and fried cheese curds. It was delicious!

For our third day in Vienna, we went a little out of the city to visit the Schönbrunn Palace. We had signed up through Viator for another guided tour. We weren't sure exactly how long it would take to get to the palace, so we ended up being a little early for the tour. No problem though, we could take pictures outside, and then grab a coffee and a cake at the local coffee shop.

Conveniently, our tour meeting point was right outside the coffee shop.

This tour started with the gardens. It was fall, so things weren't in full bloom, but it was still pretty.

The inside was really stunning too.

It was a long day with lots of walking, but Elena still had energy for bed aerobics when she got back to the room.

On our last day, our flight back to Amman wasn't until the evening, so we had quite a bit of time to do a little more exploring. We decided to check out the Albertina Museum, since we had walked by it several times in the previous days, and we really liked what they had done with their steps. It turned out to be one of the best museums we have ever been to.

It was just the right size and really interesting. The building it's in used to be a palace, so there are some beautiful rooms still decorated in that style, but then there's enough space for a few other, carefully curated exhibition spaces.

We started on floor -1 with an exhibit of work by Robert Longo. The large pieces looked like photographs, but they were actually charcoal drawings. They were fascinating. There was also a riveting statue that looked like it was about to fall.

Next, we had fun looking around the palace rooms. Vivian loves the chandeliers.

Even those rooms had really interesting art pieces to check out.

Probably the best exhibit was one on Chagall. We learned all kinds of interesting new things about his life that we hadn't known.

There was an exhibit with all kinds of layered paint, which we might have found more interesting if there were more colors involved. The technique was cool though.