Vienna 2
Trip Start
Nov 14, 2008
1
44
102
Trip End
Feb 26, 2009
Vienna,
Austria
Sunday, December 28, 2008
I love these walking tours, this one Vicki took and she gave really good descriptions of the sights. Mich mysteriously had urgent photo-checking to do on her camera each time Vicki gave the background and stories about a place. We saw a lot of places, and I decided to spend the next few hours sightseeing on my own before heading to the Schnapps museum.
Spanish Riding School and Sigmund Freud Museum
The Spanish Riding School was conducting its daily training session in the morning, with its horses prancing to Mozart and Strauss music. I felt very cultured being there, even if just for 15 minutes. I could imagine the Viennese aristocrats at this elegant indoor venue enjoying the "adorable ponies" through their monocles.
Next up I headed to the apartment where Sigmund Freud had his practice. The audioguide showed him to be a really intriguing character, and the museum held a lot of his personal antiquities collection. His famous couch wasn't there, but the waiting room and a few other rooms were set up the way he had them.
Schnapps museum
I think everybody in our Contiki group took up this option. The host was a fourth-generation owner of the factory, and was really funny when speaking to us about how they produce the Schnapps (and quite a lot of other alcohol). My favourites were the alcohol with real gold fragments floating around, and the one he only showed the guys, called "Rene Pogel" (read it backwards). At the end we were given samples of Schnapps, absinthe and others. He told us we're meant to have only three shots, but that nobody's counting - so I had eight!
House of Music
I decided to attend tonight's Mozart and Strauss concert at Schonbrunn Palace, but not for the 68 Euro (incl. dinner) that most of the group did. I bought a lower-category ticket for 44, without dinner, giving me more time in the city. I ended up going to the House of Music with Mark and Rachael. It had interactive features explaining how we detect and interpret sounds, a set where you "conduct" the Vienna Philharmonic, and a table where two people roll dice - each bounce becomes a different musical note, with the number on the dice, and the length until the next bounce, determining the pitch and note length - then it's played back, and mine actually sounded pretty nice.
Mozart and Strauss concert at Schonbrunn Palace
I sat with Deutsch and Shanthi in the Orangerie by paying the 9 Euro difference in price, and we were all pretty disappointed with the concert. The first half was all Mozart, which was slow and dull, even with the two opera singers, and the second was more upbeat with Strauss's waltzes. I only recognised about 4 pieces, the best being Strauss's Blue Danube and Radetzky March, but they didn't play Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, Mozart's most recognisable piece. All up a big waste of money, nowhere near as good as the Classical Spectacular I saw in London.
