Europe-Vienna 10-13-09

We arrived in Vienna Wednesday morning and went to the Schoenbrunn Palace; once the Habsburg family's summer home (the former Emperor of Austria). We took the tour of the palace and then walked through the gardens and the Gloriette Monument. This visit took most of the day. The grounds were huge. The walk to the fountain and then to the Gloriette Monument took forever. On top of the Monument you could see for miles. To top it off, the weather was perfect!

The next day, we headed for Salzburg, home of Mozart and the Sound of Music. We took the bus to the Old Town centre with lots of old time shops and souvenir vendors. We walked up to Festung Hohensalzburg (a castle). Views were breathtaking! The hillsides were plush green and the mountains were majestic! We envisioned what it would be like to live in the surrounding homes. When we came down the mountain from the castle, we slipped into a couple of cathedrals to look at the artwork.

On Friday, we went to the Lipizzaner Museum, which is a Spanish Riding School. We watched as the horses pranced about in various styles such as a trot, walking sideways and turning in circles. I guess this is what the school considered performances. We kept waiting for the show to begin. Once we discovered that the warm-ups were the actual show, we decided to leave. We went to the Hofburg (another palace of the Emperor), the Kaiserappartements and Sissi Museum and learned about the history of the Empress Elizabeth and how Princess Diana was compared to her – except that Princess Diana didn’t have hair down to her feet and she didn’t spent 2 hours each day brushing her hair. The Empress also spent a full day just washing her hair! We later went to Stephansdom (St. Stephen’s Cathedral); an old gothic church. We took an elevator to the top of one of the towers to get some awesome pictures of the city.