I had a WUNDERBAR trip to see Marie as she is studying abroad for the year in Vienna Austria. This blog is mostly pictures--It was SO hard to narrow them down!
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| Eating at a café with Marie. She had a vegetarian dish and I had green peppers stuffed with spiced ground pork, with tomato sauce and potatoes. |
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| Jenny and I at the bakery where we had breakfast several days. |
My traveling companion was Jenny Nofziger, a friend from Pettisville. We met Jenny and her late-husband, Rob, our first year in northwest Ohio when we were working in the Pettisville Food Booth at the Fulton County Fair. Rob and Jenny met when he was in Bolivia (where she grew up) with MCC. Rob died last year around this time of an aggressive cancer. We miss him a lot and I know he would have been thrilled that Jenny came to Austria with me. In fact, when I called her to bounce the idea off her, she said "Yes" right away! She was a fantastic traveling companion and we had lots of good laughs and memories together.
DAY 1. For our first day to help us et over jet lag, Marie took us to wait in line for standing room tickets to see the opera, La Boheme, at the Staatsoper (Vienna State Opera). What a fun experience to tie our scarves onto the leaning railings to hold our places and then see all the different people who did the same!
DAY 2. Marie's church was a fun experience! There were about 60 people there and it seemed that half of them were teenagers or young adults. They were all so friendly--I had a wonderful conversation with two young men about Austria's compulsory military service. They explained to me that young men had to do 6-9 months of military service or civilian service. Gregor, one of the young men, was serving at a home for disabled older adults because he did not pass the test for military service.
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| Marie's church, Baptistengemeinde on Beheimgasse, that meets in an office building. |
We went out to eat at an authentic Viennese restaurant.
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The amazing platter we got to share at the Zwolfapostilekeller (12 Apostles Celler) including frankfurter, smoked pork, blood sausage (not my favorite but good to try one time), grammelknodel (pork craklings in a potato dough ball that is boiled), Fleischknodel (chopped ham in dough ball), and Speckkrautsalat (AMAZING sauerkraut with allspice corns in it). As if this wasn't enough food, we also got Wiener Snitzel with potato salad!
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DAY 3. This is Schonbrunn Palace, where the Austrian royalty lived. We enjoyed seeing SO MANY Rococo style rooms (which means--very fancy!). But we also saw the office (very plain and simple) and toilet of Emporer Franz Joseph :) We enjoyed learning about the famed "Sisi", Franz Joseph's wife, Elizabeth, who had ankle length hair and a tiny waist. She was rarely at the palace but Franz Joseph loved her deeply.
We went to the Belvedere Palace and saw beautiful Expressionist paintings and works by Gustav Klimt, including "The Kiss" for which he is famous. I LOVE art museums!
Marie making a meal for us in her apartment. She shares this kitchen with 6 other young women!
Our room at Kaiser 23, our hostel. Down the hall we had bathrooms (one room with men's stall and a woman's stall) and showers (three with doors you locked). We had a sink in our room.
DAY 4. We took a day trip on the train to Salzburg! "Angel Phamacy"--or Engle!
Hohensalzburg Castle sits above Salzburg. Here you see the dome of a church Salzburg Cathedral. Behind the church we saw Petersfriedhof or St. Peter's Cemetery
-- catacombs and a cemetery. Tucked into the basement of one of the buildings there was a cute little bakery where you could buy a roll straight out of the oven for 1 Euro! So delicious!
One of the reasons we went to Salzburg was to see their Christmas Market! We tried sweets, a sauerkraut sandwich with a ground pork patty, and hot drinks.
DAY 5. I was in Vienna over my 48th birthday and for my birthday, Marie made a walking church tour. It include 17 churches/cathedrals of the first district in Vienna (including a little history about each one and directions). Jenny and I made it to 9 or the 17 before it got too dark to see them. This is a yarn bomb on one of the columns of Karlskirche, the first church we visited. I love it!
Below is me with my church tour standing in front of Karskirche.
Karlskirche had scaffolding all the way to the top of the church. Jenny and I went up an elevator and then climbed the rest of the way. it was awesome to see the frescos up close and see the very top!
On the way to the next church we passed by the well known "Opera Toilet" in the Ubahn station. It plays opera music while you use it. You have to pay .50 Euros for most public toilets in Vienna and a little more for this one and the "Modern Art Toilet" we found later.
Above are horses from the famous Spanish Riding School in Vienna. We walked past them on our church tour.
Pulpit in St. Michael's Church. Below are the steps up to the pulpit. Very interesting to me. . .
Marie's description of this church in her walking tour, "behind the annouying poster on scaffolding is the beautiful Baroque, Roman Catholic church of St. Peter". :)
After enjoying churches all day, we met Marie and invited her friend from Northwestern, Gabe, to the 12 Apostles Cellar (again!) for supper. The food was so good AGAIN, and I even had a man playing violin serenade me :)
DAY 6 The next day we went to the Art History Museum. Here is "The Peasant Wedding" by Pieter Brueghel the Elder. We saw lots of wonderful paintings and also a special exhibit by Lucian Freud, the grandson of Sigmund Freud. His paintings were so interesting--he painted naked people very realistically rather than sexually or idealistically.
Marie in front of her school (IES)--it was once a type of palace/mansion.
The Hundertwasserhaus--an apartment house--so whimsical and fun.
"Modern Art Toilet" by the Hundertwasserhaus.
Highlight of the trip--seeing Marie perform a Shubert piece at her concert with a chamber orchestra!
Some scenes from Jenny's point of view--she was always taking wonderful pictures. Marie and I getting ready to get on the train, navigating in the city center, etc. :)
At Westbahhof station.
I will miss my sweet Marie!
A Real beardman picture for Jess!
Jenny was always stopping to smell and look at the flowers!
DAY 7--Time to go home. . .and we saw this little guy getting on the plane in front of us :)
