Blog by jo

Museum of Fine Arts

Vienna completely desensitises you to massive, grand buildings. The Museum of Fine Arts, Hofburg, Opera house, Parliament building and City Hall are just some of the monumental structures scattered throughout the city centre. Each is impressive on their own, but put them next to each other and it all looks a little unbelievable. Combine these buildings with lush parks – filled with huge shady trees and bright flowers arranged in intricate patterns – and you find yourself in one beautiful city.

Hofburg (Imperial Palace)

We arrived in Vienna on Wednesday 16 April after a two and a half hour train trip from Salzburg, and started seeing the sights right away. What I enjoyed from the beginning, and frequently during our stay, was strolling past the Museum of Fine Arts and City Hall, and through the Volksgarden.

Volksgarden

A must-see sight in Vienna is the Schloss Schönbrunn, the Habsburg monarch’s summer palace. It is a little out of the city, but was easy to get to using the metro. Unfortunately the flower garden in front of the palace had not been fully planted when we were there, so we didn’t get quite the full effect. However, it’s fair to say the grounds were spectacular all the same. After walking around, and taking lots of pictures, we also went through the maze and labyrinth, which was a bit of fun.

View of the Schloss Schönbrunn from the Gloriette Monument on the other side of the palace gardens

View of the Gloriette Monument from just in front of the Schloss Schönbrunn

Not only is Vienna easy to cycle around, but it also supplies city bikes. At stations throughout the city, you can register at the terminals using your credit card and this releases one of the bikes that is locked up nearby for your use. The bike can be returned by locking it up at any of the stations dotted around the city centre, and there is no charge if it is returned within two hours. We found them very handy to ride out to the Sigmund Freud museum, which was an interesting museum to learn a bit more about the life of Freud. Although, to my disappointment, the museum did not pay much attention to the details of his work.

City bikes

Cycle path that goes around the city

As luck would have it, a friend from the UK was in Austria while we were there and spent the weekend with us in Vienna. The weather was sensational, and much time was spent outdoors – chatting, eating and drinking. On Saturday, we wandered the Naschmarkt, which was filled with delightful foods and trashy wares. I don’t know who purchases shower heads from a market, but there were plenty for sale.

A bike festival was also held that weekend outside the City Hall. There were some impressive jumps, with even more impressive riders doing stunts against the somewhat incongruous backdrop of the ornate City Hall.

Rider at the bike festival going over a jump in front of the City Hall

Our best meal in Vienna was at a cafe right near our hotel on the first night. I had a chicken risotto, but Mikey had the more interesting spinach and polenta strudel.

Spinach and polenta strudel

Of course, being famous for the Wiener schnitzel (which means Viennese cutlet) and the sacher torte, we also tried both of those during our stay. We went to a schnitzel restaurant one night and valiantly tried to finish the meal put in front of us…but alas we were both unsuccessful.

Schnitzel (hand provided for scale)

Our time in Vienna was thoroughly enjoyable – a city very worthy of a visit.

Gardens in front of the Hofburg, with City Hall peeking out from behind the trees

Salzburg

In Europe, at least in all the places we’ve been on this trip, the shops are shut on Sundays so it’s a good day to be on a train. On 13 April, we left the land of mayonnaise and flat pillows (Germany) for an 8 hour train trip to Salzburg, Austria. It sounds like a long time, but the train was really comfortable and by the time my book was finished and Mikey’s coding completed we were there.

Our first tourist destination was Festung Hohensalzburg, a castle fortress built in 1077. It is perched atop a hill and provides the best views of the city of Salzburg on one side, and the mountains on the other. It was wonderful to sit in the sun and look out over the fields and mountain range. The hills were alive with the Sound of Music!

View of the mountains from Festung Hohensalzburg

Yes, Salzburg prides itself on being featured in the famous movie, The Sound of Music. For an arm and a leg, you can take the ‘Sound of Music’ tour and see the locations which appear in the movie. Having not seen the movie, it didn’t mean much to me. Apparently, some hard core Sound of Music and Julie Andrews fans take these tours with great enthuasiasm. The two main locations from Salzburg that are in the film are the formal gardens of Schloss Mirabell and the Stift Nonnberg, which is apparently where the movie first encounters ‘Maria’.

The formal gardens at Schloss Mirabell

Stift Nonnberg

Both Mikey and I were thrilled to get our first full day of warm weather in Salzburg. Spring seems to be on its way, and this was the perfect place to enjoy it as Salzburg has plenty of gardens, park benches and lawns on which to soak up the sun.

When the weather got cool again, we headed inside and toured St Peterskirche, a church/abbey dating from 847 AD. It was our first look at an Austrian church, and it seemed to be a lot more white and have a lot more altars than most church/cathedrals I’ve been in lately.

St Peterskirche

Of course, the other thing that Salzburg is famous for is Mozart. Both Mozart’s birthplace and residence (until he was 24 years) was here, although – unfortunately for Salzburg – Mozart couldn’t wait to leave. Still, this doesn’t seem to bother the people of Salzburg, who make the most out of this piece of history.

Mozart’s Wohnhaus (residence) included a sound and film museum that showed a short film about his life up until he left Salzburg and displayed some of the pianos he played as a teenager. Strangely, no information was provided about his later life. No mention of his wife and children. It was a rather selective recounting of his life, which was disappointing. Mozart’s Geburtshaus (birthplace) was, quite simply, weird. This may sound harsh, but there was really nothing of value there. For example, one room had paintings of Salzburg upside on the walls to illustrate how Mozart saw things from a unique perspective. ??? They also had a freaky looking doll in a cradle that was supposed to be Mozart as an infant. The Mozart Geburtshaus was one of the poorest attempts of getting money out of tourists that I’ve ever seen. It was worse than the mozart ties and violin magnets available on every street corner.

Despite this unfortunate tourist attraction, there was a lot to like about a little town like Salzburg. It was easy to get around, yet lots of places to go and plenty of different foods to eat (good Italian and Japanese). It is incredibly pretty, especially with the river running through the city and all the well-kept gardens. The people were lovely and it seemed, not only were they used to tourists, they were happy to have them around. Salzburg seemed to embrace its history and set its own pace, and its hard not to like that.

Our first night in Salzburg, with the Festung Hohensalzburg in the background

Prior to leaving Australia, I was given an assignment – to try a hamburger from Hamburg. Or maybe it was to find out if hamburgers were from Hamburg. I don’t really remember, so it may just have been to take a picture of one.

Anyway, Mikey and I spent about 15 minutes changing trains at the Hamburg train station when travelling from Copenhagen to Berlin. Unfortunately, during that time I was unable (and perhaps unwilling) to seek out an authentic Hamburg hamburger. So, in order to complete my assignment, I offer the following photo of a real German hamburger that I had while I was in Tübingen. And according to Wikipedia, the hamburger was named after the Hamburg steak, that originated in Hamburg. Assignment completed.

And, as I am getting a few requests for more photos of food, here is a picture of a couple of delicious patisserie tarts (lemon merigue and berry) that we had in the gourmet eatery at the Galerie Lafayette store in Berlin. A prelude to Paris….

View of Berlin from the top of the Reichstag (parliament building), showing the Brandenburg gate in the foreground.

Getting to Berlin was an adventure. We took the train from Copenhagen last Wednesday (9 April), expecting that we would need to exit our train once we reached the edge of Denmark, take a ferry to mainland Germany and then board a train on the other side. Not so. Our very large train boarded the ferry with us. It seemed crazy. We exited the train once on the ferry, and had 45 minutes to shop or grab some food before boarding the train again before the ferry reached Germany. It certainly made it a hassle free trip for us.

I’m just going to make a quick comment about currency – It was nice to get rid of our Danish kroner and start using Euros again. It seems silly to me that Denmark doesn’t convert to Euros (although even more so that Switzerland still uses Swiss francs – they are in the middle of Europe for crying out loud!!). While I strongly dislike having 1 and 2 cent pieces, Danish currency uses coins for up to 20 kroner (about $4.50 AUD) so there were a lot of coins to carry around. However, Denmark being expensive did help to lighten the purse.

It was a six and a half hour trip to Berlin from Copenhagen, so we didn’t do much exploring till the next day. The Brandenburg gate was one of my favourite spots, considered by some to be a symbol of freedom and unity in Berlin (unfortunately the only close up photo we took of it was out of focus). I was intrigued by the Holocaust Memorial, which consists of a field of concrete blocks. It is an abstract memorial, of which there are varying interpretations, and is dedicated to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust from all over Europe. The information centre, built underneath the memorial, focuses on the stories of individuals and family who were affected, and includes personal letters recounting their feels and experiences during the Holocaust.

Holocaust Memorial

Checkpoint Charlie – the crossing point between East and West Berlin during the Cold War – was a comical site and obviously only remains for the tourists these days. For €1, you could get your photo with a solider at the checkpoint and, if you paid a little more, could get a stamp in your passport for East Berlin. I love getting stamps in my passport…but this was going a little too far. It was hard to imagine that, in the days of the Berlin wall, this would have been a site of incredible tension, particularly during the stand-off between the Soviet Union and the U.S. in 1961.

Checkpoint Charlie

We did plenty of walking around during our three full days in Berlin, particularly when we could not find the Stasi museum. We eventually found it, although as soon as we got inside I ignored the exhibits in favour of sitting down. There was some cool stuff on display, including old spy cameras that were cutting edge technology back in the day.

Stasi museum – watch as a hidden microphone

Although it was cold and wet for most of our time here, we got a break in the weather to enjoy the Tiergarten (gardens) next to the Brandenburg gate on our last full day. We also lined up to get into the Reichstag (Parliament building) and took the lift to the large glass dome built on the roof to see spectacular views over Berlin.

Tier garten

The Reichstag is an incredible sight, successfully mixing historic and modern styles of architecture. The large columns at the front, the towers bearing flags on all the corners and its sheer size makes the building an imposing sight. Yet the glass dome softens this picture by exposing the activity inside, so you can see all the people walking up the ramps within to the top of the cupola. The dome is said to symbolise the importance the Parliament places on transparency, and together with the 1916 inscription appearing on the architrave “Dem Deutschen Volke” (To the German people” or “For the German people”), the Reichstag seems to represent – both visually and actually – the best of Germany’s political past.

Reichstag

The skyline of Berlin is dotted with cranes, and new buildings regularly appear. It seems to be a progressive place that is eager to grow and, perhaps, reinvent itself. The lonely planet describes it as the “European Shanghai”, and I’d have to agree with this description. It is a place of diversity. Away from the significant historic sites, it is a city that looks like it could be the capital of any of a dozen different countries around the world. It was a fascinating place to be.

Dome on the roof of the Reichstag

Nyhavn canal

Copenhagen is a cosy city. It is not very big compared to most capital cities, but then the population of Denmark is only about 5 million. It is easy to walk around and see all the sites without having to catch the metro. Many cafes and restaurants are set below the level of the sidewalk, so there are many stairwells leading down to doors and the ground floor windows are at feet level. Inside you can see the people gathered, laughing and chatting by candle light. It really is cosy.

On Friday 4 April, we got a lift to the Stuttgart airport and flew to Copenhagen, Denmark. It was only an hour and a half flight, but as we left at about 8pm we didn’t reach our hotel until after 10pm.

We toured the main sights on Saturday, including the Radhaus (city hall) and central square, the Nyhavn canal (house 67 on the canal was once the home of Hans Christian Anderson), Amaliehaven (palace gardens), Amalienborg slot (palaces of the Royal Family) and the statue of the Little Mermaid.

One of the three palaces of the Royal Family that are situated on this square (not sure if this one is Mary’s)

After walking through the large parks near the centre of the city, we took a tour of the Royal Treasury. The armed guards and their huge guns tipped us off that the jewels on display were the real deal, including the Queen’s Crown.

The Treasury was in the basement of this castle

On Sunday, we had a look at the Dansk Design Centre that displays products of ‘typical Scandanavian design’, which I’d describe as innovative designs of functional items using clean simple lines. In short, an extremely expensive version of IKEA. The centre claimed Denmark to be a leader in innovative designs, although quite a few of the products displayed were by Swedish designers. I really like the simple designs of the products (lamps, bowls, vases etc) but I think the items were terribly overpriced. It has only been open since 2006, so we’ll see how successful it becomes…

We also looked at a couple of churches, including Vor Frue Kirke (where Prince Fredrick and Princess Mary were married). The churches were large, with very high ceilings, and not overly ornate, which I particularly liked (must be that clean Scandanavian design).

Vor Frue Kirke

We briefly left the EU when we entered Christiania (at least that is what the sign said). The ‘free state’ of Christiania was established in 1971 when squatters took over a 41-hectare abandoned military camp in the eastern part of Copenhagen. While the government tried to move the squatters, the hippie revolution prevailed and about 1,000 people settled there to live communally with few constraints (ie laws). They established their own schools, businesses, homes and recycling programs, facing some problems when the free-law approach attracted those with serious drug problems. Hard drugs are now banned, but apparently dope can still be bought on Pusher St. This seems to be the main street. Many signs indicate that taking photos is not allowed on Pusher St, and the market place sells primarily bongs along with a bit of handmade jewellery. It wasn’t the nicest place to be, especially when I saw the signs specifically warning “Please don’t pee here”. It is expected that the government won’t let this social experiment continue for too much longer as Christiania is on prime real estate and some Danes are resenting the community’s rent-free tax-free situation.

One of the streets in Christiania

The next day we had a look inside the Rathaus and climbed the tower to get an excellent view of Copenhagen. I also really enjoyed visiting the University library. It was just the way I’ve always thought a library should be. Old and imposing. The kind of place where it doesn’t feel appropriate to talk. Ladders to reach high shelves. A balcony. Stained glass windows. Wood everywhere.

University library

On our last full day in Denmark, we avoided the rain and had a look at a couple of exhibits at the National Museum. Then we went to the Christiansborg, which includes the parliament, government offices (including the Prime Minister’s office), a large church and the Royal Reception chambers. After a few attempts, we finally got ourselves to the Royal Reception Chambers at the right time for an English tour. The Chambers are currently used by the Queen for royal banquets and state dinners. The tour was excellent and the Throne room, Great Hall and Queen’s library were particularly impressive rooms. The Great Hall was filled with tapestries depicting scenes from the Viking era to the present day. The final tapestry was a collage of famous faces (like JFK and Einstein) and scenes from the last 100 years (like World War II and landing on the moon). It looked strange to have such a modern scene as a tapestry. Anyway, we enjoyed the tour and didn’t even mind having to cover our shoes with big orange slippers to protect the floor.

I think the weather/season prevented us from seeing a more beautiful Copenhagen, which I imagine would look quite amazing when all the flowers are in full bloom. I felt we didn’t quite get as good a feel for the place because a lot of boutique shops, cute cafes and the like seem to be hidden away (its part of that cosiness), and so I think Copenhagen is one place where having a local person to show you around is particularly helpful. Having said that, there was plenty to see and we found Copenhagen a lovely place to be.

Mikey with Hans Christian Anderson

Mikey is now on holidays and its planes, trains and automobiles for us for the next 4 weeks. Yay! After painstakingly whittling down our wishlist of places to see (which seems to be getting longer rather than shorter), we are heading to the following locations:

4-9 April Copenhagen, Denmark

9-13 April Berlin, Germany

13-16 April Salzberg, Austria

16-21 April Vienna, Austria

21-25 April Milan, Italy

25-28 April Marseille, France

28-1 May Avignon, France

1-4 May Paris, France

4-5 May Frankfurt, Germany

Most of these places we have never visited, although Mikey has been to Vienna and we have both been to Paris. We are particularly looking forward to Austria and spending some time in the south of France. Hopefully we will get some warmer weather as we go along. It has been pretty cold so far (10°C is a warm day).

On 5 May, we fly from Frankfurt to Austin, Texas – where Mikey goes back to work – and then we head home to Australia at the end of May/start of June.

I’m not sure how much access we will have to the internet while we are on the road, so my blogs may be posted in bursts…

Before Mikey went on holidays – and we left Germany to tour Europe – we spent our last weekend in Tübingen (29-30 March), the little town we called home for two months. I picked up a ‘historic tour of Tübingen’ map from the Visitor’s Information Centre and roughly translated it into English using Google translate and a couple of Tübingen websites. So, on Saturday, I decided to take Mikey on a historic tour of Tübingen.

The weather was good, and Mikey was pretty forgiving all the times I realised I had not been looking at the map and we had missed the next turn. Many of the sights we had already seen, but it was nice to see them while learning a bit about their history ie. the City Hall, the Collegiate church and Tübingen’s castle.

Tübingen’s Rathaus (City Hall)

Mikey also took some nice photos of Tubingen in black and white and posted them on our site.

Tübingen in black and white

About 6km out of Tübingen is the Bebenhausen Monastry, so we drove out there after we had finished our historic tour. The former Cisterian monastery was one of the richest monasteries in Württemberg between the 13th and 15th century. The cloisters were cold and eery, but looked really great. I could imagine a monk sitting on a bench reading quietly.

Bebenhausen Monastry cloisters

On Sunday (29 March), some friends from Tübingen went with us to see Lake Constance (Konstanz). It was about a 150km drive south to the town of Constance that sits on the Swiss border. We met up with some friends who had driven up from Zurich and toured the town, taking some great pictures from the top of the Gothic cathedral and by the lake.

Lake Constance/Constance

It was a lovely sunny day, perfect for walking around and then settling in the sun for a chat and a beer. After a relaxing afternoon, our friends from Zurich headed home (which was a bit sad because it will be a while before we see them again) and we took the ferry across the lake to the town of Meersberg.

Meersberg is a much smaller town than Constance, but makes up for it with charm. The lakeside promenade, with its colourful flower beds and sparkling water view, was the perfect place to spend a Sunday afternoon… in fact most afternoons would be well spent here. It had a real Mediterranean feel, which was unexpected (although not really well reflected in the photos). We walked the cobblestoned streets to the Altes Schloss, an 11^th Century castle that is said to be the oldest structurally intact castle in Germany. As the sun started to set, we felt the tiredness in our legs and decided to head back to Tubingen.

Meersberg

So that was our last weekend in Tübingen. Mikey and I are thoroughly appreciative to all the people who made our time there special. Particular thanks to our flatmates, Ines and Sebastian, and Mikey’s colleagues at work who made such an effort to welcome us and help us out. Thanks all!

Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site entrance

On Saturday (22 March), the rain stopped and we took the train just out of the city to the Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial site. This was the first Nazi concentration camp built in Germany in 1933, and served as a prototype for the other Nazi concentration camps. It was established a few weeks after Hitler became the Reich Chancellor to hold politically prisoners. In total, it is estimated that 200,000 people were imprisoned here, of which one third were Jews. Approximately 40,000 died in Dachau and its sub-camps, largely from disease and malnutrition. In 1945, American troops liberated the survivors.

After hiring audio guides, Mikey and I walked through the camp entrance into the roll call square, where the chilling wind ripped right through us. I felt horrible thinking how cold it was, and here I had the luxury of a coat and gloves. The main barracks on one side of the roll call square held the museum, which outlined the conditions in Germany prior to the war, the events in Europe during World War II, and life in the Dachau camp until its liberation.

On the other side of the roll call square, two prisoner barracks remain on the site and have been recreated to show what they were like when the camp was in use. The rest of the barracks have been removed, so the camp looked and felt extremely desolate.

Dachau – where the prisoners barracks originally stood.

While it was sobering to walk through the camp, I was not prepared for how disturbing it felt to walk through the crematorium. The gas chamber, with fake shower fittings installed to disguise its real purpose, was horrible because of the vivid pictures I saw in my mind’s eye. I struggled to process it. I didn’t want to look, yet I didn’t want to stop in the hope I would find a way to comprehend it and what it meant.

Dachau – fence line

As we walked out, we passed a wall which was inscribed with what seems to be the purpose of this site, established by the camp’s surviving prisoners:

“May the example of those who were exterminated here between 1933 – 1945 because they resisted Nazism help to unite the living for the defence of peace and freedom and in respect for their fellow men”.

A memorial at Dachau, with “Never Again” written in several languages.

On Sunday (23 March), we went to Munich’s Englischer Garten (English Garden) – one of the largest city parks in Europe. The light snow ensured the locals kept their clothes on (apparently the locals like to nude sun bake in the gardens in summer).

Englischer Garten

Much to Mikey’s excitement, the river running through the park forms a large natural wave when exiting a particular tunnel in the park. There are more than a few photos (and videos) on our website of some guys making the most of the wave by practicing some surfing.

Surfing in the snow at the Englischer Garten

That night, we went out for a beer before dinner. Mikey found a place in the lonely planet that was nearby, but failed to read the descriptive paragraph. As I walked in, it was clear to me that Mikey had taken me to a gay bar. After ordering some beers, and noticing the art and lack of females, Mikey realised too…Anyway the beer was good.

Before we left Munich on Monday (24 March), we just happened to be strolling through the main square for one last look around Munich as the Glockenspiel (carillon) at the top of the Nues Rathaus was chiming. All these figures came out to dance around the top – including jesters and knights jousting. It was nice of Munich to give us a farewell.

Glockenspiel – Knights jousting

Dear readers,

Do not despair, I have not forgotten about you. Sorry, but I’ve been busy being sick and finalising our April trip around Europe. But now it is time to update you on the last couple of weekends, starting with Easter in Munich.

Neues Rathaus (new town hall) in the main square

While I think it is difficult for a place to be both a charming old town and a modern city, Munich successfully does both. The long mall stretching through the centre of the city is dotted with historic buildings, none more imposing than the new town hall and the Glockenspiel (carillon) in the main square. However Munich also has a modern feel, with a really great underground metro system and many things to see and do.

Munich is famous for ‘Oktoberfest’, a festival where hordes of tourists descend on Munich to drink beer. It’s origins – to celebrate the marriage of Crown Prince Ludwig in 1810 – seems to have been long forgotten. Due to this festival, Munich caters for tourists (particularly English speakers) and displays the traditional dress and food of the region. It is said that the people of Munich are so proud of their state, Bavaria, that they consider themselves Bavarian first and German second. Many of the costumes and foods that people think of as typically german, such as lederhosen, pretzels and beer steins, are actually typically Bavarian.

Mikey and I arrived in the absolute freezing cold via train on Thursday night (20 March). After finding our hotel, we headed out for dinner and were pleasantly surprised to find the metro very efficient and the restaurants offering English menus. I tried the turkey schnitzel, which was covered in cornflakes…interesting and delicious. It went down perfectly with a glass of orangeschorle (half orange juice, half mineral water).

Turkey schnitzel in cornflakes

On Friday, we braved the cold (2°C) and rain to explore the city, particularly the old town. We saw the Karlstor, which was once a gate to the city, and the Michaelskirche, Germany’s earliest and grandest Renaissance church. In the main square, Marienplatz, we admired the old and new town halls and then wandered to view the Residenz (palace), which housed Bavarian rulers from 1385. After a coffee and a bit more of a walk around large impressive structures, we succumbed to the cold and took the metro to Alte Pinakothek (art gallery) to see some paintings by Dürer, Botticelli, da Vinci and Rembrandt.

Karlstor

That night we went to the Hofbräuhaus am Platzl for dinner.

The Hofbräuhaus is a well- known Bavarian beer hall catering for tourists. I understand it can seat about 3,000 people and is packed during Oktoberfest. We had dinner on the second floor, where there are long rows of tables from one end of the room to the other.

Hofbräuhaus

The room was filled with the noise of laughing drunk people, and we understood why when the waiters seemed a lot more interested in delivering beer than food.

Mikey enjoying his 1L beer