The first new building completed on the Ringstraße was the opera house, built in 1861-1869. It was originally known as the Wiener Hofoper (the Vienna Court Opera), but after the fall of the Habsburgs in WWI, the name was changed to the Wiener Staatsoper (the Vienna State Opera). Bombing during WW II destroyed most of … Continue reading
We returned to Krems from Melk on the other side of the Danube River, the southeast side, which is not as scenic, but the cycling was better because the trail is mostly off the road and right along the river's edge. The morning started out mostly sunny, but we found ourselves riding in the shade … Continue reading
The town of Melk, where we spent the night, is the site of the Stift Melk, a Benedictine abbey that sits 200 feet above the Danube. Originally founded in 1089, a monastic school and scriptorium were added during the next century and the abbey became known for its manuscripts and library long before the invention … Continue reading
A little over five miles upriver from Krems, we came to the medieval walled town of Dürnstein (established 1019 A.D.), just as the tourist riverboats from Vienna docked nearby. The main attraction inside the walls of Dünstein is the Augustiner-Chorherrenstift, a gothic monastery built for the Order of St. Augustine in 1410 and then rebuilt … Continue reading
On Monday, we set out on the train from Wien Spittelau Bahnhof (“Wien” is German for Vienna) to the town of Krems an der Danau for an overnight bike ride along the Danube River to Melk. Across from the train station was another Hundertwasser creation, a garbage incenerator known as the District Heating Plant Spittelau. … Continue reading
Friday was Art Day for us as we set out to see the exhibits of reknowned Austrian painters Gustav Klimt (1862-1918) and Egon Schiele (1890-1918) who, I subsequently learned, were of the Vienna Secessionist movement which turned its back on the realistic historical style of mainstream Austrian artists and worked in a contemporary, impressionistic mode. … Continue reading
It hadn’t occurred to me, though it should have, that Austria is a Catholic country (75% of the population). You know, the Habsburgs were the Holy Roman Emperors, allied with the Roman Catholic Church – that should have been a tip-off. But we were a little surprised to find out that everything was closed Thursday … Continue reading
On our first day in Vienna, we rode trams 1 and 2 around the Ringstraße, hopping on and off as it suited us. We were intrigued by what appeared to be a city gate with a palace of some sort behind it, but the sky looked a little ominous so we decided to save exploring … Continue reading
It was fascinating to learn about the rise and fall of the Roman Empire when we visited Turkey in 2012. Prior to that trip, I knew relatively little about Rome from the early years of Christianity on – and nearly nothing about the Byzantine Empire, that is, the Eastern Roman Empire that continued on until … Continue reading
On Tuesday (“Mardi” in French), we went on the scenic train ride known as the Südbahn, the Austrian Southern Railway, over the Semmering Pass to Austria’s second largest city, Graz (pop. 265,000), the capital of the Austrian state of Styria. Leaving Vienna, the country’s largest city with 1,725,000 residents, we traveled through relatively flat countryside … Continue reading
