Vienna is The Cure Oct '22

The third weekend of October David, Sally, and I shared in a first visit to Vienna, Austria. The trip was planned surrounding a concert (The Cure), but we were delighted for an excuse to check out this historic, fashionable city. I was fortunate to receive some last-minute suggestions from my office-mate who had lived in Vienna when she was younger. We arrived very late on Friday night but were greeted by very warm hotel staff and a much appreciated room upgrade.

Saturday morning kicked off with breakfast at Phil, a bookshop/cafe boasting its status as a “laptop-free zone” in order to promote conversation and snogging. The book selection was spectacular, we dined in old first class airline seats under a disco ball, and enjoyed our interesting continental breakfasts (who doesn’t love a spicy horseradish-dressed salad for breakfast, I ask you).

From there we started strong by taking in a show at the Spanish riding school. This is essentially like a pilgrimage to Mecca for me, so I was fully enthusiastic. David and Sally also enjoyed it, though I expect it was a bit boring for them at times (you can only watch so many a passage and piafe). The tickets had to be printed at home (no using your phone here!) and there were strangely specific directions about how to fold them just so. I followed the instructions with precision, only to be mightily made fun of by David. Thus, a real highlight for me was that when the ticket collector scanned our tickets he heartily complimented me on how perfectly they were folded and David heard him. I was redeemed! The school itself it quite ornate with enormous chandeliers that are elevated before the horses enter. We had standing room tickets (as did most folks, only a handful of incredibly overpriced seats were available). I ended up feeling more conflicted about the actual experience that I had expected, though in retrospect I am not sure why this surprised me. Many equine events invoke a similar feeling for me…I cannot help but get swept up into the history/glory/spectacle of it, but I have mixed feelings about the discipline as a whole. Don’t get me wrong, these horses are extremely well cared for and live a darn good life, and work pretty hard to boot (we all have to work for a living, don’t we?). Yet then why are most of them definitively overweight? How do we justify making them work in double bits with such extreme collection of their head/neck performing lovely-to-watch but unnecessary movements? Probably a conversation for another day…All in all I was quite enamored (and what talented riders!), and then we walked across the street and were able to see into their stable as well. While I’m guessing there’s no turnout (it’s smack in the middle of the city), it was otherwise, not surprisingly, gorgeous. And here they are into the solarium thing as well (see photo below).

Vienna itself was a treat to walk around. Similar to Rome or Brussels or Paris, around every corner there’s another historic church or ornately decorated officebuilbing. Even the new architecture was interesting. I found Vienna to be significantly cleaner than Rome, however, and with less people asking for money at every corner. Also the scooters were more nicely organized and rarely strewn across the sidewalk.

Vienna’s culinary delights for us included our fair share of pastry (we found the almond plus chocolate croissant again, thank god), beer and more beer, Jaegermaester (turns out it’s not only for college students!), ice cream (perhaps second only to Italian gelato), and [for David] the obligatory schnitzel.

After the riding school we headed over to Saint Stephens church and went up the tower to take in the city view. Of course this was followed by a beer at a nearby cafe, where David and I people-watched (so fashionable, they are!) and Sally sketched. We caved in (who am I kidding, I wanted it also!) to Sally’s repeated requests and took a short carriage ride around the city when there was a pause in the rain. There are still a huge number of working horses in that city. They appeared well-cared for and comfortable. Cars were respectful of them. There’s something indescribably charming about the clip-clop of hooves down the street.

In the afternoon we checked out the Leopold Museum, home to many Klimts and Egon Schiele. Here we learned a bit about the Viennese Secession, which inspired us to then visit its architectural home (with its gorgeous gold-leaf roof) near our hotel.

Late in the day I let our family rest and Sally and I enjoyed the pool before a delicious burger (so many veggie options) at trendy Peter Pan’s that evening (I have no idea why it bore this eponym).

On Sunday we started with a slightly less European (translation: more familiar to us) breakfast at Cafe Museum, where Klimt other artists apparently hung out (we missed Cafe Central on this trip, where Freud and Trotsky famously caroused). I do love a good soft-boiled egg. Somehow Sally convinced us to eat a chocolate cake for breakfast, which jump-started her day, to say the last.

We walked over, around, and in Karlskrisch…a relatively recently built (<200 years) huge church with a gorgeous facade. Sally also enjoyed the playground adjacent, and she gave me a run for my money on a race around the fountain. We then walked to Belvedere palace and museum. We tried to enter all of 18 minutes early and were turned away (such precision) so first explored the extensive adjacent botanical gardens. We saw many a red squirrel, which used to inhabit all of Europe but has been run out of town in Ireland and the UK by the North American gray squirrel. We were probably overly charmed by these adorable little guys (“Look at the strange Americans, staring at the squirrel…do you think there is something wrong with them??” - imagine saying this in David’s German accent…).

Finally we were allowed to enter the Belvedere (10:30 on the dot!) and started with

Klimt’s “The Kiss.” In vast contrast to the Mona Lisa, it was much larger and more beautiful in person than we all expected. We also enjoyed Klimt’s other work, the Monet and Van Gogh, and the palace itself housing all these.

Sunday afternoon we headed out to Schönnbrunn, a Versailles-esque estate replete with mazes, garden, views, and yet another incredible playground. This property is so large that I readily identified it from the airplane on our flight home on Monday (see photo below).

This was followed by an incredibly long and authentic lunch adjacent to Schönbrunn. The staff was so nice, and so chatty, yet truly it took about half an hour for our first drink and almost 1.5 hours before our food arrived. We were about to give up hope on eating when the waitress stopped by and said, “It should just be another maybe 10, 12 minutes for your food, okay? We make everything from scratch so it takes time…” and we could barely contain our laughter until she walked away. Like, was the chicken laying the eggs? Did you just plant the wheat? A rather unfathomable time-frame but we were outside, the sun was shining, the beers did eventually come, and Sally was a good sport, so not such a bad way to pass an afternoon in Europe. The food was really just lagniappe in this situation anyway.

We took the underground back and I treated Sally to a bubble waffle (essentially a crepe in waffle form) while we meandered through one of the dozens of parks near our hotel.

That night David and I left Sally with a sitter a the hotel and went to see The Cure at Marx Hall. I must admit I only know a few of their songs but know what a legend they are so would be a fool not to go. They put on a great show. Robert Smith’s voice has not lost any ground over the last 40 years and I even enjoyed their new stuff. Sadly they didn’t play the song I was hoping for (or at least not before we left to relieve the sitter — how can these elderly gentlemen play for 2.5 hours straight??!! - I was exhausted just watching them) but it was a fun venue and so charming to watch the Austrian crowd of such varied age sing along.

The cab ride home took a weird turn as our driver started scrolling through videos of moderately inappropriately dressed women doing mildly appropriate things on TikTok while he was driving us. Had I been alone, or with Sally (obviously) I would have immediately gotten out but David was along so we sat it out. First - don’t watch videos while you’re operating a motor vehicle. Second, WTF, how is it appropriate to watch THAT with us in the car?!

Monday morning David left early on a work trip for the U.S. so Sally enjoyed a hotel room breakfast as I packed up and then we headed back to Ireland on our own. I was thoroughly peeved by the woman at passport control in Vienna who asked if Sally was my daughter. She then gave me a hard time, saying because my last name is different from Sally’s, I need to carry a copy of her birth certificate with me. When Sally was small, if David or I took her across international borders (I think this happened for Canada a handful of times) we did carry a formal letter from the other parents saying it was okay. But now she’s 9 and I’ve flown with her across borders multiple times by myself and it hasn’t even occurred to me as an issue any more. It also irritated the you-know-what out of me because it wasn’t about safety (i.e., other parent is not along) but instead about the fact that I didn’t take my husband’s name. So I could take my husband’s name and then it’d be fine to kidnap my own child? It makes no logical sense. Plus, at 9 years old Sally is capable of talking to a border agent and could easily have chatted her up about it. The airport further pissed me off by not having any water fountains or places to fill water bottles and charging €4.90 for a bottle of water. First, I don’t want to waste plastic, that’s why I carry a water bottle. Second, civilized countries have no excuse, they should absolutely provide drinking water. The city itself did a great job - there were water-filling stations in the pedestrian areas. So suddenly at the airport you need to pay €6/L for water? It’s ludicrous.

Aside from my airport and taxi-related irritations that I wrapped up with, we had an amazing time in Vienna. The Viennese people were very friendly, helpful, and of course spoke perfect English. The city was clean, charming, and easy to navigate. I’d like to return to Austria and learn more about the many musicians and artists who called it home.