Vienna!
My 3-week trek across Eastern Europe begins at the “Gateway of Eastern Europe”: Vienna!
A group of 9 (9!) of us boarded a Nightjet overnight in Zürich. I had got a couchette, which is one of those classic fold-out beds on trains, but the space turned out to be super cramped and wasn’t that comfortable to sleep in. It did the job, though, and we arrived in Vienna on Friday morning. We first hit Café Central, the famous cafe where Hitler, Stalin, and Trotsky frequented and played chess over coffee. It was really pretty and we got a classic European breakfast (croissant, coffee, soft-boiled egg) to the sounds of classical music. Next, we went to the Mozarthaus, a museum and an old apartment of Mozart, but after spending big at Café Central, we decided against getting a ticket. We headed towards Domkirche St. Stephan (St. Stephan’s Cathedral), which had a beautiful, grand interior. We even bought tickets to go check out the catacombs and the North Tower. I’d never seen catacombs before, so it was really chilling to see rooms of just piles of bones, each of which used to belong to a real person with dreams and aspirations. Because of the Black Death, there was a need to store lots of dead bodies underground. From the very bottom, we went to the very top and explored the North Tower. The view of the city was beautiful, complete with the classic red-tiled roofs and accented by the roof of the church (which had a colorful coat-of-arms of an eagle).
All that sightseeing worked up our appetite, so we went to a cafe for lunch. After realizing it was incredibly overpriced within 30 seconds, we immediately left and went to Chen’s, an Asian restaurant. Their spring rolls and cold noodles were to die for, although cold noodles are always to die for. Feeling satisfied, we headed to Hofburg Palace. On the way, we were feeling a bit more peckish (as is standard with Chinese food), so we grabbed some gelato and even some Mochi ice cream from a Japanese store that we explored.
At Hofburg, we saw the Burggarten (a garden and park accentuated with a treble clef made of flowers and, of course, the Hofburg (but only from the outside as we are broke college students). To really maximize the Vienna-ness of this day, we tried to get Apfelstrudel at Gerstner, but they had no space for us. Defeated, we headed home in the rain. Everyone (myself very much included) was exhausted from our adventure, so we took some time to chill at the AirBnB and find places for dinner. We settled on Everest, a nearby Indian place, and had some amazing spicy North Indian food. It was also a lot of fun introducing the non-Indians to more traditional dishes beyond chicken tikka masala and naan. The food nearly put us to sleep, and we got back, planned the next day for about an hour, and happily went to bed.
Waking up the next morning was a struggle for all of us (especially the guys) and because there was only 1 shower to share, a lot of us (myself included) had to skip a morning shower. We split up Ubers and headed to Schönbrunn Palace. It was a 3-hour wait to get into the palace, but after being in Europe for a couple months, we’d all seen plenty of palaces. So, we explored the Easter market and the outsider gardens for free. The market was really lively; I saw some really cool pretzel flavors and tried a mocha drink with a cheesecake-like pastry. The garden and grounds were also quite vast, so we took our time walking around, taking pictures of the palace with Vienna’s skyline in the background, and posing for pictures ourselves. We even stopped by the Zoo on our walk back and saw some super fluffy chickens. As with all gardens, it would have been prettier in late April or early May, but it was still really green.
For lunch, we went back into town and went to Salpicon, an inexpensive Mexican restaurant with amazing service. The food was decent, but not spicy at all! Also, for a bunch of Texans, it just made us more homesick for our usual Tex-Mex spots. We had planned today to be a full palatial day, with Schönbrunn in the morning and Belvedere after lunch. Belvedere Palace was significantly smaller, but was different from Schönbrunn in that there were some really unique statues (and I mean reallllllly unique, complete with several nude sphinxes). We strolled around the lake and grounds, saw more of the classic red-tile roofs, and eventually made our way back into the main city. Because a few of us wanted to shop and others didn’t, we split up and my group headed to this super authentic Viennese fashion designer: H&M. After securing a pastel blue sweater, we all coalesced on Gerstner again to try to secure the coveted strudel. They don’t take reservations, but we got lucky and landed a table. The ambiance was gorgeous and incredibly elegant. I got this delicious peppermint tea, and, of course, the Apfelstrudel with vanilla sauce. The strudel was pretty great, but in all honesty, the vanilla sauce was bland and unneeded. The tea complemented the sweetness of the dessert extremely well and everyone complimented me on ordering correctly (pun intended).
As we all head out and back home, I saw a self-playing piano and had a little nerding out moment. I had always seen them in movies but it was my first time seeing one in person and I was in absolute AWE. After a quick pit stop at the AirBnB, we bussed to Mythos for some Greek food (we split up and our group accidentally walked 10 minutes in the wrong direction, but actually it was all part of the plan to work up an appetite). It was delicious and felt very authentic, especially the hummus and their chicken dishes. We had initially planned to go out at night, but we were exhausted, so we just grabbed snacks and drinks at a kiosk, headed home, and played card games. I snagged a night shower and fell asleep easily.
Most of our group headed home during the day on Sunday, but Harry, Josh, and I had tickets to the Vienna Philharmonic at night. So, the three of us (+ Tejas, who had no reason to go back so early) woke up super late and grabbed lunch. Tejas went to this vegan place while the 3 of us went to this random fast-food schnitzel place. The chicken schnitzel was delicious and crazy cheap (especially compared to Zürich pricing). We attempted to go see the Musikverein (the Golden Hall), but it was closed, so instead we headed to Café Sucher and waited outside in the rain for about 20 minutes. My genomics project partner (and friend!), Mario, was in the city, so I invited him to come to hang out with us and he met up with us in the line. After finally making it inside, we got the world-famous Sachertorte (which was first served here in the 19th century for Prince Metternich) and I complemented it with Fiaker, a local cherry brandy-infused coffee.
Mario bid us goodbye and the 4 of us strolled around the city and ran into the Albertina Museum. It was free for under-19 (shhh don’t tell anyone I’m actually 20) and we saw some really cool exhibits, including some work from Picasso’s blue period, lots of works from Edvard Munch, and some colorful Monet landscapes. The basement exhibit was by Alex Katz and called Cool Painting. It was an interesting lo-fi art style, but he is relatively unknown and all the works were donated himself, which kinda makes me think that if I donate my works to a museum and pay for the exhibition, would they give me an exhibition? Mr. Katz, if you’re reading this, no hate and I really enjoyed it! I just thought it was funny that you had donated and sponsored this exhibit yourself.
Tejas left us and the 3 of us strolled around the city some more and made our way to Demel for some takeaway Kaiserschmarrn, which is this shredded fluffy pancake with cherry sauce. It was so delicious that my mouth is watering writing this blog post right now. We quickly finished our food and headed to the Vienna Konzerthaus. Immediately inside, there was a lifesize statue of Beethoven glaring at the walking area, which I found a little creepy but also quite cool. After a coat check and grabbing some water, we took our seats to enjoy one of the world’s best orchestras performing Bach’s Matthäus-Passion. It told the story of Judas’ betrayal of Jesus and the resulting crucifixion and aftermath that came from it. The piece was beautiful and even had a choral component, but it was quite slow and I had to fight back sleep a couple of times (with some really close encounters). I felt that it also did not accentuate the true ability of these world-class musicians because while the solos sounded amazing, most of the orchestral parts were the background music to the singers/chorus. The concert hall was beautiful and unbelievably ornate, and I spent a lot of time looking at it to prevent falling asleep.
After 4 or 5 rounds of applause at the end (I thought it would never stop), Josh and I headed to the train station and got some Austrian Mcdonald’s. I got this chicken-and-cheese bites box, which was this huge box full of chicken nuggets and fried cheese balls. It was really good but tragically I could not finish it before our train to Bratislava, which is a story for another day (and another post)!
(Title pun credits to History Fangirl)
Takeaways
- If you’re a time traveler, go back to Café Central in January of 1913 and BOMB it. Trust me.
- Vienna is a grand city full of gorgeous palaces, cafés, and museums. Definitely worth a visit!
- Kaiserschmarrn, schnitzel, and Apfelstrudel are must-haves, but the latter 2 can be had at any restaurant or café in the city
- Take espresso shots before watching the philharmonic—no matter how much of a music lover you are, you’ll need it
Rose-Bud-Thorn:
Rose (what went well): We had some AMAZING food during our time, from traditional pastries and schnitzel to Indian and Chinese food. Every single meal was delicious.
Bud (what was good but could be improved on): We only took public transport a couple of times because Ubers were cheap and we were in a rush. It would have been cool to explore the metro/trams/buses more.
Thorn (what did not go well): The weather didn’t cooperate most of the time we were there, and we got caught in the rain several times. As the Germans say though, “Es gibt kein schlechtes Wetter, nur schlechte Kleidung” (There is no bad weather, just bad clothing). This was super minor, though, and most of our time had amazing weather.
Rohan Chhaya 