Vienna City Austria - day one

Sunday 9^th June

Vienna has some magnificent buildings, the problem is getting around to see them all.

If we were here a month I think we would only scratch the surface.

The nice bits you want to see are spread out, and in between are bland buildings you don`t want to see.

Much of Vienna was flattened in WWll, some has been rebuilt sympathetically as it was before the war, but a lot of the buildings are 1950 and 1960`s designs.

After a bit of research, we booked a hop on hop off bus tour of the city.

There are actually four different coloured routes and we booked a two day ticket to do them all for 70 euro. 

There is also a night tour and walking tour included as well but I don`t think Sue is up for those.

It`s a big city and even with the hop on hop off arrangement and Sue found it hard going in the heat.

We`d left Louis in Ed the van with roof lights open for ventilation, food, water and the cooling fan blowing. The van doesn`t get as hot in the sun as say a car does, so I think he was happier there.

We started off on the Red route and took a complete circuit of the inner city sights then we decided to make our way to SchönbrunnPalace which comes as highly recommended.

It`s a huge building and the gardens seem to go on for ever, quite similar to Versailles.

At the ticket office the queue was endless and lady helper informed us they were now selling tickets for tours in four hours time !

Thankfully most of the gardens are free to enter, not all of course, they still charge for the Orangery, the Maze, the Privy garden and no doubt some other bits.

Anyway we chose to have a wander around the gardens and they were quite impressive in terms of scale as you will see from the photographs.

By now it was getting on for 3pm so we made our way back to Louis and thankfully he was fine having enjoyed a long sleep.

Tomorrow we have it all to do again, we`ll try and do the other two bus routes and no doubt get off somewhere for a wander.

I had wanted to go to the Spanish Riding School and see the Lipizzaner horses.

I`ve no special interest in horses but I`ve always been impressed by the synchronised shows.

Anyway, guess what ? all booked up until Tuesday. So another blank there.

Never mind, there`s still plenty to see.