Vienna - A Pleasant Discovery (1)

We chose to go to Vienna for Easter 2004 only because with Trenitalia there was a promotion at 39 euros for the couchette journey and so we said to ourselves: "We have never seen Vienna, why not take advantage of it?" We bought the tickets, then booked two little apartments online for 3 nights at the Gally apartment (which we discovered was located in a strategic position in the city; just outside the centre, near the West Station and therefore very well connected to any part of Vienna. My idea of Vienna was that of a city still tied to a glorious past and for this reason static and old-fashioned, like a museum; instead I found a city that has managed to perfectly integrate the grandeur and majesty of its monuments and imperial palaces with avant-garde architecture, and has managed to keep alive an interest in culture, from the Habsburgs to today.

So in the Stephenplatz, the imposing Gothic cathedral of St Stephen is mirrored in the Haas Haus, a modern building with rounded forms built in the early 1990s. And likewise, in the capital of music, besides the Opera House with its concerts and the house-museums of composers such as Mozart, Schubert, Strauss and Beethoven, there is the House of Music, which I warmly recommend visiting. The Haus der Musik is an interactive museum where you can experience sound in all its aspects through headphones, interactive screens, instruments to try, sound galleries, environments that reproduce the sound world of prenatal life, the sounds of the future and, even more fun, you will have the chance to virtually conduct the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.

Then try sitting on the "sound chair" where every movement of any part of your body corresponds to a sound!!! We all had a lot of fun, adults and children!!! Since the weather was kind to us, besides the Haus der Musik we visited only one other museum: the Natural History Museum with enormous fossils, dinosaur skeletons and an unthinkable variety of land and marine fauna!! Nor were the classic visits to the imperial residences missing. Inside the Hofburg we visited the Kaiser's apartments and the Silberkammer; in the first we were surprised by Princess Sissi's room but above all by her gym (something rather bizarre for the time); in the Silberkammer we were able to admire the court silverware, the kitchen utensils and the table linen.

With another ticket we then visited the Schatzkammer, that is, the treasury chamber, which includes among the objects on display the Habsburg crown from 1600 to 1918 and the crown of the Holy Roman Empire. Outside the Hofburg, the Burggarten, one of the many parks of this city, houses the former court greenhouse; a glass and iron structure inside which is the Butterfly House (Schmetterlinghaus) with hundreds of butterflies that live, fly and reproduce in a tropical forest. The 35 degrees and 80% humidity, besides fogging up the lenses of cameras and video cameras, literally zeroed our blood pressure, while on the children the only effect was to arouse wonder and amusement.

However, do not despair, because next to the building there is a wonderful café with outdoor tables, ready to restore you!! The visit to Schoenbrunn Castle, the emperors' summer residence, can require an entire day because besides the palace rooms (short tour 20 rooms - long tour 40 rooms) there is an immense park that includes the hedge maze - in "Shining" style, to be clear - the desert gardens, the Gloriette, the Vienna zoo, the Japanese gardens and more. The sore point is that although access to the park is free, every area mentioned is paid. Passes are sold anyway, i.e. cumulative tickets that already include entrance (besides the imperial rooms) to some of these..... the choice is yours. TO BE CONTINUED...