Exploring Vienna: Isn't it Grand!

*Note: We were really struck by how grand the city of Vienna is so please excuse my overuse of the adjective :)

On Saturday morning, I headed into the city with Jude and made my way past the Opera House to the Musikverein (Concert Hall)- home to the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. My sister recommended the tour after visiting a few years ago. The entire building was being set up for a ball to be held that evening and it sure looked grand! The main concert hall was spectacular. Everything was made out of wood to enhance the acoustics including paneling painted to look like marble and statues painted to look like solid gold. The tour guide told us that in the early days, to heat the hall, the Emperor would arrive early with 30 soldiers who were made to run in circles to heat the space (pee ew!). Jude tested the acoustics himself with his not-so-pleasant new screech. The acoustics were good!

Opera House and Streetcars on the Ringstrasse

Musikverein 

A group of Chinese tourists took a liking to Jude and asked to snap his photo. He obliged them with a smile.

The main concert hall

After the tour, at the recommendation of my college friend, Laura, who studied abroad in Vienna, we headed across the Ringstrasse to Cafe Schwarzenberg a grand typical Viennese cafe. Jude was a very civilized lunch date, sharing my carrot soup and bread. He learned this week to drink through a straw and I'm starting to think he's a genius :)

We settled on a chocolate mouse cake at the server's recommendation. 

We continued our downtown tour with another recommended activity- a ride around the Ringstrasse on a streetcar. I ended up on the wrong streetcar and had to make a little detour. I also managed to board a non-accessible one and the driver had to get out and help carry the stroller with napping Jude up the stairs. Whoops!

Amazing ice rink in front of City Hall- One big rink with at least a mile of skating walkways. 

After finding our way again, we strolled through part of the inner center of the city before making our way back to the hotel. Here the streets are much more narrow, but the buildings are no less grand!

Similar to our time in Paris, Pete and I wanted to have one night out in the city away from the hotel. I again searched the Bowdoin Alumni database to find people living in Vienna. There was only one person listed, a woman who happened to be a high school science teacher at the International School who also went to Teacher's College like Pete. She was very responsive and found us a student willing to babysit! A few weeks ago when I started to research our trip here, I came across a new New York Times 36 hours report on Vienna published in December in video format. We decided to try out a trendy Chinese restaurant that was featured. It is known for it's "fondue" hot pots and dumplings and was very smaaklijk (tasty). The menu was completely in German and we were having a hard time figuring out what to order. Did you know that the Google Translate app will translate text in real time if you hover your screen over the words on a page?? Grand! It only does this for 6 languages currently and Dutch is not yet one of them (surprise, surprise!). 

Amusing translations

When friends told us about the 3 euro standing room only tickets for the Vienna Opera, I knew that I would like to check it out to see the interior of what is supposed to be one of the world's most beautiful opera houses. Unfortunately, the tickets go on sale 80 minutes before the performance, coinciding with Jude's bedtime. I had the idea to go after dinner and see if we could get in as people were leaving. We arrived just minutes before the opera ended and dashed indoors as the people started streaming out. It was fun to see the inside even if we didn't get to hear any music. 

Rebels!

The night out ended with a short ride along the Ringstrasse to see the grand buildings lit up at night!