We are living in a land where we can't seem to avoid schnitzels. I had one for lunch in Brasov Wednesday. We were served one for lunch in Bucharest Thursday. I tried one in Vienna at a fast food place Friday (I actually wanted the Cordon Bleu, but our helpful new friend who spoke German ordered schnitzel instead, half of which I took back to the apartment), I had a Cordon Bleu for lunch on Saturday (really a schnitzel gaudied up with ham and cheese). We had left over schnitzel with breakfast Sunday, and Sunday Jim had one that was bigger than his plate (with leftovers) for lunch Sunday. We still have leftover cordon bleu and schnitzel in our fridge that will be dinner tonight and meat with breakfast tomorrow.
The problem is that all the restaurants in the central zone that aren't Asian or Middle Eastern are doing 'typical Austrian', which apparently schnitzel. You do know, of course, that Wiener Schnitzel is not about hotdogs, it's about Vienna. We have a plan for Monday that we hope will avoid both schnitzel AND over-large portions. Watch this space for updates!
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| Soviet War Memorial |
Sunday was chillier and way less crowded than Saturday. I had been told to go to the Nascht Markt on the weekend for both food stalls and flea market, but somehow missed all the info that said the whole place was closed Sunday. The market is further south than the area we have been walking to so far, but steps are good, and we discovered some 'new' parts of the city--a very lovely city park along the River Wien had a a memorial to Johann Strauss, there was an interesting fountain that turned out to be a Soviet War Memorial (in Vienna???) , the Secession Museum (smallish, quite modern).
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| Strauss Memorial |
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| Technical Institute |
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| New Friends from Berlin |
After wandering several blocks through the closed market, we turned northeast to get back to the Hofburg, where we had a tour scheduled for 2pm. Once there, way before 2, I was getting hungry so Jim led me to a restaurant he had seen in a small alley and wanted to try....turned out it was the home of the world's largest schnitzel -- bigger than a dinner plate. We were seated at a communal table with no one else, but soon enough another couple joined us. When THEIR huge schnitzels arrived, Jim could see, even with his lack of German, that they thought it was pretty dry and commented -- it was a very nice couple from Berlin, visiting Vienna for a few days. The husband's English was great and the wife did okay. We talked about the Viennese version of German and she had an article listing at least 2 dozen words of Austrian with their German counterparts -- this is more than an accent difference like northern and southern English, it seemed like it was even more distinct than American and British English. Good thing we're headed to Germany where the language I learned in college and find in my phrase books is standard!
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| Tyroler Parade |
Back at the Hofburg, we were still pretty early for the tour and went to the park in front of the palace, and soon heard music, headed toward us....the Tyrolean Associations we had seen yesterday were making their final parade through the city and coming to the area where we were to board the bunches of buses parked there. This was an unexpected treat, and kept us entertained til tour time.
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Outside horse walker in background - largest in the
world -- can hold 19 horses and control their speed |
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On the list of chief riders, I discovered my long-lost
cousin, Hubert.... |
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We spent about an hour at the Spanish Riding School, visiting the summer and winter exercise grounds, the stables (with horses), and tack room. It is called a Spanish school, not a Viennese one because the horses came from Spain in the 1500s along with the new emperor who was raised in Spain and now had to live in Vienna. The horses are relatively short and stocky -- much heavier legs and heads than thoroughbreds, for example -- because they were originally used as war horses and had to carry riders with armor and be armored themselves. The breed has been stabilized for several hundred years, as this place is totally tied to keeping the 1700s alive. The winter training ground is also the exhibition hall and has remained the same since it was built in the 1700s, with the exception of electric chandeliers added in the late 1800s. It was supposed to be very plain, and it is, only in comparison to the typical baroque style which would have had gold leaf everywhere. Unfortunately, we were not allowed to photograph the horses, as too many people are too dumb to turn off their flash and end up disturbing the horses.
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| "Plain" Exhibition and Exercise Hall |
At the end of the tour, we ambled home, in search of a different Konditeri for another snack. We had seen a couple on our side of the river, but Sunday apparently was not the day to visit, so we skipped it and collapsed instead. We did see a very nice sunset over the buildings from our room. A challenge for us in the evenings, since we are not going out to dinner, is what to do -- only one computer (tho we do have a tablet and smartphone too) and only one TV channel in English. It is quite disconcerting to find an old NCIS dubbed into German!
Below: Vienna Sunset from our apartment: early and later
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