It seems shops are closed on Sundays in Vienna. Managed to find a local bakery and Spar shop at a garage to get a few basic provisions, including washing powder – we’ve got a kitchen and washing machine here but the apartment is more sparsely equipped than you’d expect with everyday items like wine glasses and a corkscrew/bottle opener missing! Luckily, we carry this sort of stuff with us, even when travelling by train, but Bev forgot the washing powder!
Came back to enjoy breakfast in the sunshine on our balcony overlooking the courtyard. The apartment is in a fine c.19th tenement with an enormous front door. We’re on the third floor, with no lift! Although the booking site stated ‘no lift’, we hadn’t anticipated the SIX flights of steps. Climbing the gigantic staircase daily will certainly keep us fit while we’re here . . . each floor has a double flight of massive stone steps and iron handrails due to the height of the rooms. Decided to try out the Vienna public transport system. There’s a U-bahn stop just a few minutes from our apartment, Kardinal-Nagl-Platz and we’ll go to Karlsplatz and visit one of the oldest stations on the network. The station pavilions at Karlsplatz, no longer in use by the U-bahn, were designed by Otto Wagner in the early 1900s as part of Vienna’s new metropolitan railway. There’s now a rather nice coffee house and the proprietor let us look through a folder of old pictures showing the history of the pavilions.
Next stop was the Secession Exhibition Hall where there were several interesting exhibitions and then we wandered over to Karlskirche. Another day when we ran out of time, so the Vienna Museum will have to wait. Sat in the square in front of Karlskirche for a rest, built by Emperor Charles VI in the early 18th-century, named after Saint Charles Borromeo. One of the columns was being restored, so the photo looks a bit lopsided! We didn’t go inside, feeling a bit overwhelmed with Baroque splendour! Passing by the Musikverein on the way back to the apartment we noticed the concert programme for Monday looked interesting and called into the box office to enquire about seats. Yes, there were some available for tomorrow, at a reasonable price. Bev went to a concert here about 40 years ago and wonders if it really is so full of gold!
We finished the day in one of the old coffee houses, Cafe Schwarzenberg, but had spritz instead of coffee and cake! Had a long chat with an interesting German couple who visit Vienna regularly and gave us recommendations for other places to visit. At the next door table we met a girl from Boston, Ohio who is a student at St Andrews, Scotland, travelling with her Dad! It’s interesting that we’ve met far more people on this trip than we do in the campervan . . .