Saturday 22nd September
It was sunny but cool when we woke however there was no time for our usual morning walk. Our flight to Vienna was at 10.20 am and so we checked out at 8 am and caught an Uber to the airport.
I noted on check-out that the cheapest daily rate for the Novotel was about 100 € more than we paid so my OCD obsession with early planning had paid off at least.
The drive to the airport took about 30 minutes through more flat, albeit very green, terrain and was rather uneventful. Getting on the plane was not so though. Austrian Airlines had oversold the flight and needed to offload folk. We survived the cut but, when we got on the flight and found that Marks seat number of 18B did not exist, I started to panic. Luckily, it was quickly sorted and the rest of the journey to our Vienna apartment went smoothly.
Our apartment is well located and only about 100 m from the hugely popular St Stephan’s Cathedral. It is a large two bedroom and two bathroom space and, after the hotel-style rooms in Bruges and Brussels, we were pleased to have much more space.
Our host, Lewar, suggested a venue for lunch and so we headed there after after unpacking. It was a 7 minute walk to Plachutta but we were very glad we took Lewar’s advice. We’d found it almost impossible to find any restaurant that served vegetables on our trip thus far so the traditional Austrian dish of Tafelsplitz went down a treat. It sounds awful but was delicious and was basically meat and vegetables boiled in broth and served with a side of cooked and puréed spinach, fries, sauerkraut and sour cream. I can’t convey how excited I was to see the spinach!
Following lunch we stopped off at our local supermarket, Merkur, to buy some milk and orange juice and were amazed by how lavish this 3 story establishment was; it even had a cafe and a wine bar! We had booked seats for a performance of Mozart’s Requiem at St Charles Church for 8.15 pm and so went home after our bit of shopping to rest up before our evening outing.
We needed to collect our tickets for tonight’s performance of Mozart’s Requiem and tomorrow’s Vienna Boys Choir so we left home at about 6 pm to seek out the two ticket offices. There was some time to kill prior to our 8.15 pm performance of Mozart’s Requiem so we headed to the nearby Cafe Mendez for a drink and small bite to eat.
The Mozart performance lasted only an hour which was just as well given how fatigued we both felt. The walk home down the main High street of Vienna took us about 20 minutes and was a bustling scene even at 10 pm. There was more interesting fashion on show and one thing we had picked up rather quickly is that Vienna is a very affluent city. The fashion is most appealing due to its innovative design and creative flair although the cost of some items was rather alarming; as the photos below reveal.
Overall, it had been a rather successful day and we loved the location of our apartment that was going to be home for the next 5 nights. We were looking forward to exploring more of Vienna in the coming days but, for now, we headed straight home and turned in for the night after our rather long day.
