Mozart Madness

Day 8

We left Lucerne which I really enjoyed.

We stopped in Lichtenstein which was very mountainous. The scenery was very nice.

We then went onto Innsbruck. We went to the Maximillian Museum which was nice, but small.

We took a beautiful, scenic ride to Salzburg. I got sick of carrying around my video/digital camera. I bought a very nice, compact, 6 mega pixel digital camera with a very nice sized monitor. It fits in my pocket.

After having a nice Austrian dinner a couple of us walked the streets of Vienna which was very beautiful, especially at night. We walked around for a few hours, even running into a German Beer Festival which was a lot of fun.


Day 9

We walked around Salzburg, seeing many sights we saw last night, however, they were explained. We stopped at the Mirabell Gardens which were real beautiful and saw two weddings going on.

We went to St. Peter’s Church which was amazing! The ceilings were unbelievable. We saw Mozart’s birthplace, house, and also many places from the Sound of Music.

We then drove to Vienna. We have a beautiful hotel right on the Danube River. It is one of the nicest hotels so far and we had a few really nice hotels. Only the one in Lucerne was small.

I had no luck getting a reservation at the Sacher Hotel, a place that was recommended, which was totally booked. The second choice the hotel suggested was also booked. Saturday night!!! The third choice was the charm. WOW!! We were not disappointed. Only myself and one of the Aussies went. We went to a 300 year old Austrian restaurant called Piaristenkeller. The food was exceptional. It was a four course pre fixe menu. The first course was an assortment of fresh Austrian hams and wild boar pate. It was sooooo good. The second was a soup that was very good, but I forget what it was. :) The third course was a deer steak that was superb! The meat was in some sort of gravy on one side and a cranberry type sauce on the other. Dessert was some frozen cake with the best vanilla and chocolate ice cream I have ever had. Thank God I am doing a lot of walking! :) I would highly recommend this restaurant.

When we thought the night could not get any better, we were two of ten people in the restaurant each night that get invited on a tour of the wine cellar museum. It was truly amazing. We got to learn about the history of the restaurant, the emperor, the empress, and their wine. First the owner’s son came around and put these strange hats on the ten people invited, and then paraded us through the restaurant and into the cellar. The wines housed here are gifts to the emperor and empress. The youngest wine is from 1917 and the oldest from the 1700’s. Paintings from the cellar and the restaurant were all authentic from the era of 300 years ago. It was a very impressive collection. The group was given a glass of champagne which I was told was very good. The owner’s son spoke of wine from his own personal collection. Wine which bared his picture and were from his wedding, graduation, etc., made just for that occasion.

We really enjoyed this experience and is a definite highlight on this trip. It was just pure luck and being in the right place at the right time.

PS. My dinner was the same that Mozart used to eat. :)

Day 10

We started the day off at the Schonbrunn Palace which was unbelievable. There were 40 rooms which we visited. Also, the grounds were all very beautiful. Male Aussie and myself trekked up to the top of the hill for an unbelievable view of the palace and the city. No one else in the group attempted the climb up. The view was well worth it. Some crazy people were even jogging up the hill. They said it should take about 45 minutes each way. It took us about 35 minutes or so round trip.

We then went on a tour of Vienna which was very beautiful with stops at the Heldenplatz and St. Stephen’s Church. I then ventured out on my own and went to the Jewish Museum which was very impressive, especially with the Lorenzo Da Ponte and Mozart exhibitions. It is the oldest Jewish Museum in the world opening in 1895 and closing in 1938 for obvious reasons. It moved many of its pieces to other museums. By 1990 it only located about half of its near 7000 pieces. Some were destroyed, lost, or just unaccounted for. . The museum was very interesting including a viewable storage area on the top floor. The Mozart and Da Ponte exhibitions were both excellent!

I also went to the Judenplatz which was excellent with a memorial to the 65,000 Austrian Jews murdered during the Holocaust.

Tonight we had a very nice Austrian dinner of Weinerschnitzel. After dinner we went to a concert performed by a Viennese Waltz orchestra. It was beautiful music of mainly Strauss and Mozart. The classical music was amazing, as was the opera and ballet.