Vienna

Yesterday the sun shone in Budapest.  Another day without thermals!  How exciting!  Greg had work to do so Bella, Liam and I hopped back on the hop on/hop off bus to do a bit more touring, taking lots of photos from the open top bus with all the blue sky, and went on the Danube cruise at 1pm.  We sat up top, so we could get some good photos (of course!) but it was starting to get overcast and cooler, so the kids were a bit reluctant.  On the way down river it was fine, but on the way back it got so cold (wishing we did have our thermals on now!)  we ended up going inside.  There was a commentary on the boat which might have been really interesting but the tourists around us were speaking to each other loudly in Hungarian (we thought) that we could only catch random words which was annoying.  We do love our audio commentaries!  We caught up with Greg and had some pizza for lunch, and it was unexpectedly delicious - who would have thought that the best food we had in Hungary would be pizza??
We were grateful that it was Sunday and traffic was not as mad as on Friday when we'd arrived, so we got out of the city without too much drama and it was a quick 2 1/2 hour drive to Vienna.  The road was great (we are so grateful to have left Polish roads behind us!) and the speed limit on the freeway was 130 km, but  no-one - except us! - keeps to it.  We are really hoping to avoid any traffic infringements so even though it's tempting to keep up with the others we let them flash their lights and toot their horns at us... and stick to the rules!  Once we crossed into Austria it was autobahn time again.  Its really stressful when its dark (it's dark by 5pm these days) and the cars are literally flying along a dark freeway with only their headlights... I am always so grateful when we safely make it to our destination!!
We are staying in a hotel in the suburbs about 20 minutes from the city by tram.  When we arrived and checked in we headed out to find somewhere to eat.  There are loads of places to eat around here - but they were all full of smokers.  Yuck.  In the end we opted for a small Turkish takeaway without any smokers.  Not impressed.
Today was COLD.  About 7 degrees.  It was back to our thermals and we were grateful for them :-)  Oh, except Greg of course.  I'll let you know when he takes the plunge.  Then you'll know it's seriously cold!  We started off by taking a few tram rides around the city to get our bearings, then we went to St Stephen's cathedral and walked the 343 very windy stairs to the top.  Bella and Liam couldn't believe we paid for the privilege!!  It was very dizzying to twist your way up and back again, but the view was good!
Our next stop was the Leopold Museum, reputed to have a good range of Gustav Klimt.  Yes, here is my new bit of info, Gustav Klimt is an Austrian - I never knew that - and also quite a lad, having 6 kids to three different partners while having a long term (20 year) "life long intimate friendship".  Bella said "sounds like friends with benefits".  Well, yes.
Again we struggled to find somewhere smoke free to eat.  I thought Paris was full of smokers, now I have to say the Viennese win hands down.  Every second person is smoking and the restaurants are full of them!! It's disgusting. Bah humbug, throw them out in the cold I say...!  We went to Belvedere, a gorgeous castle which was absolutely bursting with Klimts (including his famous "Kiss") - but no photos were allowed.  We found somewhere smoke free for dinner - Augustina Keller - and went to a musical performance we'd been talked into while at St Stephens (by a man dressed as Johann Strauss, one of many in the platz!).  We knew it was the equivalent of seeing a corroboree at home, and it wasn't cheap... but I thought we should do it anyway!  So you'll be pleased to hear that yes, it was a bit schmaltzy

and if you looked closely the costumes were a bit thread bare, but the music was wonderful and I was pleased that the kids enjoyed it as much as I did.  I'm not sure about Greg!!  So a full day of smoky Vienna!