The next morning we woke ourselves up European style, with some delicious pastries. Those look like American style sizes to me though, look how enormous that thing is!

TH isn’t really a car guy, but he did love this sporty smart car.

The subway system blows my mind. You walk in the entrance, walk down the stairs, past this little thing (you need to insert your pass if you need to validate it) and onto the train. No gates or bars or turnstiles to manage, just walk right on using an honor system of sorts. It was crazy!

Free magazines in each car if you’re bored.

I don’t know if you can read this, but I did the scribbling on this, the actual ad says the swear words! I really hope this is some kind of Google spoof or something. Why would Google need to put up something so vulgar?

While we walked to our lunch spot, I kept my eyes peeled for mini photo shoot locations.

Lunch was at Saint Charles Apothecary. If you visit Vienna absolutely make the time to stop in here for lunch!

It’s a little shop adjoining the apothecary where you walk in and sit down, and the owner sets food down in front of you. There is no ordering, because there is no menu.

The glasses and pitcher are made by his wife, and I’m still a little sad we didn’t splurge and buy a set. It would have been a really nice way to remember the trip!

The meal was tomato soup, bread, and water. That’s it, and it was so good that I think we paid him double what he quoted as the price. One of those meals where I can’t decide if I want to stuff my face, or pontificate on how absolutely amazing the food I’m stuffing my face with is.

A little more time on the metro and a short walk later we were standing at the gates of beautiful Schönbrunn.

I handed the tilt-shift over to TH for the first time ever to let him have some fun. It’s an all manual lens and I’m really impressed with how well he handled it!

We didn’t do the tour, just walked the grounds taking pictures, and it was more than enough time spent at Schönbrunn for us. Plus it was free!

The light that day was absolutely breathtaking, but my landscape photography skills are so poor that I didn’t do it justice. The sun was shining through the clouds so that it only hit the palace and made it look like it was glowing.

This is a little bit better, but I’m still not doing it justice!

You can tour the house, the zoo, or the French garden (which contains a giant maze).

We didn’t go in the maze, just took pictures on the other side of it.

After our time at Schönbrunn we headed back into the city to try to see the catacombs in St. Stephen’s Cathedral, but it was closed because Mass was about to start. Sad, because the only other thing TH really wanted to see was Mozart’s house, which was closed as well by the time we got there. Too many pictures at Schönbrunn I guess!

It was really interesting walking around St. Stephen’s Cathedral. They are in the middle of restoring the exterior, and you can see that they hang a giant facade over the areas they are working on. Why they do this, I have no idea, but it must have been incredibly expensive and time consuming to make.

Look at the difference between the sections that are cleaned, and those that aren’t though! It’s going to look stunning when it’s all done.

There was a political rally being held in the square next to the cathedral, and so I secretly took a picture of these police. Was this dangerous? I have no idea, but That Husband is known as “Mr. Safety” so he told me to be careful because the police might beat me up or something.

We were actually really sad to see the rally because we wanted to visit our favorite place in Vienna, Julius Meinl. It’s not just a grocery store, it’s an experience (I’m thinking of asking them if they’d like to pay me to use that genius phrase I just came up with. Ha!). Yes, I know there is one in Chicago, but it’s absolutely nothing like it’s European counterpart. This was  a grocery store with candy from all over the world, and each candy display was labeled with the country of origin. We probably spent an hour looking at all the chocolate bars, trying to decide if we wanted chocolate from Sweden (arguably the best in the world) or something from Vienna (you know me and how much I like buying local). TH introduced me to the magic that is Kinder Chocolate and I think I ate 20 of the Kinder Country mini bars.

It’s always nice to find another person holding a big huge dSLR. I know there is a really good chance they’ll be able to take a decent picture at f2.8 if I hand my camera over!

We finished the night at Figlmüller, as recommended by Ashley’s husband Matt (he served his mission in Vienna so we knew he’d know what he was talking about).

Figlmüller actually has two locations in this area, and we walked up to the first one in a little alley and asked about the wait. They told us there was no wait, because you had to have reservations to eat there. I was so sad! We saw the location below when we were walking away, but since it had the same sign, I insisted that it would have the same policy and we shouldn’t waste our time. We proceeded to walk around for an HOUR (starving and arguing the entire time) trying to figure out where to eat. Food is a huge priority for me, and I was not interested in eating at a tourist trap with sub-par food made with sub-par ingredients. We actually sat down in a little place that looked nice enough, but menu prices were high, there was a whole lot of English, and I’m pretty sure there were even some pictures of the dishes they sell. (If you didn’t know, pictures on a menu = a restaurant that’s not worth your time and money.)

I felt bad doing it, but we actually told the waitress we were no longer interested and walked out. I know that doing so caused her to have to clean up our place setting and reset the table, but we only had two dinners in Vienna and I wasn’t about to waste one of them in the Denny’s of Austria.

I finally gave in to TH, and we went back to the second Figlmuller location, the one with the huge line out front, that I assumed took reservations as well. Turns out, it’s a walk-in only location! I’m such an idiot. We waited about 30 minutes and gladly took a poorly situated table near the (drafty) door. We didn’t care where it was though, we just wanted our food and we wanted it now.

Lesson learned, don’t be afraid to “look like a tourist” and ask questions.

I wanted to eat some Wiener Schnitzel because I think it’s important to sample local fare while travelling, but I admit I don’t find myself craving it when I think back. It was good, and I ate most of what you see pictured (I should have shared with TH, it makes me so sad to waste meat!)

On our walk home we noticed this building with dancing lights. Pictures don’t really do it justice, so I have a little video to show you later. :)

I loved the walk home. I felt safe (though I clutched my Kelly Moore to my side with anxious air) and the lights were beautiful.

The next morning we woke up early enough to visit one last tourist attraction.

The Hundertwasser-Haus!

Click to enlarge

The Hundertwasser has no straight lines. So I decided to post without any straight lines either.

Can anyone tell me what this says? I think it’s so beautiful. (You don’t have to transcribe the whole thing! Just give us an idea.)

Next up, I’m finally going to start showing you the photos I took at my SIL’s Polish wedding! I have a lot to share, broken up into 4 posts with pictures, and then I’m going to see if I can edit together some of the video from the day in a way that doesn’t show the groom’s face.

Also I’m not a car person, but I would so drive this around.

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