..........................I LOVE VIENNA!!!

Wow! Wow, our jaws have been dropped all day strolling down this beautiful city.  I had no idea how cool this place is.  We only had one day to see it all so, we tried.  Around every corner is a beautiful building worth painting.  The shopping is incredible in this market square area where St Stephens' Cathedral sits.  I guess this area is called the Hofburg or "hero's square" . This shopping rivals Paris and it is all in one place.  Today it was Friday and the place was packed.  We found a Starbucks, sat and just people watched.  So much English spoken here that we could hear conversations all day and understand!

These beat the heck out of Schneeballens

I would have loved to have gotten a purse at Chanel, or a scarf at Hermes', but instead I got memories and money saved for another trip here.  There was one gift we bought ourselves today as a souvenir, a knife made of ceramic so you never have to sharpen it.  Gary was all for that.  These knives have one disadvantage though, they can break if dropped on the floor.....so I will be using this Kyocera knife carefully and remember the little kitchen shop "Haardt & Kruger" with the very nice young man who took so much time showing us the different options in the cutlery area that I never knew existed.

It was very cold out today and so Gary wanted a hat.  That was easy as there were quite a few hat stores, he was in heaven.  He admits to a hat, watch, and shoe fetish, but I know of a few others...cars would be on that list too.  We just strolled and strolled and could not get enough of this place.  Gary loves to look at the women's fashion (well that's what he says he's looking at)...but I have to agree the European women dress fabulously......and they are all thin and can pull off anything.  Very few heavy Europeans.

 Sitting in Starbucks with our (finally) large vanilla lattes we really couldn't believe how lucky we were to be here.  I never knew Vienna to be so big and beautiful.  Gary said he had heard several people mention that it was a great place to come to but I had not.

The University that sits right here is the one for worldwide economics and has lots of students from the U.S.A. here so that explains why English is used so much.  We saw so much wealth here as well.  Bentley's, Mercedes, Land Rovers and on and on dashing down these small crowded cobblestone streets.

I got to see my Lipizzaners today.  The stable for them is right in the Market area and there they were eating lunch.  They have an exercise time every morning but we missed it, and they have an exhibition tomorrow at 1:00 but we will be gone. Well I got to look at them in person and that will have to do. I will go home and rent that Disney movie that I saw as a kid that had made such an impression on me and really the only reason I knew of Vienna at all.  I will also rent the movie about "Sissi" the Empress Elisabeth who fell victim to an assassination sort of like the Marie Antoinette situation I think.  But Sissi's picture was everywhere around here as a real saint to the people and I would love to learn more about that.  Today I also learned that Beethoven was not from Vienna but Hitler was.  Two misconceptions that these people like to let you know.  Also "Sigmund Freud and Albert Einstein were both born and raised in Vienna and unfortunately the last of the real intellects", she said that not me.

Can you find Burger King, Starbucks and McDonalds?

I can't describe the beauty of this place.....breathtaking I suppose will have to do.  This place is on our list of places to return to someday when we can spend more time and see inside all the buildings and museums, and take a ride in the buggy around the "ring" as they call it  to stay at the Hotel Sacher Wien right across from Starbucks in the Square, and finally to see the Lipizzaner's show.  This place I will dream about.

Auf Wiedersehen