Bill and I ventured to Vienna, Austria for a week just before the start of summer. What a glorious city. Art, music, architecture, history, wonderful cuisine, and more! Vienna has it all.
We’ll be writing more articles about our stay but I wanted to start with our lodgings. We were fortunate to find a wonderful chalet-styled Tyrolian cottage on Airbnb that was away from the crowds and noise of the city but still close to the action. The U-Bahn station was just a short 13-minute walk away, and from there it was a mere 10 minutes or so to the heart of the metropolis.
The house was located in a nature preserve that used to be the hunting grounds for the imperial family. In Europe, land is at a premium and quite scarce. The Europeans are also really into gardening. I mean really, really, into their gardens. So it is not uncommon as you travel to find small garden plots that people buy or rent. They’re tiny sanctuaries away from their high rise apartments where they can set up their own garden spaces to enjoy on the weekends. But in Vienna, instead of turning the excess land into just garden plots, they often build small houses on them. That was the case with our house and it was charming. It almost felt like the cottage was straight out of a Tolkien novel. The name of our street was actually “Hobbitweg,” (Hobbit Way). The only thing missing from this fairytale house was siding you could eat!
Our hosts Silvia and Gerhard were very sweet and we managed to communicate with a great deal of smiling, laughter, and hand gestures. Our own command of German is somewhat less than comprehensive and the Viennese dialect can be quite difficult to understand, even for native German speakers. Reading it is not too bad, but once an Austrian begins to speak, all bets are off as to whether we will recognize what the heck we are hearing.
We arrived to a lovely little feast set up for us in the living room with baked pretzels, cheeses, a variety of olives, chocolates, and a bottle of homemade Muscat wine (our host’s specialty). And the house itself was perfect—all cozy inside with wood interior and Alpine-styled furniture. It had three levels, which included a full kitchen, dining room, living room, three bedrooms and two full baths, not to mention a basement with a workout room and a sauna. It also had a private backyard that was a haven for us when we’d come home after a day of sightseeing. It made for the ideal getaway. This was truly a home away from home and it was the perfect way to start off our week in what has to be one of the most beautiful cities in Europe.
Next installment… Opera in the bathroom and what exactly is Sacher Torte anyway?