Vienna is a beautiful beautiful city. Despite the rain on our first day, we had another day or so of wandering around the grand buildings, wide clean streets and monuments galore. Really, it looks like what we thought Paris would look like before we went there!

Vienna - Grand Buildings

Vienna - Grand Buildings Vienna - Grand Buildings

Vienna - St Stephens Cathedral

Vienna - St Stephens Cathedral Vienna - St Stephens Cathedral

Vienna - Hofburg Palace

Vienna - Grand Buildings Vienna - Mozart statue

The Hofburg winter palace was one of the highlights of the trip though. I’d kind of forgotten that Vienna was one of the capitals of the  Austro Hungarian Empire ,which existed from 1867 to 1918 (it collapsed as a result of WWI). The palace was definitely one of those old-money old-world kind of palaces full of antique furniture, dramatic carpets and curtains and beautiful art. Unfortunately, we couldn’t take pictures inside half of it! It was all very grand, which you expect for a palace!

Vienna - Hofburg Palace

Vienna - Hofburg Palace Vienna - Hofburg Palace

Vienna - Hofburg Palace

What we could take photos of was the impressive and excessive Silver Collection. The Hasburgs (the family who ruled the Austro Hungarian empire) commissioned many many dinner sets and table centre pieces over the years. Basically,  about 7,000 items from the total of 150,000 in the collection’s holdings are displayed over an area of 1,300m². Holy heck. Anything gold is gold plated too!

Vienna - Hofburg Palace

Vienna - Hofburg Palace Vienna - Hofburg Palace

Vienna - Hofburg Palace

And that was Vienna! We were definitely thrilled to visit and had a fab weekend.

Next up will be the Shetland Islands – the northern most islands in the UK! Expect, ponies, puffins, ruins and museums.

Until next time…

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