After the glorious sun yesterday, the rain was a little hard to take, especially in, of all places, Vienna. But, these things are beyond the control of the tour company. We have to just go with the flow. And flow we did. By mid-morning we thought the rain would wash us away! In fact, we were ducking for cover from a total downpour when I saw this store sign and thought it very appropriate!
Vienna is a big city, and getting around without our group would entail a whole new skill set we were unwilling to learn. So we opted to stick with the group even though exploring on our own sounded like a lot of fun. We might have had it not been pouring down rain. Anyway. We only saw a small part of what the city had to offer, but what we saw was interesting.
Our first stop was Belvedere Palace. The baroque palace was first built as the summer house for Prince Eugene of Savoy. It sustained major damage in WWII, and has been restored. It now houses a museum, and exhibition space. We didn’t go inside, just wandered the grounds a bit, and, of course, I took photos of the exterior and grounds. It was pretty impressive.
From there we went by coach to central Vienna where we began our walking (in the rain) tour. We’d worn rain gear (unlike many of our traveling companions) so it wasn’t too bad.
We started at the Hofburg Palace, and at the riding facility near it, caught a glimpse of a few of the Lipizzan Stallions. This one was in the warming stall. They are gorgeous animals, and I was feeling badly that we wouldn’t be able to see a performance before Mr. Tattered told me about an article he read recently about how badly they are mistreated, so that disappointment went away.
From there we wandered downtown to the shopping district. Not sure why that is always included in these bigger city tours. Do you suppose they just want Americans to know they have all the expensive “big name” designer stores, too? I couldn’t care less if I tried…
But I did enjoy the architecture, even in the monsoon!
Yeah, I could come back here again…
Tattered 'n Worn 