Vienna

Views from Schönbrunn Palace's Gloriette

Vienna (Wien in German, Wean in Austro-Bavarian) is a 1,840,573 inhabitants city flowed by river Danube and capital of Austria, located in the eastern part of the country. This city has an imperial and multicultural heritage due to it's time as Habsburg capital city, hosting influenced of both West and East Europe. It's considered a leading European music center and one of the most liveable city in Europe.

How do I arrive to Vienna?

 Vienna is a very big city so there are many way to arrive there from many places:

• Plane: the most frequent way to arrive to Vienna by plane is using Vienna International Airport, 19 km south east from the city. To go from the airport to the city, there are buses every hour (even in the early hours) and trains (CAT is faster 5-10 minutes faster than average train line but more expensive). Another choice that is sometimes cheaper is flying to the near city of Bratislava (Slovakia), just 60 km from Vienna. To go from Bratislava to Vienna there are buses from the airport (1-2 hours).

  

  Vienna Metro map

• Train: the main train station is Wien Hauptbahnhof, with international and national trains; Wien Westbhanhof is another important station with regional services and trains to Salzburg. There are trains to Linz (aprox. 1.5 hours), to Graz and Salzburg (aprox. 2.5 hours) or Innsbruck (aprox. 4 hours 15 minutes). There are many trins to neighbouring countries like Bratislava (aprox. 1 hour) in Slovakia; Brno, Ostrava and Prague in Czech Republic; Győr or Budapest in Hungary; Passau (aprox. 2.5 hours), Munich (aprox. 4 hours), Nuremberg (aprox. 4.5 hours) or Frankfurt am Main (aprox. 7 hours) in Germany. There are also nigh trains to Germany, Serbia, Ukraine, Greece, Bulgaria, Turkey or Russia.
• Metro: Vienna Metro, known as U-Bahn, connects all the districts of Vienna in 5 different lines (1-4 and 8). It works 5:00-01:00 everyday and 24h during the weekends. It's a very popular mean on transport and works quite well together with local S-Bahn trains. Vienna also has tram lines that although slower, they give nice panoramic views of the city.
• Bus: there are buses from Vienna Bus Stations to almost all over Austria and also to international destinations like Germany, Czech republic, Slovakia, Italy, Poland, the Balkans or Baltic countries.
• Car: if you rented a car, it's a 2 hours journey to Graz and Linz, 2 hours 45 minutes to Salzburg and 4 hours 50 minutes to Innsbruck. To other foreigner cities it takes 1 hour to arrive to Bratislava (Slovakia) and 1 hour 40 minutes to reach Brno (Czech Republic).

Once in Vienna, as in many European capital cities, the best ways to move are using public transportation (tram, buses, underground and train), bicycles or walking.

History

 The first settlements in what is now Vienna were the Celts, later Germanic tribes and after it, the Romans, which founded Vindobona as a defensive point in the Danube river. After the fall of the Western Roman Empire it was occupied Avars by Hungarians till the 9th century, when Charlemagne conquered it and added it to the Eastern March, which later grew into the duchy of Austria. During Middle Age Vienna was an important ally of the Pope and it was first inhabited by Babenberg dynasty and later Habsburg dynasty, becoming de fact the capital of the Holy Roman Empire since 1437 (except when it was invaded by Matthias Corvinus of Hungary), having a huge cultural and scientific development. During the 16th and 17th centuries Vienna was threatened twice by an Ottoman invation (Siege of Vienna in 1519 and Battle of Vienna in 1683) and it suffered a plague which reduced a third its population; despite this, Vienna was the center of Baroque-style in Europe. In the Napoleonic wars Austria was defeated by France in Battle of Wagram, becoming its ally till the French defeat in Russia, when the chancellor Klemens von Metternich changed again Austrian Empire's side. When France was defeated, in the Congress of Vienna, the Austrian Empire's territories were preserved. In 1857 the city walls were demolished and, after the loss in the Austro-Prussian War, Austria gave more power to its inner nacionalisms, becoming the Austro-Hungarian Empire. During Franz Joseph I's reign the country had an important development but after Franz Ferdinand (heir presumptive of the Austro-Hungarian throne) assaination in Sarajevo in 1916, WW1 started, which ended with the breakup of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. After WW1 Vienna became the capital city of the Republic of German-Austria and then the First Austrian Republic, remaining a high center of culture and modernism and called red Vienna (because the socialdemocrat SPÖ won always there until Dolfuss' dictatorship). In 1938 took place the Anschluss (union with Germany) and became part of Nazi Germany till the end of WW2. After the war, Vienna and Austria were firstly divided like Germany but in 1955 the Austrian State Treaty created the Second Austrian Republic. It's the third UNO's capital (after New York and Geneva) and since 1995 it belongs to the EU.

Vienna's top 10

If you have little or you just don't want to visit all Vienna, here's a list of the 10 places you can't miss in Vienna.

1. Hofburg Palace and its facilities (Albertina Museum, Austrian National Library...).
2. Schönbrunn Palace and its gardens.
3. Belvedere Palace.
4. Riesenrad (also known as Vienna Giant Wheel).
5. Vienna Art History Museum.
6. Vienna Catholic Cathedral.
7. Leopold Museum.
8. Vienna Natural History Museum.
9. Hundertwasser House.
10. Karlskirche.

What can I visit in Vienna?

Vienna is visited by aprox. 7 million people per year because of it's history, culture and buildings. There's a card that allows you to get into some monuments for free and get discounts (Viena Pass). Whether or not buying it, it's up to you; but it's very recommended checking and comparing the places you want to visit and their price and the card's one. These are the main sightseeing points:

• 

  Hofburg Palace

  Hofburg (9-17:30 from Sep to Jun; 9-18 from Jul to Aug; 13.90€/ 12.90€/ 8.20€  adults/ students/ kids): former principal palace (and winter palace) of the Habsburg dynasty rulers, built in the 13th century but expanded many times. It has several buildings like the Imperial Apartments, Sisi Museum (museum of the most loved Austrian queen, Elisabeth of Austria) and Imperial Silver Collection. Within the complex it can also be visited the Spanish Riding School, a horse school which offers exhibitions (from 25€) and the practice is also available to be seen (10-12 Tue-Fri from Jan to Jun and from Aug to Dec; 15€/ 7.5€  adults/ kids). Not far from it, there's the Austrian National Library (10-18 Tue-Sun), a Barroque library that belonged to the Habsburg Emperors and is considered one of the most beautiful in the world. It hosts the State Hall (8€/ 6.50€/ 6€  adults/ retiree/ students) and some museums like the Literature Museum (7€/ 5.50€/ 4.50€  adults/ retiree/ students) and the Globe, Papiro and Esperanto Museums (4€/ 3.50€/ 3€  adults/ retiree/ students).

  

  Austrian National Library

  The palace is also home of Albertina Museum (10-21 Wed and Fri; 10-18 rest of the week; 14€/ 11€/ free  adults/ students and retiree/ kids), a museum which hosts more than 65,000 drawings and approximately 1 million old master prints, plus significant collections of Impressionist and early 20th-century art. Outside the building of the palace, getting to Hofburg's entry by Schweizerhof, it can be found Hofburg Imperial Treasury (9-17:30 Wed-Mon; 12€/ 9€/ free  adults/ reduced/ kids), museum hosts a collection of secular and ecclesiastical treasures like the Imperial Crown, the Imperial Regalia of the Emperors and Kings of the Holy Roman Empire and the Imperial Crown of the Holy Roman Empire.
• Burggarten and Volksgarten: parks next to Hofburg whose highlights are many statues (like one of Mozart), a Butterfly House and an Art Nouveau conservatory.

  

  Ephesos Museum

• Neue Berg Museum (10-18 Tue-Sun; 10-21 Thu; ticket included in the Art History Museum one): complex of musesums, part of Vienna Art History Museum, that has 3 museums: Ephesos Museum (has pieces form the archeological site of Ephesos), the Imperial Armory (exhibits arms and armors) and the Collection of Historic Instruments (shows Renaissance and Baroque instrument).
• Augustinerkirche (8-17:30): 14th century parish church of the imperial court of the Habsburgs that has an harmonious 18th century Gothic interior. Many Habsburg weddings took place here (like the wedding of Archduchess Marie Louise to Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte of France in 1810 or the wedding of Emperor Franz Joseph in 1854 to Duchess Elisabeth in Bavaria. Here it's located the Herzgruft too, a burial chamber that contains the hearts of 54 Habsburg rulers.

  

  Vienna State Opera

• Vienna State Opera: a  Neo-Renaissanceo pera house built in 1869 for the emperor Franz Josef I.  who belonged to the Emperors till 1920. It's the most popular symbol of Viennese arts and one of the first buildings rebuilt after WW2. There are guided tours (7.50€ /3.50€  adults/kids) which last 40 minutes. Inexpensive standing room tickets are made available for every performance and sold the day of the performance. The line forms about two hours prior to the performance.
• Gallery of the Academy of Arts (10-18 Wed-Mon; 12€/ 9€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 18): art gallery owned by the Academy of Fine Arts, a prestigious painting school founded in the 17th century. This institution is famous for having rejected Adolf Hitler twice because of his "unfitness for painting", one of the reasons that made him change to politics. It's focused in Flemish, Dutch and German classical paintings and has works by Rembrandt, Rubens, Bosch or Van Dyck. It's most famous painting is The Last Judgment, a triptych by H. Bosch.

  

  Maria Theresa grave at the Imperial Crypt

• Imperial Crypt (10-18; 7.50€/ 6.50€/ 4.50€  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 18): mausoleum, located under Kapuzinerkirche, that houses the tombs of generations of Habsburg royalty (bones of 145 of them and cremated remains of others), including 12 emperor and 18 empresses. The decoration of sarcophagi varies from puritan plain to eccentric Rococo. 
• Musikverein: concert hall from 1870 that is home of the very famous Vienna Philharmonic. Its largest hall, the Großer Musikvereinssaal, is considered to be one of the world's finest concert halls. Like in the case of Vienna State Opera, there are guided tours for visitors instered on it.
• Haus der Musik (10-22; 13€/ 6€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ kids under 12): sound and music museum provided with hi-tech interactive and multimedia expositions to explore the music history and composers. It's located in the Palace of Archduke Charles, where Otto Nicolai, the founder of the Vienna Philharmonic, lived. 

  

  Musikverein

• Vienna Literature Museum (10-18 Tue-Sun; 5€/ 4€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ kids under 19): museum about Austrian literature from the 18th century to today, presenting the work, among others, of Franz Kafka, Johann Nestroy, Arthur Schnitzler, Ilse Aichinger or Friederike Mayröcker. It also has a surprising objects room based on literacy characters.
• Prince Eugen Winter Palace (9-17): Baroque palace that was built as a residence for Prince Eugene of Savoy, having been used later for the Court Treasury and Ministry of Finance. Nowadays it houses period furnishings and exhibits detailing the biography of the prince and the history of the palace too.
• Vienna Jewish Museum (10-18 Sun-Fri; 12€/ 8€/ free  adults/ students/ kids under 18): located in Eskeles Palais, this museum shows the history of Jews in Vienna, since their settlement around Judenplatz till today. There are expositions about religious art and the Holocaust. The ticket also allows you the entrance to Judenplatz Museum (10-18 Sun-Thu; 10-14 Fri), a museum which shows the excavated rests of the Vienna medieval synagogue, which was destroyed by the Archduke Albert V.

  

  Johann Strauss monument at Stadtpark

• Wiener Stadtpark : large municipal park in English style that has statues of famous Austrian artists, like Schubert or Strauss II, and a 19th century music hall, Kursalon Hübner, with waltz concerts.
• Vienna Jesuit Church (8-18): 17th century church that, although it has an austere exterior, it has one of the most elaborate Baroque interiors in Europe, designed by Andrea Pozzo. It's also known as University Church because it's located next to the buildings of the University of Vienna.
• Heiligen Dreifaltigkeit Greek Orthodox Church: 18th century Byzantine revival church built by Theopil Hansen located in the historic Greek district of Vienna that is used as the seat of the Metropolis of Austria and Exarchate of Hungary and Middle Europe.

  

  Exhibition at MAK

  Heiligen Dreifaltigkeit Greek Orthodox Church
• Museum of Applied Arts of Vienna (MAK) (10-18 Tue-Mon; 12€ /9€ / free  adults/retiree and students/kids under 19): museum that teaches about handicraft and daily objects in different periods, from Renaissance to Art Deco. There are many weird objects that will draw the visitor's attention for sure. Some of its more important objects are Wiggle Chair by Frank Gehry or Stoclet Frieze by Gustav Klimt.
• Postsparkasse Museum (10-17 Mon-Fri; free): building owned by Post Office Savings Bank that was built by Otto Wagner in the early 20th century. It has a small museum that introduces the visitor more to Otto Wagner's art and has some of his original furniture and plans.
• Vienna Mozarthaus Museum (10-19; 11€ /9€ /4.50€  adults/retiree and students/kids under 19): only remaining house where the famous musician Mozart lived. It shows how was the society in the end of the 18th century and some original scores by the Austrian genius.

• 

  Vienna Catholic Cathedral

  Vienna Catholic Cathedral (6-22 Mon-Sat; 7-22 Sun; main nave ticket 6€/ 1.5€  adults/ kids; all inclusive 14.90€/ 3.90€): Romanesque and Gothic cathedral dates back to the year 1147, having witnessed many important events for the Habsburg and Austrian history. It's most popular part is the multi-coloured tile roof, symbol of the city of Vienna. With the all inclusive ticket catacombs, cathedral's threasury, north and south towers are available to visit (otherwise it can be purchased each place for the same place as the main nave ticket). 

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  Ankeruhr

  St. Ruprecht Catholic Church: 13th century Romanesque style church that is considered to be one of the oldest in Vienna. Its interior was modified and has Baroque decoration and it owns the oldest bells and stained glass panes in the city. In summer its walls are fulled with ivy.
• Ankeruhr: Judgenstil style clock built by Franz Matsch in 1911. Prominent figures of Viennese history have a Roman number and at midday there's a "parade" of them in the clock with music.
• Hoher Markt: oldest square in Vienna, center of th Roman settlement.

  

  Neidhart Festsaal

• Neidhart Festsaal (10-18 Tue-Sun; 5€/ 4€/ free  adults/ students/ people under 19): the oldest secular frescoes in Vienna, that date back to 1407, are located in an aparently normal house. They are preserved in very good conditions and illustrate scenes from the life and poetry of the Viennese minnesinger Neidhart von Reuental.
• St. Peter Catholic Church (7-20 Tue-Fri, 9-21 Sat-Sun; free): 18th century Baroque church that is believed to be located over a previous medieval one. The most outstanding parts of it are the frescoes located at the dome and the Baroque high altar by Antonio Galli Bibiena and his workshop and Martino Altomonte. It organises free organ concerts everyday at 15.
• Austrian Resistence Historical Archive (9-17 Mon-Fri; free): exposition located in Vienna Old City Hall that shows the resistence against the Nazi occupation, its influence and effects on the history of Vienna and Austria.

  

  Maria am Gestade Church

• Vienna Plague Column: Baroque Marian column built at the end of the Great Plague of Vienna, in 1679.
• Maria am Gestade Catholic Church (7-21): Gothic church that used to be popular among river Danube sailors. Its Gothic choir windows were taken to Franzensburg Castle (in Laxemburg) but it keeps three very nice porticos. Today the church is associated with the Czech community in Vienna.
• Kunstforum (10-19 Sat-Thu; 10-21 Fri; 11€/ 6€/ 4€  adults/ students/ people under 17): museum located in an impressing Neoclassic building that organises very interesting temporary expositions of Modernistic or Contemporary important artists. Some of those exhibitions were about Vicent van Gogh, Egon Schiele, Picasso, Frida Kahlo or Balthus.

• 

  Scots Church

  Looshaus: 20th century building built by Adolf Loos, considered one of the most significat buildings of Wiener Moderner era. Nowadays it's home of an Austrian bank, Wiener Raiffeisenbank, but has an exhibition with photographies and documents of the building's history.
• Scots Church (10-17 Tue-Sat; free): 12th century church and monastery founded by Benedictine monks from Scotia Maior (Ireland), whose current outlook is Baroque. It's façade is from the 19th century and it has an interesting shop and a museum.
• Beethoven Pasqualati House (10-18 Tue-Sun; 5€/ 4€/ free  adults/ students/ kids under 19): small museum in the place where Beethoven lived during 10 years and where he composed the Fourth, Fifth and Seventh Symphonies or the opera Fidelio.
  

  

  Votivkirche

• Votivkirche (10-18 Tue-Sat, 9-13 Sun): 19th century Neo-Gothic Catholic church designed by Heinrich von Ferstel, regarded as one of the most important religious sites on its style. It's located where an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate Emperor Franz Joseph took place in 1853. It's made of sandstone so it's quite vulnerable to air pollution and acid rain.
• Sigmund Freud Museum (10-18; 12€/ 7.50€  adults/ students): small house-museum where Freud lived during its more prolific years, from 1891 to 1938. It has personal objects and temporary expositions although he took most of his objects when he fled to London before WW2.
• Servitenkirche: 18th century Catholic church built by the architect Andrea Palladio for the Servite Order in Emperor Ferdinand III times. Here it's buried Ottavio Piccolomini, and Italian nobleman that served as military for the Spanish army and for the Holy Roman Empire.

  

  Liechtenstein Museum and its library

• Liechtenstein Museum (only guided tours): Baroque style palace with a garden that has sculptures. It keeps Hans-Adam II (Prince of Liechtenstein) art gallery, with paintings like Portrait of a Man by Raffaello or Portrait of Clara Serena by Rubens and one of the most precious pieces of furniture in the world, Badminton cabinet.
• Vienna Jewish Cemetery (8-15 Tue-Fri; free): oldest preserved Jewish cemetery in Vienna, used from the 16th century to 1784. Nazi officials decided to raze it but some Viennese Jews removed 931 gravestones and buried them at Vienna Central Cemetery. They were rediscovered and relocated in the 1980s.
• Strulhofstiege: outdoor staircase in Jugendstil style designed by Theodor Johann Jaeger in 1910.

  

  St. Johannes Nepomuk Catholic Chapel

• St. Johannes Nepomuk Catholic Chapel: church built in the 1890s by Otto Wagner, being his first religious structure. It was used as a model for the construction of Kirche am Steinhof.
• Türkenschanzpark: lovely park inaugurated in 1888 by the Emperor Franz Joseph located where there were some Turkish entrechment from the first Ottoman siege on Vienna. It has some botanic rarities from all continents.
• Schubert's Birthplace Museum (10-18 Tue-Sun; 5€/ 4€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): house where Franz Schubert lived since he was born in 1797 till he was 5 years old. It's very small but has an interesting exposition about his life and work, and also about his glasses, one of his more peculiar characteristics.

  

  Spittelau Waste Incineration Plant

  
  
• Spittelau Waste Incineration Plant (guided tours on request): waste incinerators aren't usually attractive but Hundertwasser restyled the façade of this plant in 1989, becoming a photogenic spot at Viennese landscape.
  
• Karl-Marx Hof: public housing complex built in the late 1920s by Karl Ehn (Otto Wagner's student) built during Austria's First Republic. It consists of 1382 apartments and it's considered the world's longest contiguous public housing complex (1.1 km long). There's a permanent exhibition (guided tours on request) that speaks about the history of Red Vienna, that explains this period between 1919 and 1934 in which SPÖ (social-democrats) ruled Vienna; the rest of the building is still used for housing.

  

  Karl-Marx Hof

• Beethoven Museum at Heilingenstadt (10-18 Tue-Sun; 7€/ 5€/ free  adults/ students/ kids under 19): another of Beethoven's many residences in Vienna (in those times Heiligenstadt was a spa town on the outskirts of Vienna) where he came to improve his deaf. Here he composed Symphony No. 2 in D major and other works like the Variations for piano opus 34 and 35 or parts of the three Sonatas for violin opus 30.
• Zum heiligen Kreuz Catholic Church at Grinzing (7-21:30): church first built in the 15th century but burnt during the Ottoman sieges of Vienna. The church was also damaged during WW2 but one of its most precious treasures survided, the organ in which both Beethoven and Schubert used to perform.

  

  Zum heiligen Kreuz Catholic Church at Grinzing

• St. Leopold Catholic Church at Leopoldsberg (8-21 Mon-Fri): small 17th century church located in the top of Leopoldsberg (425 m high) that provides great views of Vienna and the surrounding area. 
  
• Pathological and Anatomical State Museum (10-18 Wed, 10-13 Thu and Sat; 4€/ 2€  adults/ retiree and students): small museum, placed at a squat tower that used to be an insane asylum, that has some of traces of medicine history with hydrocephalic infants, wax castings of tertiary syphilis, antique medical devices or a laryngeal tuberculous ulcer. This museum isn't recommended for everyone as it may be considered disgusting for some.
• Josephinum (only guided tours): museum located in a surgeon academy built by Emperor Joseph II which has one of the weirdest collections in Vienna: more than 1200 models of 200 years olds wax midwifery, operation tools and operation paintings. Today it's still used for research.
  

  

  Austrian Museum of Folk Life and Art

• Austrian Museum of Folk Life and Art (10-17 Tue-Sun; 8€/ 4€/ free  adults/ students/ people under 19): museum located in Schönborn Palace, a 18th century Baroque Palais by Lukas von Hildebrandt, that depicts traditional life in Austria and neighbouring Central Europe countries with religious and rural art and hand-made furniture. 
• Austrian Parliament (tours when it isn't being used): 19th century Neoclassical building designed by Theophil von Hansen that is home of the two houses of the Austrian Parliament. It has more than a hundred rooms, including commitee rooms, libraries, lobbies, dining rooms, bars and gymnasiums. Outside it can be found Pallas Athena fountain, built in 1902 by Carl Kundmann.

• 

  Upper part of Vienna City Hall

  Vienna City Hall (free guided tours at 13): 19th century Neogothic building built by Friedrich von Schmidt (architect of Cologne Cathedral) imitating Flemish city halls. It has one of the biggest portico courtyard, Arkadenhof, and a 103 m high clock tower. In front of it there's a pleasant park with some fountains and it's the place where Wiener Eistraum is placed.
• Damian Palace: Baroque Palais whose central sections are from the 18th century and its second floor was added afterwards. It has changed hands frequently and each owner adapted it.
  
• Catholic Church of Maria Treu: Baroque church attributed to Lukas von Hildebrandt built for the Order of the Piarists that has eight chapels and frescoes by Franz Anton Maulbertsch. It's the first place where Missa in Tempore Belli by Hayden was played.

  

  Catholic Church of Maria Treu

  
  only museum of its kind in Austria, with displays focusing on the history of shoemaking
• Vienna Shoe Museum (16-19 second Tue of the month; 3.50€/ 3€  adults/ retiree and students): museum that explains the history of shoes and shoemaking, the only of its kind in Austria.
• Strozzi Palace: 18th century Palais built for Countess Maria Katharina Strozzi and owned by Strozzi family, an ancient family from Florence (great rivals of Medici family). Today it's home of the finance offices of 9th, 16th and 17th districts.
• Auersperg Palace: 18th century Baroque style Palais designed by Lukas von Hildebrandt that was owned by Prince Adam von Auersperg. In 1945 the Austrian resistence group O5 met here and it has always been a center for music, hosting many celebrations and balls.

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  Vienna Natural History Museum

  Vienna Natural History Museum (10-18:30 Tue-Mon; 12€/ 7€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 10): museum built in the 19th century as a twin for Vienna Art History Museum. It hosts an amazing collection with minerals, fossils, stuffed animals, reconstructions of dinosaurs and meteorite's pieces. One of the most impressing parts is the anthropological section, where it can be seen the impressing Venus of Willendorf, a small sculpture from the 30,000 BC. It contains a world-class exhibit of the Habsburgs' art collection, including Raphael, Titian, Caravaggio, Bosch, and Brueghel. The museum has an excellent collection of ancient Egyptian, Greek, and Roman art. The coin & medals collection is also exhaustive in its scope.

  

  Tower of Babel by Brueghel the Elder

• Vienna Art History Museum (10-18 Tue-Sun; 10-21 Thu; 15€/ 9€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ kids): museum, also known simply as Kunsthistoriche, located on a 19th century palace opened in 1891 by emperor Franz-Joseph I to shelter Habsburgs' art collection and make it accessible for citizens. It is the largest art museum in Austria and one of the world's greatest art museums. This formidable art collection exhibits world-class masters such as Raphael, Titian, Caravaggio, Bosch and Brueghel the Elder. Some most outstandings works of art are Tower of Babel by Pieter Brueghel the Elder, Summer by Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Madonna del Prato by Raphael, The Art of Painting by Johannes Vermeer or Infanta Margarita Teresa in a Blue Dress by Diego Velázquez. It also has an excellent collection of ancient Egyptian, Greek and Roman art, as well as a coin and medals collection.

  

  MUMOK and Kunsthalle

• Museum of Modern Art of Vienna (MUMOK) (10-19 Tue-Sun; 14-19 Mon; 12€/ 8€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): 20th century art museum focused in Fluxus, an intermedia concept art movement. There are also expositions on other movements like Viennese Actionism, Expressionism and Cubism and the expositions change regulary. It also has major works by Andy Warhol, Pablo Picasso, Joseph Beuys, Nam June Paik, Wolf Vostell, Gerhard Richter, Jasper Johns and Roy Lichtenstein.
• Kunsthalle (11-19 Tue-Sun; 8€/ 2€/ free  adults/ students/ people under 19): exhibition hall where highly-regarded exhibits of Contemporary Austrian and international works of art are temporarily exposed. They are frequently innovative, using video, photography and new technology.

  

  Self-portrait by Egon Schiele

• Leopold Museum (10-18 Wed-Mon; 13€/ 9€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ kids under 7): museum which was created with Rudolf Leopold collection, made of 19th century and Austrian Modernism works of art. Its main works of art are The Self Seers (Death & Man), Mother with two children and Cardinal and Nun by Egon Schiele, Death and Life by G. Klimt. There are works of other painters like Albin Egger-Lienz, Richard Gertsl or Oskar Kokoschka. It can be bought a combined ticket for Leopold Museum and MUMOK (20.50€/ 16€  adults/ reduced).
• Rahlstiege: staircase from 1870 that connects Mariahilfer Straße and Gumpendorfer Straße.

  

  Secession

• Secession (10-18 Tue-Sun; 9.50€/ 6€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ kids under 10): museum created by some Modernist artists like Gustav Klimt, Josef Hoffmann or Kolo Moser. Among its highlights are Beethoven Frieze by G. Klimt and the building's gold cupola, which is known among Viennese people as the golden cabbage.
• Karlplatz Stadtbahn Pavilions (10-18 from Apr to Oct): Modernist train pavilions built in 1898 by Otto Wagner for the first public transport in Vienna. Among all the ones he built, the best ones are this ones located in Karlplatz.
• Vienna Museum (10-18 Tue-Sun; 10€/ 7€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): museum that shows the history of Vienna from Neolithic to the 20th century. It has, among others, Celtic coins, medieval Fürstenfiguren, Loof's furniture or Egon Schiele and Gustav Klimt's paintings.

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  Karlskirche

  Karlskirche (9-18 Mon-Sat; 12-19 Sun; 8€/ 4€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ kids under 10): 18th century Baroque church designed by the architect Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, considered the best example of this style in Vienna and the largest Baroque church in the north of the Alps. It has paintings by Baroque painters like Sebastiano Ricci, Giuseppe Antonio Pellegini or Daniel Gran. It has a lift to its big cupola, enabling watching closer J. M. Rottmayr's frescoes.



Soviet War Memorial in Vienna

• Soviet War Memorial in Vienna: Soviet style monument that commemorate 17,000 Soviet soldiers who died during the Vienna Offensive in WW2.
• Arnold Schönberg Center (9-17 Mon-Fri; 5€ /3€ / free  adults/ retiree and students/ kids under 12): exhibtion that has an archive of the work of the Viennese composer Arnold Schönberg, focused on his work, his music and a gallery of his paintings.
• Vienna Serbian Orthodox Cathedral: Neo-Byzantine style cathedral founded in the 1890s over a previous one from the 16th century. It's the seat of Austria-Switzerland Diocese.

  

  Upper Belvedere

• Vienna Russian Orthodox Cathedral: Neo-Byzantine style cathedral founded in the 1890s paid by tzar Alexander III of Russia. It's the seat of Vienna-Austria Eparchy and is located by the Russian embassy.
• Belvedere Palace (22€/ 19€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): palace complex that divided into two palaces, considered the most beautiful Baroque palaces in the world, built as summer residence for Prince Eugene of Savoy. Upper Belvedere (9-18) is the most important one, whose rooms are full of recent Austrian and international art since 1800s, with paintings by Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele and Oskar Kokoschka.

  

  The Kiss by Gustav Klimt

  It has world art masterpieces like The Kiss and Judith and the Head of Holofernes by Gustav Klimt, Napoleon crossing the Alps by Jacques-Louis David, Rocky Landscape in the Elbsandsteingebirge by Caspar David Friedrich or Portrait of Eduard Kosmack by Egon Schile. The other palace is Lower Belvedere (10-18), a palace that houses temporary exhibits and also nice rooms like the Marble Gallery, Golden Room or the Grotesque Hall. It can also be visited the Prunkstall (10-12), former stables that now are used as a permanent collection of medieval religious art and a collection of medieval tapestries. The complex has some very nice gardens, Belvedere Gardens, that are great to have a walk.

  

  Belvedere Gardens

• Botanical Gardens of the University of Vienna (10-18 from Apr to Sep; 10-17 Oct and from Feb to Mar; 10-16 from Nov to Jan; free): garden established by Empress Maria Theresia in 1754 as a garden for medicinal plants. It has an important number of rare plants (among them some alpine specimens) and is maintained by the Univeristy of Vienna.
• Belvedere 21 (11-18 Wed-Sun; 8€/ 6€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): museum with 20th and 21st century art and a collection created by the Austrian artist Fritz Wotruba. Blickle Kino (1950 cinema) and Salon für Kunstbuch (museum's shop where the visitor can buy works of art) are also part of the facilities of the museum.



Room at the Museum of Military History of Vienna

• Museum of Military History of Vienna (9-17; 7€/ 5€  adults/ reduced): museum placed in Vienna's Arsenal, Neo-Byzantine style, that displays a collection of objects that go from the Thirty Year's War to WW2. It has pretty interesting objects like weapons, uniforms, the open-top car where Archduke Franz Ferdinand was murdered (that marked the beginning of WW1), Nazi propaganda and Hitler's speeches after Anschluss. Taking pictures or video costs 2€.
• St. Marx Cemetery (6:30-20): cemetery used between 1784 and 1874 in which Mozart was buried (in an unmarked pauper's grave) in 1791. Some time later his grave was identified and the current tombstone was built.

  

  Vienna Gasometer

  
  
• Vienna Gasometer (guided tours on request): four former gas storage tanks that were used between 1899 and 1984, when town gas stopped being used. It was a location on James Bond: The Living Daylights and revitalised in 2001 by the architects Jean Nouvel, Coop Himmelblau, Manfred Wehdorn, and Wilhelm Holzbauer. The outside wall was conserved but each gasometer was divied into zones for living, shopping or entertainment.
• Transport Museum of Wiener Linien (9-18 Wed, 10-18 Sat-Sun; 8€/ 6€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 16): museum located at a former depot houses with a collection of vintage vehicles that explain the history of the Viennese public transportation system. The collection has horse-drawn streetcars from 1868, a steam tram set from 1885, many electric streetcars from the 1910s until the recent past and buses from 1949-1978. It has a simulator of a U-Bahn too.

  

  Hundertwasser House

• Hundertwasser House: apartment and office complex designed by Friedensreich Hundertwasser, one of the landmarks of Expressionist architecture in Vienna and Austria and one of the most visited places in Vienna. It has curved lines and colourful walls. It's still used for residential purposes.
• Museum of Art Fakes (10-16 Wed-Sun; 6€/ 5.50€/ 3.20€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 18/ kids under 10): eccentric museum focused on the art of forgery. It has a large collection of counterfeited paintings (many of them high-quality forgeries) and an important collection of fake Hitler diaries that fooled many experts in the early 1980s. 

  

  Kunsthaus Wien - Hundertwasser Museum

• Kunsthaus Wien - Hundertwasser Museum (9-18 Wed, 10-18 Sat-Sun; 12€/ 5€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ kids under 10): museum that shows the way Hundertwasser understood art and is the world's only permanent exhibition of Hundertwasser's works, that hosts regular temporary exhibitions of other artists too. The façade may remind to any of the buildings of Antoni Gaudi in Barcelona and its design is full of wavy, undulating floors and a notable lack of straight lines with bright and glaring colours.
• Johann Strauss House-Museum (10-18 Tue-Sun; 5€/ 4€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): house where Strauss lived and composed the famous waltz The Blue Danube. It has musical instruments, furniture and paintings that belonged to him and allows to know more about this famous musician and composer.

  

  Flak Towers at Augarten

• Vienna Crime Museum (10-17 Thu-Sun; 8€/ 4€  adults/ students): museum that shows the history of police and justice system from the Middle Ages until WW2, with exposing some famous Viennese criminals.
• Otto Wagner Schützenhaus (11-23 Mon-Sat): buidling designed by Otto Wagner in 1908 as a part of the redevelopment of Donaukanal. It was neglected during many years but it houses a restaurant since 2010.
• Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary-Augarten (12-19 Tue-Sun; 5€/ 3€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): museum that has an exposition with sculptures of Gustinus Ambrosi and hosts special exhibitions of Contemporary art by Austrian and international artists. It's located in a very nice park, Augarten, where it can also be found the Flak Towers, a pair of ainti-aircraft defense towers built by Luftwaffe during WW2, using war victims (who were buried in the park and still remain undiscovered).

  

  Brigittakirche

• Brigittakirche (7-19): 19th century Neogothic Catholic church built by Friedrich von Schmidt. It was built using red-bricks and has a beautiful interior too.
• Brigittenau District Museum (15-19 Tue, 10-12 Sun; free): small museum that tells the story of the district of Brigettenau (20) through pictures, views and models.
• Millennium Tower: 171 m high tower designed by the architects Gustav Peichl, Boris Podrecca and Rudolf Weber that is the 2nd highest building in Vienna and is one of the main landmarks over the Viennese skyline. It has 51 floors and is home of a commercial complex called Millennium City.
  

  

  Vienna Giant Wheel or Riesenrad

• Prater: central and biggest park in Vienna with many black poplars and chestnuts, a swimming pool, a golf course and many facilities. Here it's located Vienna Giant Wheel (10-21:45; 12€ /5€  adults/kids), also known as Riesenrad, a giant wheel from 1897 that has appeared in many films like in Orson Welles' The Third Man, James Bond's The living daylights or Before Sunrise by R. Linklater. Its spin lasts 20 minutes so you can have great panoramic views. The Viennese version of the worldwide-known museum Madame Tussauds Museum (10-18; 23€/ 19€  adults/ kids), with international sculptures of people like Michael Jackson or Nicole Kidman and Austrian celebrities like Francis Joseph I or Sigmund Freud is also located within Prater. Here there's also a small museum that explains the history of this park and its amusement park, Prater Museum (10-13 and 14-18 Fri-Sun; 5€/ 4€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19).

  

  Prater

  
  
• Campus of the Vienna University of Economics and Business: stunning campus opened in 2013 designed by many international architecture firms. Its most important building is the Library & Learning Center by the architect Zaha Hadid.
• Vienna Circus and Clown Museum (10-13 Sun; free): museum that has an usual collection of props and costumes with rotating exhibits.
• DC Towers: 220 m high towers designed by Dominique Perrault with an observation deck, tallesest skyscraper of Austria.
• Donau City Catholic Church (8:30-18; free): 21st century church designed by the architect Heinz Tesar located by UNO City.
  

• 

  UNO City and Donauturm

  UNO City (guided tours on request; 15€/ 13€/ 5€  adults/ retiree and students/ kids under 16): complex completed in 1979 that hosts United Nations Office in Vienna, used as seat for such international agencies as IAEO, UNHCR, UNOV and UNODC. It's an extraterritorial area exempt from the jurisdiction of local law.
• Donauturm (10-24; 14.50€/ 9.90€/ free  adults/ retiree and people under 14/ kids under 6): observation tower designed by Hannes Lintl that provides a spectacular view of Vienna and further, one of the tallest buildings in Austria and in Europe. It has two rotating restaurant.
  



Goethehof

• Goethehof: another example of social housing built during Red Vienna period. These living blocks of around 700 apartments with a mixture of Modern-Functionalist and Jugendstil styles. They were inhabited by the working class and were one of the strongholds of the resistence against Austro-fascism during the Austrian Civil War (1934).
  
• Hirschstetten Garden of Flowers (9-18 Tue-Sun from Mar to Oct; free): garden used as publick park with some themed gardens, a far with petting zoo, an insect-themed playground or an educational beehive.
  
• Fatty George Jazz Museum: small museum about the life of the musician Fatty Georgia (native from Essling district) that also speaks about jazz music. It's located inside a historic toilet.
• Citygate: two apartment buildings (80 m and 100 m high) built int 2015 that strike out because it's surrounded by low-rise buildings. It has a shopping mall too.

  

  Interior of Paulanerkirche

• Floridsdorf Jewish Cemetery: cemetery from 1877 built for the then town of Floridsdorf (now district 21) that was in use till 1978.
• Paulanerkirche: 17th century church with a largely Baroque decoration. Pauline Fathers built in the times of Emperor Ferdinand II and it was burnt during the second siege of Vienna by the Turks.
• Third Man Museum (14-18 Sat; 9.50€/ 7.50€/ 5€  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 16): museum focused on the film by Carol Reed The Third Man (1949) and the starring Joseph Cotten, Alida Valli, Orson Welles and Trevor Howard, that was filmed in Vienna.

  

  Haus des Meeres

• Haus des Meeres (9-20; 19.90€/ 14.90€/ 8.90€  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 16): zoo located in an air raid defense complex from WW2 and its former gun emplacement (nowadays it has a platform with nice views of Vienna's skyline). Some sites are rainforest glasshouses, aquariums and terrariums. It has an interesting exhibition on Mediterranean sea life and apes and birds are allowed to freely mingle with the visitors (touching or feeding them is forbidden).
• Schubert's last residence Museum (10-18 Tue-Sun; 5€/ 4€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): houser that belonged to Schubert's brother house where F. Schubert composed in his final days, like the lied The Sheperd on the Rock, and died in 1828. This museum shows how were his last days and documents related to him.  
  
• Schönburg Palace: small Baroque Palais designed by Johann Lucas von Hildebrandt with a garden that is currently used as a location for events.

  

  St. Florian Catholic Church

• St. Florian Catholic Church: church designed by Rudolf Schwarz in the 1960s with a mixture of light concrete and dark glass. It was built where there were two previous churches (last one was demolished in 1965 due to traffic considerations) but keeps the main altar for the old church in the organ loft of the new church. Next to it there are many community hosses from Red Vienna period (1920s-1930s) with styles from Art Decó to Modernism. Some of the most important ones are Reumannhof, Metzleinsthaler Hof, Matteottihof or Matzleinsdorf.
• Spinnerin am Kreuz: 16 m high Gothic column erected in the late 14th century by Master Michael Knab. It was built to thank for the safe return of a husband from the Crusades and was used as public execution site until the 19th century.

  

  Imperial Furniture Museum

  
  
• Imperial Furniture Collection (10-18 Tue-Sun; 9.50€/ 8.50€/ 6€  adults/ retiree and students/ kids under 14): 18th century store that hosts one of the largest furniture collections in the world. It belonged to the Habsburg family and there are furniture from evey Austrian emperor since Charles VI to the Viennese Modernist movement, apart from including contemporary Austrian architects and designers, such as E.A. Plischke, Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky, Luigi Blau and Franz West. Its most popular elements are Maria Ludovika of Austria-Este's Egyptian cabinet, the wooden designs by Brothers Thonet or Prince Eugene of Savoy's bedroom.

  

  Haydn House-Museum

• WestLicht (10-18 Tue-Sun; 8€/ 5€/ 3€  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): gallery that shows unfrequent cameras (going from underwater or toy cameras to KGB sky cameras) and one of the 30 modified Hasselblad cameras used on the Apollo moon mission. It hosts the famous World Press Photo show for the world's best press pictures and temporary exhibitions too.
  
• Haydn House-Museum (10-18 Tue-Sun; 5€/ 4€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): house where the musician Joseph Hayden spent his final 12 years of life, where he composed the oratorios The Creation and The Seasons. Here you can learn more about his life, his music, and policts and society in the 19th century.

  

  Kirche am Steinhof
• Vienna Technical Museum (9-18 Mon-Fri, 10-18 Sat-Sun; 14€/ 12.50€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): large museum that has exhibitions with machines and electronic equipment, together with their evolution since they were first design up to their current form. 
  
• Kirche am Steinhof: Jugenstil sytle church built in 1907 by Otto Wagner next for Steinhof hospital, largest mental hospital and sanatorium of its time in Europe. It's widely regarded as one of the most important Art Nouveau churches in the world.
• Ernst Fuchs Museum (10-16 Tue-Sat; guided tour on request): museum located at Wagner Villa, eccentric villa designed by Otto Wagner that was bought by Ernst Fuchs to Wagner's family. It has paintings by Fuchs exhibited in the house and it can be seen the obvious influence of the house on them.
  

  

  Schönbrunn Palace and Gardens

• Schönbrunn Palace (8-18:30 from Jul to Aug; 8-17 from Nov to Mar; 8-17:30 rest of the year; long route 17.50€/ 16.20€/ 11.50€  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 18; short route 14.20€/ 13.20€/ 10.50€  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 18): summer palace of the Habsburg dynasty built in Barroque-style, considered the Austrian version of Versailles Palace and part of UNESCO World Heritage List. It has 1,441 rooms (22 visited in the short route and 40 in the long one) and the most popular rooms are Franz Joseph I and Sisi's (his wife) ones. In the long route the 18th century rooms from Empress Maria Theresea times. The palace has hosted important meetings like one between J. F. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev during Cold War.

  

  Gloriette and Schönbrunn Gardens

  Outside it, the palace is surrrounded by Schönbrunn Gardens, an incredible Baroque garden built in French style with fountaintes, sculptures and decorative elements that has remained unaltered since its creation in 1779. Some of the highlights are fake Roman ruins, Gloriette (kind of triumphal arch with great views of the gardens), a laberynth or the Crown Prince Garden. The complex is also home of Schönbrunn Zoo (9-18:30 from Apr to Sep; 8-17 from Nov to Mar; 8-17:30 rest of the year; 22€/ 11€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ kids under 6), zoo built for Empress Maria Theresa's husband in 1752 and therefore the oldest zoo in the world.

  

  Hietzing Hofpavilion Museum

• Wagenburg Museum of Carriages (8-18:30 from Jul to Aug; 9-16:30 from Nov to Feb; 9-17:30 rest of the year; 8€/ free  adults/ people under 18): museum that houses Austrian monarchy carriages, from small ones for kids to Francis Joseph I's one, weighting 4,000 kg and having gold, Venetian glass and cherubs. 
• Hietzing Cemetery (7-sunset): cemetery where distinguished Viennese people from the 18th to 20th centuries were buried such as Gustav Klimt, Otto Wagner, Franz Grillparzer or Alban Berg.
• Hietzing Hofpavilion Museum (10-13 and 14-18 Sat-Sun; 5€/ 4€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): rail station buit in 1899 that was exclusive for the Emperor and members of his court. Today it's a stop of U4 line.
• Mariä Geburt Catholic Church in Hietzing: church that dated back to the 15th century and was destroyed during the second siege of Vienna (1685) and rebuilt in Baroque style. It has some beautiful chapels and a nice altarpiece. 

  

  Klimt Villa

• Klimt Villa (10-18 Tue-Sun; 10€/ 5€  adults/ students): Neobarroque villa that Gustav Klimt used as his studio between 1911 and 1918. It has furniture reproductions on what used to be his house, his erotic sketches and old photographies. 
• Werkbundsiedlung: public housing project built by Josef Frank (inspired Weißenhofsiedlung in Stuttgart) in the 1930s. It consisted of 76 buildings (remaining 32 today) and has fine examples of Bauhaus architecture.
• Hermesvilla (10-18 Tue-Sun; 7€/ 5€/ free  adults/ retiree and students/ people under 19): late 19th century palace located in a wooded area (Lainzer Tiergarten) that was formerly used as hunting ground for Habsburg family. It keeps the original furniture an murals (some of them by Franz Matsch, Hugo Carlemont or Georg and Gustav Klimt). Nowadays it's used for special exhibits.

  

  Wotruba Catholic Chuch

• Wotruba Catholic Church (14-18 Sat, 10-16 Sun; free): eccentrict Cubist church from 1970s designed by Fritz Wotruba and placed on the top of a hill, overlooking the woods. It's inspired in Chartres Cathedral and has 152 asymmetrically arranged concrete blocks.
  
• OstLicht (12-18 Wed-Sat): photography gallery and library that hosts group and solo exhibits of Contemporary photography. It has a bookshop and a bar too.
• Neugebäude Palace (guiged tour on request): 16th century Schloss built on the place whe Sultan Süleyman was supposed to have camped during the First Turkish siege of Vienna (1529). From the 17th century it fell into disrepair but since the 1970s, some of its parts have been protected and restored.

  

  Tombs at Central Cemetery

  
  
• Central Cemetery (7-20; free): cemetery created in 1874 with almost 3 million graves (one of the largest in Europe) divided into sections for different religions: Catholic, Protestant, Jewish... At the Ehrengräber it can be found the graves of famous composers like Beethoven, Brahms, Schubert, Strauss or Schönberg. Here it can be found Karl Borromäus Catholic Church, Jugendstil church built by Max Hegele in 1911, considered among the most well-known examples of Jugendstil sacral architecture. In front of it is located Austria Presidential Crypt, crypt that houses the remains of Austrian presidents since the Austrian Second Republic.
• Vienna Forest: this forest is Vienna's green lamb (45 km of wooded hills) has some very nice paths which allow to get in touch with nature. The most popular is the path 4 (7.2 km, 3 hours) which arrives till the Jubiläumswarte and another one is path 1 (11 km) starting and finishing in Nussdorf and reaching Kahlenberg, hill with vineyards.
  

Which activities can I do in Vienna?

 

Großer Musikvereinssaal

Vienna is the cultural center in Austria and one of the main cultural spots in Europe, specially related to music. There are many important threaters, concert halls and operas like the following ones: Viena State Opera (Staatsopera, used for ballet, operas...), Musikverein (classical music concert hall par excellence), Burgtheater (the main German language theater in the world, with all kinds of plays and genres), Volksoper (second more important opera house in Vienna, specialised in operettas), MuTh (concert hall of the Vienna's Boys Choir, founded in 1498 by Maximilian I) and Vienna's English Theater (oldest and most established English-language theatre in continental Europe, with all kind of plays). But there are many other activities you can do in this city. A different way of enjoying Ringtraße is going into the Ring Tram (starting at Schwedenplatz), a tram which gives you a 30 minutes journey all over it. In case some rest is needed, there is a very nice spa, Oberlaa Therme Wien (Kurbadstraße 14), or you can relax having a cruise along Danube river.

Wiener Eistraum

  In the Danube Island (Donauinsel) many outdoors activities (like sailing, swimming, skating...) can be done and even in some places, there are nudists areas. Talking about outdoors activities one you can do in Vienna even there's no sea, is surfing in 3 City Wave (Schwarzenbergplatz) or simply enjoy others doing it. For food lovers and people who love cooking Wrenkh Cooking School (Bauernmarkt 10) is a great place to learn how to cook Austrian gastronomy. In winter Vienna has plenty of activities, like ice skiing in the Wiener Eistraum (Rathausplatz from Jan to Mar), in front of the City council, which has a nice atmosphere; or enjoying some Christmas market (Christkindlmärkte), available in Rathausplatz, Schönbrunn and Spittelberggasse.

Where can I eat in Vienna?

Naschmarkt

Vienna has many offers for many kinds of buyers, mostly found in the following streets: Kärtner Straße, Kohlmarkt, Neubau, Mariahilfer Straße, Freihausviertel, Theobaldgasse, Gumpendorfer Straße and Josefstädter Straße. Dorotheum (10-18 Mon-Fri, 9-17 Sat; Dorotheergasse 17), one of the oldest auction houses in the world (founded in 1707), sells paintings, furniture and daily use objects. Naschmarkt is a market where people can buy meat, fruits, vegetables, spices, cheeses... and food as well. Other markets are Karmelitermarkt, Bauernmarkt Yppenplatz and Brunnenmarkt. In one of Nashcmarkt's corners can be found Flohmarkt (Linke Wienzeile 48-52), a market full of antiquity and second-hand objects. Steiff (Bräunerstraße 3) is the place where teddy bears were invented, is a popular toy shop. In case you want to buy wine you can go to 1130Wein (Lainzer Straße 1); if you prefer beer, you can choose Beerlovers (Gumpendorfer Straße 35). A good place to buy jam is Staud (Yppenmarkt M); for bakery, Blühendes-konfekt (Schmalzhofgasse 19) and for all kind of food, a nice place is Meinl (Graben 19). Talking about fashion, there are some interesting shops like Dirndlherz (Lerchenfelder Straße 54-56), die Schwalbe (Reindorfgasse 38). There are shops where purchising cosmetics and natural products, such as Wald & Wiese (Wollzeile 19) or Wiener Rosenmanufaktur (Dernjacgasse 6/1/5). The best shopping center in Vienna is Palais Ferstel (Strauchgasse 4).

Where can I eat in Vienna?

Wiener schnitzel

The most typical dish in Vienna, and probably in Austria, is the Wiener Schnitzel (thin, breaded, pan-fried veal cutlet). Other typical dishes from Vienna city are Goulash (Hungarian meat stew seasoned), Tafelspitz (boiled beef in broth, served with a mix of minced apples and horseradish), Beuschel (a ragout containing veal lungs and heart), Backhendl (spiced portions of chicken breaded and crispy deep fried), Zwiebelrostbraten (roast beef slices in its sauce with onion), Schinkenfleckerln (ham stew with baked noodles) and Bauerschmaus (cold meat tray). The most popular dessets are Kaiserschmarrn (shredded pancake), Apfelstrudel (apple-filled pastry) and the Marillenknödel (apricot small dumplings) in summer.

For desserts and ice-creams Eis Greissler (Mariahilfer Straße 33) is the best idea and in the Royal Schönbrunn Bakery (Hofbackstube Schönbrunn) you can enjoy a class and later taste how to cook strudel. There are nice places to have breakfast or coffee like Cafe Central (Herrengasse 14), Vollpension (Schleifmühlgasse 16), Waldemar (Altgasse 6), the vegan Cafe Harvest (Karmeliterplatz 1), Cafe Goldegg (Argentinierstraße 49) or the popular Cafe Sacher (Philharmoniker Straße 4).

Cafe Central

There are many places to eat cheap food like Bitzinger Würstelstand (Albertinaplatz 1) for sausages, Trzesniewski (Dorotheergasse 1) for sandwiches. For typical Austrian food some nice places are Schank zum Reichsapfel (Karmeliterplatz 3), Meierei im Stadtpark (Am Heumarkt 2A), Ubl (Preßgasse 26), Maxingstüberl (Maxingstraße 7), Stomach (Seegasse 26). Some restaurants are specialised in soups like Soupkultur (Wipplingerstraße 32) or Suppenwirtschaft (Servitengasse 6). In Vienna it's very popular the beisl, mixture of inn and bistro where you can order traditional food; some of the main are Griechenbeisl (Fleischmarkt 11), oldest restaurant in Vienna; Wrenkh (Bauernmarkt 10), the vegetarian Tian Bistro (Schrankgasse 4), Joseph Brot (Landstraßer Hauptstraße 4) or HaasBeisl (Margaretenstraße 74). There are many choices of foreign food like the Thai Mamamon (Albertgasse 15), the international Blue Mustard (Dorotheergasse 6-8), the French Cafe Français (Währinger Straße 6-8), the Italians Wetter (Yppenplatz 1), La Tavolozza (Florianigasse 37) or La Salvia (Schellhammergasse). There are some modern food restaurants like Lingenhel (Landstraßer Hauptstraße 74), Skopik & Lohn (Leopoldsgasse 17), Said The Butcher To The Cow (Opernring 11). For higher budgets you can try Steirereck (Am Heumarkt 2A), Plachutta (Wollzeile 38), Tian Restautant (Himmelpfortgasse 23) or Julius Meiln (Graben 19).

Apfelstrudel

The city has also a vast pubs and clubbing offer, with places like Das LOFT (Praterstraße 1), Supersense (Praterstraße 70), Botanical Garden (Kolingasse 1), POC (Schlösselgasse 21), Meinl's Weinbar (Graben 19), Strandbar Herrmann (Herrmannpark), Loos American Bar (Kärntner Durchgang 10), Cafe Hawelka (Dorotheergasse 6), Cafe Sperl (Gumpendorfer Straße 11), the beer artisans The Brickmakers Pub & Kitchen (Zieglergasse 42) or the disco Volksgarten (Volksgarten).

Posted in: Austria,Europe