18. Vienna

The Journey

My wife Tricia and daughter Anna joined me for the weekend in Vienna. None of us had ever been to the city before. I arrived by train from Prague in the mid afternoon, while they arrived on a Ryanair flight from Dublin to Vienna airport in the early evening. We all met up at the home exchange apartment. My train journey on CD Railways took just over four and a half hours.

The Accommodation

Martina's spacious two bed apartment was perfect for our needs. We were lucky to get it for GuestPoints on HomeExchange. We didn't meet Martina, as she was treking in Nepal. She sent us superb, detailed instructions for getting to the apartment from the central HbF station and from the airport, in addition to brilliant step-by-step photos of how to get into the apartment. 

The apartment was tastefully decorated and was a very relaxing space. It was amazingly quiet with a balcony overlooking a courtyard. There was a supermarket on the ground floor and several trams to the city centre passed directly in front of the apartment. It was really close to one of the top sites, Schönbrunn Palace and an easy walk to Vienna Woods.

Our first meal was in a local Italian restaurant called Casa Mia, just 5 minutes from the apartment which was handy as none of us wanted to travel too far. 

Italian is Anna's favourite food, so we indulged her for the first night, the Weiner Schnitzel and Sachertorte could wait!

The next day we got a combination of the 17 tram and the U3 u-bahn to travel into the centre and emerged into Stefansplatz which was basking in 23 degrees C. 

Dinner was in one of the large shopping malls that Anna was somehow drawn towards! I was looking for a place with high stools and tables as my back was giving me bother (more of that later) and we found a very interesting burger place with lots of unusual offerings. 

The next day Anna and Tricia were forced to go sightseeing on their own as unfortunately had to rest in bed with a bad back! Full details in the next blog post for those interested, but in the meantime here is some of what I missed on their sightseeing tour.

We all departed from Vienna the next day, I was able to get a seat on the same flight to Dublin as Anna and Tricia. And thus ended my Interrail trip two weeks early, with two weeks done, and two more still to do.