I’ll say it right away, 3 days for Vienna is catastrophically short, especially at the end of such a long journey. This city deserves at least a week, if not more, to leisurely explore all the interesting places, museums, visit numerous establishments, and try all the traditional delicacies that Austria has to offer without feeling exhausted from the art and beauty.
One of Vienna’s most famous symbols is the Giant Ferris Wheel, which happened to be right next to our hotel Motel One Wien-Prater, in the Viennese Prater – a green oasis and a place of nostalgic dreams with attractions from different eras. The Viennese Prater is located in the heart of Vienna in the Leopoldstadt district and offers visitors a variety of attractions, such as carousels, mirror mazes, and rooms of laughter, horror caves, roller coasters, and a miniature railroad that invites visitors to enjoy a ride throughout the amusement park.
After strolling through the central streets of Vienna, adorned with monuments of architecture and history, passing by many city landmarks, parks, palaces, theaters, churches, and chapels, we found ourselves in a modern space for art enthusiasts.
Museums Quartier Wien – a new attraction in the modern face of Vienna. This large cultural complex appeared on Vienna’s map in 2001 and united various cultural institutions, art zones, and recreational areas on one territory spanning 60,000 square meters. Here, you can find museums and concert venues, green groves, and terraces with cafes and restaurants, as well as shops and bookstores.
An important item on our agenda was to try the Sachertorte – an Austrian confectioner’s invention and one of the most famous cakes in the world. Trusting the guide’s recommendation to visit Alt Wien, one of the traditional Viennese coffeehouses, after a long search, we finally ended up there, but the expectations didn’t match reality. In this café, you could have a glass of beer, eat schnitzel, and smoke a cigarette, but there was no chance to taste the chocolate cake with a cup of coffee.
A striking example of a utopian society, the Vienna Gasometers are both a reminder of the past and an embodiment of the future. Four historic 19th-century buildings were transformed into multifunctional residential, commercial, and entertainment complexes by modern architects. In 2001, the first residents moved into the gasometers, and today, only the antique facades with intricate brickwork and the pressure gauge, which once indicated gas pressure, serve as reminders of the buildings’ industrial past.
Every visitor to the Street Art Gallery in Vienna can see for themselves that street art is not just random spray-painted graffiti on walls but a true art form with its own styles, geniuses, and masterpieces. The museum space called Inoperable has been twice named the best gallery in Europe in 2011 and 2012. It regularly hosts new exhibitions of promising street artists from all over the world. Additionally, they release albums on this art form and organize various themed events – from friendly meetings with artists to seminars on the best techniques for painting on brickwork. Finding the gallery wasn’t easy for us; we had to go around the block several times, enter some designer shops located on every corner in this district, where one of them informed us that the gallery had moved and helped us find its new address.
Another atypical artistic place for the Austrian capital is the WestLicht photo gallery. Even its location can be called original. The center of photography is situated in the attic of a building that used to be a glass factory until the 1950s. In 2001, a group of photography enthusiasts came together to create WestLicht with the mission of promoting and developing the art of photography in Austria. WestLicht serves as both a museum and a photo exhibition. The stands showcase photographic equipment like cameras, flashes, lenses, and other gear with special lighting, while the walls display the first photographs taken using the daguerreotype technique, as well as works by world-renowned artists like Elfie Semotan, Peggy Sirota, Mary Ellen Mark, and others.
Adjacent to it, there is the Leica Shop and several stores with old and new photography equipment, shops of young designers, fashionable galleries, and bars.
One establishment worth mentioning is The Brickmakers Ale & Cider House, which we noticed while strolling in this area. In the evening, we returned here to have dinner and try the craft drinks they offer.
Next, our journey took us towards the village of Kaprun, the town of Zell am See, the High Tauern National Park, and along a high mountain serpentine road to Gerlos, where we stopped to spend the night.
Our acquaintance with Munich began on Friday evening at the central square, Marienplatz, when all the central streets were filled with crowds of people, each having their own way of having fun.
Undoubtedly, Salzburg is one of the most charming cities in Austria, with its unique character, architecture, and history, attracting a large number of tourists.
