Khertvisi Castle, Khertvisi, Georgia

Saturday, August 11, 2012

Vienna

Vienna.  I was in Vienna for a week, while Sam was there for a month.  We went to Vienna for four days last summer, as part of our epic vacation through various parts of Europe and a side jaunt to Cairo.  That wasn't enough time.  A week wasn't enough time either, and Sam says that a month even felt too short.  

Vienna is tough to describe.  It's impossible to feel like you're taking the right pictures because everything there is so monumental.  I'd get out my camera and stare at a building, then turn slightly to the right, again and again until I'd turned the full circle, realizing that I'd need hundreds of photos to capture everything that was spectacular about the view, and even these wouldn't grasp it.  That said, all the beauty makes it easy to take good pictures.  It's just about trying to find the *right* picture that's tough.  

Here are a few of my not-so-worthy pictures from my week in Vienna.  I ended up not taking too many snaps because of the overwhelming feeling that all my attempts would be underwhelming.  Oh well.  Maybe next time.

This is the main building of the Vienna University, where Sam studied

The university is just down around the inner ring road from the Rathaus, the city hall.  No word on whether or not there are rats there.

View of the Austrian Parliament building from the Rathaus gardens

Front of the Parliament

A very cool mosaic on the second floor of a shop along the main pedestrian mall

Roof of St. Stephen's cathedral

St. Stephen's Cathedral

One of St. Stephen's gargoyles

This clock apparently does a whole song-and-dance show at noon, but I wasn't there at noon

The church just outside Sam's dorm wasn't too shabby

We trekked out to the Wienerwald, which sadly doesn't mean "wiener world", but which means the Vienna woods.  It's a great park that we walked all around, hoping to see some wild boar.  No pigs, sadly, but we did get a sweeping view of Vienna, which is huge. 

We went out to the Prater Park in Vienna to walk around and ride some rides.  We didn't ride this carousel, but maybe we should have?  Anyways, it was propelled by real ponies.  Real ponies.  

Instead of the carousel, we rode this, which is apparently the tallest swings thing (what are these called?) in the world or Europe or Vienna or somewhere.  It was tall, and a very cool ride.

Sam may not have found Die Jurassic Park as entertaining as I did, but he posed for a picture in front of it like a sport

Because we rode the swings thing, we skipped the ferris wheel.  Seeing it made me want to watch The Third Man again.  

So, again, looking back at these pictures (and my others from Vienna), I'm unimpressed at my abilities to capture a city in images.  Can I just keep telling you all to visit all these places I've been? 

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