Austria was the only country where we visited two cities. We started off in Vienna. This was another really lovely city, overwhelmed with beautiful architecture. Also, it started snowing the day we got there, which was fun. This is St. Stephen's Church (it was sooo gorgeous inside and out):
This is the palace (with Emily in the foreground):
We split off for some of the museum-going. Ivy and I went to the Leopold Museum where there was a special exhibit on Klimt. Although I had seen his work before without realizing it, I had never heard of him. I loved it. I really liked how some of his works had really realistic faces on very abstract backgrounds. You can see some of his works here: http://www.iklimt.com/index.html. There was some other art I really liked at this museum, like Schiele. http://www.leopoldmuseum.org/text_en.php?nav=1&id=1.
The next day we went to the music museum which was SO COOL. They covered many different aspects of music. There was a section about the biological bases of hearing and the physical bases of sound, a section on composition, and a section on important Viennese composers (Mozart et. al.). And it was really interactive, so there were sections where you could compose your own "piece" using random sounds, including urban sounds, the sounds of pen on paper, and sneezes. There was even a station where you could conduct the orchestra on a screen with an electronic baton.
Appropriately, that night we went to a Strauss/Mozart concert. It was a cheap concert targeting tourists primarily, but that was honestly perfect for us. It was short, the pieces were short, and there was a bit of opera and dance as well as simple chamber music pieces. I didn't think the dancers were that great, but I thought the musicians were quite good, especially considering the casual setting. The venue was an old very Viennese building, the performance in a big, well-lit room with lots of flowery high-relief molding.
The last museum we went to in Vienna was the Freud Museum. It was in his actual house/place of work. It actually wasn't that great of a museum, unfortunately. It was interesting to see so many artifacts from his life (letters, pictures, and random things like toiletries), but the museum was more biographical than descriptive of his ideas. At the end there was, however, a room with tons of books by and about him. It would have been nice to have been able to spend more time in that library.
While in Vienna we got gelato basically every night. No regrets. We got it at a great gelateria run by flirtatious Italians. I also really enjoyed the DELICIOUS bread rolls and an amazing broccoli gratin I got the first night :DDD
Our last day in Austria we decided to rent a car and drive to Linz (famous for Linzer torts). Linz is right on the Danube:
Our first stop here was to the Ars Electronica Center which was SO INCREDIBLE. O my god there was some unbelievable technology. We started off in a 3D astronomy show that was super realistic. There was a floor on cities with databases for basically anything you would want to know. There were also build-your-own-city interactive stations. There was another floor that more directly covered technology and science. There was this thing (I don't really know how to call it) made up of hanging white plastic ferns and lights. As you moved between the hanging vines they would sense the movement and the ferns would uncoil (to create a slight breeze) and lights would turn on. There was a whole section on eye movement and what it can tell you about the attention of the person. There were activities to show you how your eyes moved when reading or looking at a picture. And while reading the instructions/explanations for the activity the text would scroll automatically according to your eye movement!! Omg, so amazing. http://new.aec.at/news/
After that Ivy and Jon went to explore the churches around the center while Emily and I took a special tram up the hill to Postlingerplatz. There was a church at the top:
and an impressive view:
It was really cold here so we stopped in a cafe and enjoyed some tea. Then we all met back up, had some real Austrian dinner (delicious dumplings for me!!! some with bacon!!!!!) and headed back to Vienna.
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