“When you go to Vienna, you need to leave your stomach at home.” An old Slovenian proverb

Vienna is one of those old European cities that come with several different names – the Austrians call their capital Wien, the English name for it is Vienna and here in Slovenia we call it Dunaj for the Danube river. I’ve been to Vienna several times, most recently in November 2023 for my birthday, when my partner and I also had the chance to explore some of the famous Viennese Christmas markets, which are definitely worth a visit if you go there during winter.

In the 14th century the city became the seat of the Habsburg dynasty, which predominantly shaped Vienna’s character and remained in power until the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian empire and WW1. The Habsburgs are most well-known for Maria Theresa, one of Europe’s most important monarchs of the Enlightened absolutism period in the 18th century, who implemented many humanitarian reforms (although they were not necessarily out of the goodness of her heart as the propaganda would have you believe), facilitated progress and centralized the government rule. She had 10 surviving children, including the “let them eat cake” Marie-Antoinette, and was said to have bombarded her decadent daughter with moral advice and dire warnings up until her tragic death during the French revolution.

The other notable Habsburg figure was emperor Franz Joseph of the giant moustache, the last emperor whose ultimatum to Serbia led to World War 1 in 1914. Although that is a heavy legacy, he is perhaps even more famous for his beautiful wife Elizabeth of Bavaria, better known as Sissi. She was widely regarded as the most beautiful princess in Europe and was obsessed with maintaining and enhancing her beauty throughout her life. Her beauty regimens were famous and basically started the trend of self-care beauty rituals that we know today. It is no wonder then that when Franz Joseph first beheld his 15 year old cousin, he immediately fell in love and the two of them were married soon after, because inbreeding was totally normal behaviour for European royal families back then.

Despite their rather turbulent marriage and Sissi’s informal nature and impatience with court protocols, which made her the people’s favourite and the bane of Viennese courtiers, the pair were madly in love. She was also a significant political influence on her husband and helped establish the dual Austro-Hungarian monarchy in 1867. Unfortunately their only son, the crown prince Rudolf, committed suicide in 1889 from which Sissi never fully recovered. To compound the tragedy she was assassinated 10 years later by an Italian anarchist who originally planned to assassinate someone else, so as can be expected there have been several movies and TV series detailing the more or less true tragic lifestory of Sissi and her romance with Franz Jospeh. When I was a child I was obsessed with her and I quite like the new Sissi TV series even though a lot of things are very far fetched. Anyhow, Vienna certainly knows how to exploit Sissi’s icon status, so there is a whole Sissi museum, several Sissi guided tours and even Sissi spa regimens.

Like all of the big world capitals, Vienna offers so many sights that it would be difficult to describe them all in one blog post. It is a true European aristocratic cultural hub, which seems to be stuck in its Habsburg prime as people still go to classical concerts and the opera like it’s the previous century and horse-drawn carriages are still a part of the regular traffic in the inner centre, although they are mostly tourist traps by now. Mozart and Strauss reign supreme and the Vienna State Opera and the Vienna Music Society are the most popular concert venues by far (you can often get discounted last minute tickets half an hour before the performance if you are willing to stand). Also, the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra is world-famous for its New Year’s concert, which we watch at home on the TV every year as I’d probably have to sell one of my kidneys to see it live.

There is a whole part of the inner centre dedicated to about 60 museums and cultural institutions, called the MuseumsQuartier, the impressive St. Stephen cathedral and several other gothic churches, the Hofburg imperial palace complex with the Austrian National Library and the Spanish riding school where you can go see a horsemanship show, as well as the Belvedere manor, which is actually two manors from the 1700s. Then there’s Prater, Vienna’s huge park with an amusement park which is fully open to the public, so you can stroll through and pay separately for each ride, and the famous Hundertwasser house nearby. You can also see some WW2 anti-aircraft flak towers, like the one in the baroque Augarten park, and Vienna hosts one of Europe’s few official Comic Cons every year.

IMPRESSIONS OF vIENNA

One of my favourite attractions in Vienna is the Schmetterlinghaus, a gorgeous Art Noveau glasshouse full of butterflies living their best lives in an exotic habitat. It was built in 1901 and is part of the Hofburg palace complex, so be prepared for crowds. The glasshouse is essentially a mini rainforest kept at 26°C and 80% humidity, complete with a waterfall and large tree trunks. You can learn a lot about several species of butterflies and see them in various stages of their life cycle and there’s also a beautiful, but very busy cafe called Palmenhaus next door. The list of sights goes on of course, but let these be enough for now.

THE Schmetterlinghaus

There is an old Slovenian proverb, which says that when you go to visit Vienna, you need to leave your stomach at home. Although that was probably worse back in the days when Vienna was an imperial city, it is still very true today. However, for me food is an important part of every experience abroad, so I’ll tell you that you really need to try the Wiener schnitzel and the Sacher cake in Vienna.

Wiener schnitzel is a very thin, large breaded and pan-fried cutlet, often served with potato salad. Originally the Wiener schnitzel is supposed to be a veal cutlet, but you can also get pork or turkey cutlets. I prefer the turkey variant, which is usually also cheaper. Pretty much every restaurant in Vienna sells Wiener schnitzel – Figlmüller is the most famous one and also the most popular, so you will need a reservation and they are fully booked for weeks in advance, but I can tell you that the schnitzels we had in Kaffee Alt Wien were just as delicious. Their apple strudel with vanilla sauce and the chocolate cake were also amazing.

Speaking of chocolate cakes, no other cake except for the original one at the Sacher hotel is allowed to bear the name Sacher cake, and the authentic Sacher cakes come with a chocolate Sacher stamp. The full recipe is a closely guarded secret, but the hotel has published an approximation online if you want to make it at home. Unfortunately the Sacher cafe is now a major tourist hot spot and there was a line of people waiting in front every time we passed by, so here’s my advice: buy a Sacher cake in the gift shop where there are no crowds and eat it at home. They are quite expensive, but it is a unique recipe and I really like it, so it is worth trying if you enjoy chocolate cake. They even sell less expensive mini cakes with their chocolate stamps. The other iconic cafes besides Sacher are also cafe Central and cafe Demel + the tiny Fenster takeaway window cafe is quite cute.

Viennese food

Vienna has one of the best places to eat ribs, the Strandcafe Wien, where you will get a whole rack of perfectly roasted pork ribs sitting on a huge pile of potatoes. We also had cheese wheel pasta for my birthday at Restaurant 8o8 and we wanted to try out some of Vienna’s hidden bars like the Chapel or Krypt, but they were all booked well in advance, so they are still on my list. Let me know if you’ve tried any of them!

Another eatery that deserves an honourable mention is the Vollpension, one of the two cafes run by the Viennese grandmas and grandpas, which are best practice examples of combating old-age poverty and promoting generational dialogue and the social inclusion of the elderly. The name means “full board”, as in the type of hotel where you get all the meals included and the place is decorated to look like an Austrian granny’s living room, complete with kitschy portraits of cats and doilies. They serve all the home-made food classics like yeast buns, breakfast breads and cakes – because where do you get the best cake, if not at your grandma’s? The concept is different from a regular cafe as well, because when you select a menu option, you are paying for the duration of your visit rather than the amount of goods consumed. Each food option grants you a certain amount of time and unlimited drinks to go with it and everything we tried was delicious. They also have an online store with turbokitsch merchandise and you can learn how to bake traditional cakes from grannies in their online courses.

Vollpension

Last but not least, the Schönbrunn palace. I could write a separate post about it and I will once I visit again during the right time, because it is definitely one of the more impressive European palaces. Schönbrunn is located a bit outside of the city centre, but is easily accessible with one of the metro lines. In fact, Vienna has a superb public transport system and you can buy a combined ticket for all the transport options (buses, trams and metro lines) at any of the ticket machines around the city. It is difficult to move around the old city centre by car and the parking spaces are few and quite expensive, so if you are arriving by car, I’d recommend parking outside the city centre and taking the metro to go in. On our last visit we were told that street parking is free in residential areas outside the centre during the weekends, which is something most visitors aren’t aware of, but make sure to double check if that’s still true when you visit.

The Schönbrunn palace served as the Habsburg summer residence whereas the Hofburg palace was the winter residence. The palace grounds include huge, absolutely gorgeous gardens and one of the oldest zoos in Europe, which is why you will need to reserve at least one whole day to explore, but it is very worth it. However, I don’t really recommend visiting during winter, because when we were there in November all the otherwise beautiful flower spirals and intricate garden labyrinths were replaced by nourishing piles of manure and fertilisers, so instead of a lovely winter garden experience, we got a pile of cr*p and lots of birds pecking through it. You can still take a guided tour through the palace interior and there was a small garden with festive lights and decorations and a Christmas market, but it was not the real Schönbrunn experience.

SChönbrunn palace