Vienna 🇦🇹

The capital of Austria, Vienna or Wien, is deeply absorbed in the arts, culture, and music. It was the home to Mozart, Beethoven, and Sigmund Freud to name a few notable residents as well as site of the Hapsburg’s Imperial summer palace, Schönbrunn.

We were able to get last minute tickets to the Classical Concert at St Peter’s Church. Set in the vault of the baroque cathedral we listened as a string quartet play Mozart, Vivaldi, Bach, Schubert, and Beethoven. The church itself was possibly one of the most beautiful we’ve seen and the acoustics were heavenly as the sounds danced around the arced domes. Unfortunately no phones were allowed inside but probably for the best so one could fully appreciate the experience.

The next morning we visited the original snow globe company where the snow globe was invented by Erwin Perzy I in 1900 almost by accident. Erwin repaired medical tools at a hospital and one day was asked by a doctor if he could make their electric lights brighter. He was aware of shoemakers using water in a glass ball to magnify the light and began experimenting by adding different flaked materials to aid in reflecting the light such as metal (which sank too quickly). He then stumbled across a mixture of wax and plastic that would float for extended time and enhance the illumination. He thought it looked like snow and decided to put a miniature model of the Maria Zell church inside. He decided to patent it and called it a “glassball with snow effect.” While the shop was a bit underwhelming the kids enjoyed looking at all the different snow globes. Can you guess which one was their favourite?

Our final stop was Schönbrunn (‘beautiful spring’) Palace. The grounds are massive and with two uninterested children we decided to just enjoy dessert and water fountains. We tried the original Mozart torte and Punschkrapfen.

Our final bit of excitement ended with thinking a giant murder hornet had flown into our bedroom. Jason the hornet slayer valiantly geared up and slayed the flying beast. Luckily it was only a cicada killer.