I'm in Vienna: April 2011

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Ostern in Wien!

I guess it’s better late than never but Frohe Ostern everyone! Easter-time in Vienna is an incredible time - the trees are all in bloom, the gardens are as beautiful as ever, there are Easter markets all over the city, and people are happier than ever (probably because of the extensive breaks most Austrians get!). This is definitely my favorite time that I’ve experienced so far in Vienna.

On Easter Sunday, my friends Carrie, Jared, Pete, and I went to 10:15 mass at Stephansdom. The mass was beautiful, but very long, and was said by Kardinal Christoph Schönborn, the Erzbischof (Archbishop) of Vienna. I was happy to go to mass at Stephansdom, as I could finally cross that off my Vienna bucket list! After mass, we went to brunch at a Cafe in the first district, and on the way went to the Freyung Easter Market. I was very very excited to go as I hadn’t seen any yet (the Easter markets are set up about a week before Easter, and I was in Croatia for their start).

“Altwiener Ostermarkt” means Old Viennese Easter Market

These are REAL EGGS! Hand-painted. The way they are made is so cool - they poke holes on each end of the egg and blow everything that’s inside out of it, and then somehow clean it.

These are some marble eggs

The Easter Bunny!

Some delicious Easter bread!

Pretzels :)

After our Easter brunch, we all went to the Schönbrunn Osternmarkt. I hadn’t been to the Schönbrunn yet, and was totally blown away by how beautiful it was!

Some handmade Easter decorations

This is definitely my favorite Palace in Vienna.

Eating a deeelicious Bretzel (Pretzel in German) with Pete

Jared and Carrie

We walked through the gardens to see the Schönbrunn’s “ backyard”

The Gloriette

I went back to the Schönbrunn Osternmarkt on Monday to buy some souvenirs for friends and family!

Fun fact: Snowglobes were invented in Vienna!

I’m finally caught up in my blog posts! That’s all for now! My next post will probably be about my field trip (today) to the Snowglobe factory in Vienna!

Auf Wiedersehen!

SPRING BREAK!

I spent my spring break on the beautiful island of Hvar in Croatia. Before coming to Vienna, I had no interest in going to Croatia... honestly, I thought Croatia was a third world country. Kind of embarrassing considering it is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. I went on this adventure with my roommate Ellison, and we had an amazing amazing amazing time!

We left from the Vienna airport on Saturday at around 2 and landed in Split at 3. We had some time to kill before our 8:30 ferry to Hvar so we walked around the city and met up with Michelle, Mairead, and Kent, who spent their spring break in Croatia, Bosnia, and Slovenia. They had been walking around all day and showed us some of the pretty parts of the city. It was a very cool city and very very different from anywhere in Europe I’ve visited.

That’s the ferry we took to Hvar in the background.

Some old buildings in Split... this is essentially what the whole town looked like.

These were EVERYWHERE!

Woohoo! Escalators on the ferry to Hvar!

We got to Hvar around 10 PM and were picked up by a shuttle to take us to our hotel. We stayed at the Hotel Adriana, a beautiful hotel (offering awesome Easter discounts) on the bay in Old Hvar City. Our days consisted of eating breakfast on the hotel’s patio, going to the beach/pool, laying out in the sun, going to dinner, and getting back to our hotel room by 8PM every night. One day we mixed it out by going out on a sailboat and sailing around the surrounding Pakleni Islands. Needless to say it was a VERY relaxing vacation!