A Day at Schönbrunn Palace
We got up at about 8:00 today, showered and breakfasted. We then walked down to Wattgasse and caught the #10A bus to our destination today: Schönbrunn Palace!
When we got to the Palace we found it quite busy at the ticket window so we first checked out the gardens:
The Gloriette
After wandering through the rear gardens of the Palace, we wound our way up the switchbacks to the Gloriette on the hill. Fantastic view of the Schönbrunn and surrounding Vienna from here:
The Gloriette was fantastic:
We took lots of shots, then headed back down the hill. On the way, we paused to admire the Neptune Fountain:
The Strudelshow
Walking around to the front of the Palace, we found the location of the Strudelshow, (a live demonstration of how apple strudel is made) which we planned to attend at 1:00PM. We killed some time, then made our way down to the bakery where the show was held – what a wonderful and entertaining show!:
When exiting, I helped myself to a complimentary piece of very delicious strudel:
Time For Lunch!
After the Strudelshow we returned to the Palace courtyard and had lunch at the Residenz Café: surprisingly, absolutely delicious! Sitting in a cool mist generated by the mist machines above us, we had lunch: Vince had a vegetarian burger, sparkling water and Cappuccino, and I had a Hapsburger (how clever) with fries and a tea. THEN, I had my first sample of Viennese Sacher Torte: awesome. The entire meal was exceptional and we were pleasantly surprised by the quality of the meal given the touristy location:
After our delicious lunch we picked up our tickets and went into the Schönburnn Palace. Taking the “Grand Tour”, we worked our through all 44 rooms of the Palace: magnificent, beautiful and highly enjoyable. It took just under two hours to see what we wanted to see. Unfortunately I have no photos of the Palace interior, as photography was prohibited.
We finished the tour, then went back out to the front of the Palace and took more pictures:
We went around to the rear of the Palace again as I wanted to take some long exposure shots of the magnificent fountain, but the water had stopped!! 🙁
Continuing on our exploration of the gardens, we wandered over to the west gardens to see the Starbassin (Star Basin), took a few good shots, then basically just sat, rested and absorbed the richness of our environment:
Time To Go Home
It turned 5:00PM so we decided to call it a day; we’d been here all day and felt it was time to go home:
Leaving the Palace and going out to the street, we caught the #10A back to the apartment, getting off at the Wattgasse stop.
That evening we cooked pizza at the apartment for dinner, rested, backed up and reviewed our daily shots, and caught up on this journal. It was a quiet evening and we were off to bed at 10:15 to get rested up for another big day tomorrow!
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