Thursday, August 1, 2013

EuroTrip - 14 days Trip to Switzerland, Italy and Austria (Part 3)

Part 1
Part 2

So finally got the time to write about the third leg of our Eurotrip - first being Switzerland and second Italy. Our last 4 days were spent in musical cities of Austria - Vienna and Salzburg. Here are my recommendations and tips -

Recommendation/Tips
  1. Use Rick Steves audio guide to tour Vienna. They are good
  2. Most of the things to see in Vienna is around St Stephens Cathedral, so you may want to look out hotel for rent closer to this area
  3. There are lots of people (dressed properly) outside the Opera House selling tickets. Do not get tricked into their sweet talks as they sell for more and gives you seat which may not be good to view the stage
  4. You should have legendary Sacher tart at Sacher Cafe near Opera House, Vienna
  5. In Salzburg - go to Wolfgangsee lake (via bus) and hire an electric boat. You can then visit the entire lake on your own. Shop closes before 6pm
  6. Ride a bicycle in Salzburg to visit places like Hellbrunn palace and the fort. You will enjoy the ride
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So we spend two days in Vienna and two in Salzburg. Most of the places in Vienna are located around St Stephans Cathedral, so we completed all those things in one day. Dont forget to stop at Sacher cafe (besides Opera House) and have their legendary Sacher Tart. We also visited the Hofburg palace and bought the tickets for Sissi Museum, Imperial Apmts and Imperial Furniture (though we did not visit Imperial Furniture). Also, it makes sense to visit Rathaus at night. It looks very beautiful. Next day we were off to Schloss Schonbrunn Palace. The palace architecture is frankly not that great, however the area is quite big which makes it grand. We took the pass which offered us grand tour of the palace, maze, gloriette and gardens. After doing Imperial Apmts tour, we did not find the grand tour interesting. Walking up to the gloriette is ok and it does offer a good view of the palace from distance. At night, we decided to go for a two hours ballet (Don Quixote) at Opera House. After talking to dressed up people selling tickets outside, we found that all those folks are agents, and you could buy your tickets directly from the Opera House office at a much cheaper rate. Few pics of Rathaus and Scholl Schonbrunn palace.



We then were off to Salzburg. And Salzburg is all about of Sound of Music. We decided to do the tour ourselves and visited Mirabell gardens, took a bicycle and rode all the way to Hellbrunn Palace (and they still have the Gazebo used in I am Seventeen song of Sound of Music). We didnt visit the Mozart Place from inside, just went pass by and took pics.You should definitely take time to go to Wolfgangsee lake by bus (takes 40 mins one way). It is so beautiful. All we did there was took the electric boat and drove far far away ourselves in the lake. It is very beautiful. Should not miss this experience. Salzburg is a small city and two days are enough to visit all places. Pics of Wolfgangsee below



Listing down some fares related information that might be useful


In all, we felt that we balanced our euro trip well by including mix of things like churches, natural beauty, music, otherwise visiting architectures and churches would become very boring.

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