Miriam's Moments

Part 2: Austria and Budapest and home again!

Lower Austria has 9 regions. Our first stop was the lovely village of Melk with its spectacular 1089 Benedictine Abbey, perched high above the Danube, the richest abbey in the world. The first 5 Austrian emperors lived here, 270 years of Habsburgs. There are 80,000 books in the library. Today it is a co-ed school; few of the 100 teachers are Benedictines. The weather was perfect, too, for our visit, and the gardens in were in full fall splendor.

I enjoyed seeing an old 1640 globe with California shown as a large island. And appreciated the motto: "Without a legitimate battle, there is no victory."

The Baroque Pavilion

From Melk the Danube takes a lazy course towards Vienna through the lovely Wachau Valley with its vineyards and villages, castles and fortresses standing guard. In the old days, owners built them to collect fees from those who passed. Apricots are also a specialty of the area.

Franz Gruber author of "Silent Night"was born in a Wachau village

The small town of Krems had a lovely baroque church up a steep hill.

We arrived in Vienna October 7 , and set off to see this grand city. The Hofburg Palace with 18 buildings and 2,600 rooms, was home to the Habsburgs, who ruled Austria and Hungary and other lands from 1218 until 1918. Maria Theresia was the only female to rule.. She had 16 children in 19 1/2 years. Franz Josef I died in 1916, his wife Elisabeth, called Sisi, in 1898. I recommend the mini-series "The Empress" about their lives.

Sisi

Home of the famous (120 male) Lipizzans (white dancing stallions), Spanish Riding school built from 1729-35

I love Steiff animals

The Cathedral of St. Stephen, founded in the 12th century is magnificent. The tile roof is my favorite part.

Part of the Hofburg is the Albertina Museum which contains many famous works, such as Albrecht Durer's "Hare." I enjoyed the more contemporary team works by Peter Hauenschild and Peter Ritter: "Golden Bonnets" (2008) and "When the Grass is Knee-high" (pastel)

And drawings of another team, Muntean and Rosenblum. Both pairs found inspiration and critique in working together. I appreciate their captions such as :

"You think it will never happen to you. That it cannot happen to you. That you are the only person in the world to whom none of these things will ever happen. And then, one by one, they all happen to you. In the same way they happen to everyone else. There is so much you cannot foresee. Yet it is all laid out clear."

Durer, "Hare"

And I always enjoy Chagall and Picasso and many others

Renoir

Nolde

We went to an evening concert of familiar Mozart and Strauss music at the small Palais Auersperg. Beforehand we heard a great lecture on Mozart so that we could better appreciate it. The string/piano sextet was wonderful as were the ballet couple and especially the powerful soprano and baritone.(?)

Our last day in Vienna, Ramona and I took the great metro to the Upper Belvedere Palace, completed in 1722, to see the art gallery featuring Gustav Klimt"s "the Kiss", Viennese icon of the Golden era before WWI, and other of his works.

I also appreciated seeing other artists' work such as that of Egon Schiele, who was enchanted with houses and walls (like Da Vinci) in Bohemian town Cesky Krumlov (a town I recommend!)

Mid-afternoon we passed through a lock at the border of Austria and Slovakia, passing through the Danube floodplain, the Slovakia hills of the little Carpathian mountains, past Bratislava. Hungary was geographically between Asia and Europe, has a very complicated language, its closest language group being Finnish) often had to fight off the ottoman empire, became Christian in 1000, was under Hapsburg control in the 17th century, was reduced to rubble by Napoleon in 1809. Much of Budapest was built in about 1896. The Nazis bombed all its bridges, the Russians liberated it and stayed 40 years. In 1956 there was a valiant uprising. About 250,000 fled through Austria and many on to the USA. The largest settlement of Hungarians is in Cleveland, Ohio.

In the morning we took a bus tour of the Pest (flat) side with it's elegant buildings (many embassies), and Heroes Square , monument to Hungarian warriors and Kings, the first being Ista (Stephen)

and City park , which is flooded and frozen for winter skating. The famous spa is across the street.

The Chain Bridge is under renovation. We took the old funicular up the ancient Buda hill. The two cities, Buda and Pest were united in 1873. Guards before the palace.

Budapest with 3.6 million people, is one of the EU's largest cities. Its parliament is the third largest in the world.

The Fisherman's Bastion honors St. Stephen (died 1038). He was so powerful he ruled Vienna during the last 5 years of his reign.. The Bastion is a fanciful millennial creation (1906) of what a medieval fortress might look like!

As much as I love goolash (with paprika) and German sausages and sauerkraut, I love the Matthias Church where many kings were crowned on the Buda hill, and the views of a magnificent city.