Vienna: Schonbrunn, Belvedere, Freud and Prater

On June 25, we awoke to sun! For the first time since our arrival! We were thrilled not to need our rain jackets and umbrellas!! We met up with my cousin Sue and her boyfriend Jakob so they could show us around the city.
Our first stop was Schonbrunn Palace, a magnificent palace on the outskirts of Vienna. It was the former summer residence of the imperial family (The Hofburgs). The construction on the palace began in 1695 and was fully completed in the mid 18^th century. The palace grounds contain numerous fountains and statues, in addition to flowers and trees, all arranged according to French patterns. In 1695, when the palace was commissioned by Leopold I, he asked for it to surpass the Palace of Versailles (Paris, France) in glory.
Below is a picture of the front of the palace:

There were horse carriages lined up outside the castle to take people on rides:

The gardens behind the palace were beautiful, as they were all framed along a path leading up to the major fountain.


Sue, my Mom and I in front of the fountain:

After Shonbrunn Palace, we made our way over to Belvedere Palace, which is a smaller, but beautiful palace used as the summer residence of Prince Eugene of Savoy, a military commander. It consists of two palaces, which are linked together by a long garden. Unfortunately the garden area was under construction, so it was difficult to take a good photo of it.
Here is a photo of me and Sue in the back area of the palace:

The front of the Palace:

The gardens of the palace (which were under construction):

The palace serves as an art gallery, housing 19^th and 20^th century paintings, mainly by Austrian painters. Some of the painters include: Monet, Renoir, Romako, Markart, Von Amerling, Petter, Von Schwind, Cornith, Schindler, Moll, Egon Schiele, Kockoschka, Klimt, Khnopff, Lieberman, Von Hofman and Hirschl.
We went inside and explored the palace and the artwork (unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take photos of the artwork, only the building itself).


After spending hours walking around, my mom and I rested on some bouncy balls in one of the gallery rooms.

From there we went to eat a late lunch at a Greek restaurant to gain a bit more energy for the rest of the day’s activities!
Our next stop was the Sigmund Freud Museum. It is located at Berggasse 19, in the apartment where Freud established his medical practice in 1891, and continued to receive patients and develop scientific principals about the human psyche until 1938, when he was exiled to England. It contains documents, photos and objects from Freud’s possessions. Unfortunately the main furniture (including the couch which he saw patients on) has been moved to London, England. The museum was small, and a little disappointing, as it is only contains one small room of photographs and documents, and one room decorated with the original furnishings (the waiting room, shown in a photo below).


From there we went to the Neo-Gothic Votive Church of “Christ the Savior”, which was built in 1856-1879. The towers at the top of the church remind me a tiny bit of the towers on La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, Spain.


Our last stop for the day was the Prater Amusement Park, containing the famous Wiener Riesenrad, Vienna’s Giant Ferris Wheel. It was built in 1897 by the English engineer Walter B. Basset. It has a total height 64.75 meters, and the total weight of all the iron structures is 430 tones. It has 15 cabins in total, and each cabin can easily fit about 10 people. From it, you get a view of the entire city of Vienna, as well as the rest of the amusement park.



A view of St. Stephan’s church:


After the amusement park we stopped quickly at the grocery store to buy some wine and snacks. We were pleasantly surprised with how cheap the wine is here!! We found wine for 1.49 Euros!! (We decided not to buy the cheapest wine and we went for a more expensive bottle at 2.49 Euros)

We then went back to our hotel with our wine to rest.

Technorati Tags: Schonbrunn,Belvedere,Freud,Prater

Vienna: IPOS Conference Events

The evening of June 23^rd, my Mom and I attended an IPOS buffet reception hosted by the Mayor and Governor of Vienna at the Heurigen Restaurant “Fuhrgassl-Huber”. The restaurant is at a vineyard, and there are rows and rows of grape vines growing out back.



The dinner was delicious!! And so was the wine!
The next day, June 24, was the day of my mom’s oral presentation. I came to watch her in all her glory. She was introduced to the audience as Professor Dr. Maru Barrera, world renowned researcher and speaker. I was so proud!! She gave a very interesting talk about the effects on parents of having a child with a life threatening illness (mainly cancer) who is about to undergo a bone marrow transplant (their last chance at survival). She showed differences between mothers and fathers in their ability to cope with the situation and manage stress, as well as their problem solving abilities, and the overall difficulty of managing the circumstances. Her talk was very successful!!


After the talk we had planned on going shopping, but it was raining very heavily, so we went back to the hotel and rested for a few hours before the Gala Dinner at night.
The Gala Dinner was the Auersperg Palace, in a beautiful banquet hall.

The food (and drinks) were amazing!! We had originally thought the food at the reception hosted by the Mayor and Governor of Vienna the previous night was excellent, but once we tried the Gala dinner, our taste buds were completely blown away and we realized that THIS was absolutely incredible!! We would eat like this daily if we could!! It also didn’t hurt that all our servers were very easy on the eyes.
They had a string quartet playing during the reception and during the dinner:

After dinner they had a dance floor, and we had a great time dancing!


We made our way home after a long fun night celebrating the end of the conference. The rest of our time in Vienna would be for fun!

Technorati Tags: IPOS

First Impressions of Vienna

My flight from Amsterdam to Vienna (on June 22) was very pleasant. And my trip from the airport to my hotel (The Austria Classic Hotel Wien) was even more pleasant. I met a very interesting American electrical engineer!! We had an interesting conversation about the changes in the US vs. the changes in Canada with regards to the current economic situation. In addition, we talked about engineering jobs and schools in both Canada and the US. I also had a chance to enlighten him on the significance of the iron ring, which he found fascinating, and he vowed to try to start a community like it in the US.
I took the train from the airport to the city center, and then a taxi from the station to my hotel. My taxi driver was also very nice, and funny. He helped me with my backpack (which at this point was probably around 20kg, because I combined it with my carry-on backpack which contained 3 books, a magazine and a bottle of water). After lifting my backpack (and almost dropping it) he asked me if all Canadian girls were this strong? Strong enough to carry this huge and heavy backpack throughout Europe!
It was cold and rainy in Vienna, but that didn’t take away from my excitement of seeing my Mom at the hotel! I quickly got changed and we went together to the IPOS opening ceremony.
IPOS stands for International Psycho-Oncology Society, and this is the 11^th World Congress of Psycho-Oncology, discussing issues related to the multi-disciplinary perspectives in psycho-oncology. My mom was here in Vienna for the conference. She was presenting 4 posters and was also making an oral presentation.
The ceremony was nice. They had a violin quartet performance.

After the quartet, the Austrian Minister of Health spoke. Unfortunately his speech wasn’t in English…
They also had a few other musical performances before opening the buffet. At this point I had been awake for 28 hours straight and was eating for the first time in many many hours (my last flight only fed me a cookie!). Since I was about to crash, we went back to the hotel early so I could sleep.
We awoke the next day to more rain. My mom went to her conference and I set off to explore the city armed with my map, camera and umbrella. I walked past the University and made my way over to the Stadtpark, which is a large, beautiful, park right downtown. The park has many small walking paths, winding around ponds, trees, sculptures and flowers.

Even though it was severely raining, the park was still beautiful, enjoyable and incredibly peaceful.
After visiting the park I took a walk over to the Hofburg Palace (The Imperial Palace). The area consists of various buildings, built in different periods, as each ruler wished to “leave their mark” on the palace. It started as a small fortress in 1275 and kept growing until 1918, when the Habsburgs fell from power. It was the seat of Austrian power for over 6 centuries.
I walked past the Statue of Joseph II (1806), past the Winter Riding School (where horses are trained and give performances), to the Michaelertor, which is the entrance gate to the vast number of palace buildings. Below is a photo of the entrance:

I then went inside the palace complex, and found the Neue Burg, which is the main Imperial Palace building. As you can see from the photo, the rain had subsided a bit, and umbrellas were more scarce.

From there I went to see the outside of the Museum of the History of Art, and walked around the Museums Quartier, which is a collection of museums, film venues and other cultural centers.

During that time, a very loud protest was taking place in the streets of Vienna. A very kind police man explained the situation to me. The people were protesting the current economic situation in Vienna. They are all former employees of Siemens, who were recently let go. They all congregated around Parliament, and joining hand in hand, they proceeded to form a large circle around the building.


At this point I was very wet from the rain, so I started walking back towards the hotel. I walked down some pedestrian shopping streets leading me in the direction of my hotel. Along the way I stopped at St. Peter’s Church.

This is a photo of the ceiling paintings:

Finally, I visited St. Stephen’s church, which has a glazed tile roof, and has stood here for over 800 years.


After a full day of exploring I made my way back to my hotel to rest before dinner.

Technorati Tags: Vienna,Stadtpark,Hofburg Palace,St. Peter’s Church,St. Stephen’s church

Flight to Amsterdam

So I am currently sitting in the Amsterdam airport. I have a 4 hour stop-over here until my next flight to Vienna. My Mom is waiting for me in Vienna, as she arrived yesterday. I decided to fly a day later than her so I could spend Father’s day with my dad.
My Dad spent all evening with me last night helping me pack, and all morning as well. I finally got my backpack all ready, but even with all my dad’s help I couldn’t get it under 16kg. To my credit, my mom asked me to bring a few things to her in Vienna, which added weight to my luggage.
This is me with my backpack containing all of my belongings for the next 2 months:

My Toronto-Amsterdam flight was really smooth and quite short! At least it felt short, it was only 6:30 hours long, which is almost nothing compared to my 13 hour Toronto-Tokyo flight last summer!! The airplane was massive!! It had two floors, and just hundreds and hundreds of people!

I watched the movie New In Town with Renee Zellweger. It was alright, cute, but nothing spectacular. And I spent the rest of the flight sorting through photos from my Dad’s 64^th Birthday Party my Mom and I threw for him on Friday night, sending out emails attaching the photos, and listening to the Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix audiobooks. I sat next to a very sweet Greek couple who were on their way to Athens to spend the next 2 months relaxing in the sun in a very exotic Greek city.
During my short time sorting photos during the flight I managed to completely drain my computer’s battery (it’s times like these when I wish I had paid the $50 extra for the larger battery…). Once I arrived in Amsterdam I set out to find an outlet in the airport. I successfully found not 1 but 2 outlets… but neither of them would charge my computer. So after frantically searching the airport stores, and with the help of a very nice airport employee I was able to purchase a new adaptor, and at last I am on my computer again!
I will end this blog post here, since I have nothing new to report. I will fly to Vienna in a few short hours to join my mom for the next week :)

Europe Trip: Packing and Itinerary

So I leave for my trip in 5 days!! I am currently trying to get my backpack (with all my belongings for 2 months) under 15 kilos. I have a 23 kilo limit on my international flights and a 20 kilo limit on everything else. But I figure, since I will with no doubt be buying things along the way, if I keep my bag light I can buy 5 kilos worth of stuff. And of course, it is much easier to carry a 13-14 kg bag than a 20kg bag on my back!!
That all being said, I’m finding it quite difficult to pack 2 months worth of stuff in under 15 kilos, especially when the backpack alone weighs 3-4 kilos!! I’ve eliminated my shampoo bottle and replaced it with a tiny mini one, hoping to pick up little shampoos along the way from hotels. I’ve also eliminated other cream products, since they take up a lot of weight. I’ve reduced my number of shoes to 4 (each with a very specific purpose: 1 pair of running shoes, 1 pair of Birkenstocks, 1 pair of flip flops and 1 nicer pair of shoes). I’ve also done many other similar sacrifices in order to lighten my load.
I also have my itinerary almost all worked out:
June 21: Fly to Vienna. Spend the week there with my Mom (she is there for a conference). During that time I’ll hoping to see other places in Austria, and hang out with my cousin Sue.
June 28: Fly to Rome, spend a few days exploring Rome.
July 1-8: Tour some of the south of Italy then take boat to Greek islands, spend some time relaxing in the sun on the beautiful islands.
July 9-12: Tour Athens.
July 12: Fly from Athens to Lisbon, Portugal and meet up with my friend Chad.
July 13-14: Spend 2 weeks touring around Portugal and Spain. I plan on visiting Lisbon, Madrid, Malaga, Seville, Toledo, Malaga, Cordoba and Granada.
July 25: Take train to London, and spend a few days touring around there.
July 29: Leave London and take train to Brussels for a few days.
July 31: Take train to Amsterdam and meet up with my friend Fieke (who lives there) for the weekend.
Aug 3: Travel to Berlin, and spend a few days there.
Aug 7: Make my way over to Budapest from Berlin. I might stop in Prague on the way and spend a day there to split up the very very long train ride (I think it’s around 10 hours).
Aug 8-18: Spend time in Budapest and around Hungary. I’ll hopefully make my way over to the Balaton (the largest lake in Hungary, filled with cottages) with some of my cousins to spend some time relaxing in the sun. My friend Mikaela might be coming to visit me from August 10-17 in Budapest. I also plan on going to the Sziget Festival, which is in Budapest and runs from Aug 12-17. It’s a music festival, which has bands from all over the world. I went a few years ago and had an amazing time!
Aug 18: I fly from Budapest back to Toronto, just in time for my Birthday on August 20^th!
I will be traveling with my mini netbook, so I’ll be connecting to any wireless connection I can find along the way so I can upload photos and write blogs about my travels!

Introduction

This is a blog about my adventures through Europe as a new Electrical Engineering and Management graduate from McMaster University.

I hope you enjoy my stories and photos!

Gaby Bohus