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Eastern Europe
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Eastern Europe

A 22-day adventure by West Family Travels Read more
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  • Trip start
    August 5, 2023
    West Family TravelsEastern EuropeTraveler
    McLaren Car Amsterdam airport

    Amsterdam

    August 6, 2023 in the Netherlands ⋅ 🌧 16 °C

    We have just boarded our KLM flight at Edmonton airport. The West family is finally making a return trip to Europe after a three year hiatus. We were supposed to make this trip in 2020 but we all know what happened with that. I do have a little sadness as we won't have the boys to travel with. They are all grown up now. Chris is working as a lifeguard this summer and Andrew is working as a guide at Camp Thunderbird on Vancouver Island. We still have our delightful daughter Madeline and we have brought her charming friend Jada Lemieux. Our plan is a week in Prague, 5 days in BRNO and one week in Vienna where we will collect another sophisticated friend of Madeline's Alice Keeble. Bon Voyage.Read more

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    Prague

    August 6, 2023 in the Netherlands ⋅ 🌧 16 °C

    We have made it to Prague.That shouldn't come as a surprise seeing that was was our final destination. We all fell asleep on the Amsterdam to Prague flight. The main excitement was losing Jada after promising her mother that I wouldn't within literally seconds of landing in Czech. Jada was at the front of the plane and disembarked to a gate while we disembarked from the back of the plane onto a bus. We just assumed everyone was on the bus so it was quite unnerving when we got off the bus and there was no Jada. Our phones initially weren't working due to no Sim cards so we had to get onto the wifi to contact her. She had sensibly just waited at the gate. Our driver a 30 year old woman met and after a long walk/run to her car we experienced some of the most aggressive driving we have ever experienced. She was definitely a frustrated formula one driver. She dropped us off at our Air BnB in a building named Hotel Chill. Talk about an unrest cure. I entered the access code to the electronic box and it opened box 6 with no keys rather than box 5 with our keys. As we still didn't have a SIM card this was going to turn into a hassle as my contact with the owner was through the Air BnB app so I was going to have to wander around and find some free Wifi. Fortunately some other guests came into the building and I told them our story and they had the owners phone number. After a quick call all was sorted out. Off to buy Sim cards tomorrow. We then did what I call the zombie walk. We tried to stay up as long as possible. We got some groceries ate supper and went for a little walk before collapsing with exhaustion. My initial impression of Prague is a major party town. Every small grocery store is a liquor store in disguise. My other observation is that I love art Nouveau architecture. Edmonton should bring in an art Nouveau bylaw.Read more

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    Everything Alphonso Mucha

    August 7, 2023 in Czech Republic

    Our first day in Prague was an Alphonso Mucha day. Alphonso Mucha was a Czech artist who initially gained fame for his Art Nouveau prints but branched out into design and jewellery. His productive time was between 1900 and 1931. He was also a Czech nationalist and he branched out into nationalistic paintings after Czech gained its independence from Austria in 1918. We started at the Mucha museum. It was a little on the small side for the price but had his major prints and a good movie about his life. We then went and took a tour of the municipal building which despite the name was a concert hall done in the Art Nouveau style. They had commissioned Mucha to paint some of the rooms After the municipal building we were all tired out so we chilled at our apartment. After supper Cheryl and I went and found one of the hanging men statues. Cheryl and I had a good night's sleep. The girls not so well and it had nothing to do with the 5 pm coffee we warned them against.Read more

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    Prague Castle Tour

    August 8, 2023 in Czech Republic ⋅ ☁️ 19 °C

    We took the team up to the Prague Castle. Within the Prague castle they have built the large gothic St. Vitus Cathedral. It was very spectacular. St. Vitus was an Italian martyred in AD 303 who had nothing to do with Czech or Prague until the good King Wenceslas of the Christmas Carol fame bought a bone from his arm and brought it to Prague as a holy relic in 925. Of course all holy relics require churches to be housed. The present Cathedral was started in 1300 but took 600 years to build. That would make the Transmountain pipeline appear to be on time. Anyhow St. Vitus is the patron saint of dance so on his saint day people dance. I had heard of St. Vitus as some children after rheumatic fever develop a neurological movement disorder called St. Vitus dance named after the crazy dancing people do on his saint day. I had never known this association. The church was pretty good what with the huge Nave, a Mucha stain class window, St Vitus tomb and Good King Wenceslas tomb.

    The excitement had only just begun though as we still had the Royal Palace. Madeline told us that they had leaned about the Palace in grade 11 AP history as that was the site of the defenestration of Prague which had set off the 30 year war. In 1618 angry Czech Protestant nobleman had thrown the two Austrian Hapsburgs governors out of the window. She was very thrilled to see the window and send back photos to their history teacher Mr. Robinson. Vladislav hall was very impressive. It was so large that they could have jousting tournaments. We started to flag after that and quickly toured the Basilica of St. George and the mediaeval quarter which was so swarmed with people it felt claustrophobic. We walked back towards the river taking in the Lesser town, Wallenstein garden, the courtyard of the Franz Kafka museum, the Shakespeare book shop, and the Charles bridge which was incredibly busy with tourists. The courtyard of the Kafka museum is noted for the two men urinating statue. We were quite tired so took a team back up the hill to our apartment.    Read more

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    Jewish Quarter and Anton Dvorak

    August 9, 2023 in Czech Republic ⋅ ⛅ 19 °C

    We were really flagging this morning after the long day at the castle. We decided that we would let the girls sleep in and that we would go to the Anton Dvorak museum which was located only 5 minutes from our apartment. I noticed it on Google maps but it seemed pretty low on the tourist radar as it wasn't in Rick Steves book and it certainly didn't hit any of the top things to do in Prague on trip advisor. The museum had opened in 1932 about 30 years after Dvorak's death. The house itself had nothing to do with Dvorak although he at one point had lived in the area. Dvorak was obviously a Czech composer known for capturing many of the Czech folk songs and for some of his symphonies specifically For a New World which is one of my favorites. The museum was small and possessed some of his worldly possessions including his viola, piano eyeglasses and various awards he had won. No manuscripts. They had a very nice video on his life that we watched.

     We walked back to our apartment and collected the girls before heading off to a cafeteria just off of Wenseleus square. The cafeteria was in the basement of a building and it was something out of the Soviet era. Large portions of meat and potato meals on plastic trays. My son Chris had recommended it. Of course there were no chicken meals for Madeline and Jada only picked at her meal.We had to go to McDonald's afterwards for Madeline.

    By then it was about 1 pm and we had to start our tour of the Jewish quarter. Prague had a large Jewish population of maybe 100000 before WW2 and of course we all know what happened with the holocaust. Only 10000 survived. Prague's Jewish quarter dates back to 1000 AD and despite various setbacks ie Pogroms over the years the community had prospered and in 1876 they were granted full rights as citizens. The tour consisted of three synagogues, one mortuary and a Jewish cemetary. The synagogue was interesting because I had never been in one. The second was interesting as the synagogue was no longer being used and they had inscribed all the names of Czech citizens who had died in the holocaust on the walls according to towns and family names. There were 155000 names. It was rather sobering. The Jewish cemetery was very neat. Lots of gravestones all highly pigglty The mortuary and third synagogue we were getting bored. We stopped for iced coffees before hitting the last synagogue known as the Spanish synagogue which was the most beautiful. We were exhausted after an afternoon of Judaism.    Read more

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    This pils for you

    August 10, 2023 in Czech Republic ⋅ ☀️ 16 °C

    I have always wanted to do a brewery tour. Perhaps it was the influence of growing up in London Ontario birth place of Labatt's brewery that led me to have this desire. Of course Labatt's brewery had a nice brewery tour but despite having lived in London Ontario for 32 years, I never did the tour. So of course when I heard that there were brewery tours in Pilsen, a small city just outside of Prague, I bought us tour tickets. Madeline and Jada didn't want anything to do with the tour so they stayed in Prague and walked around in their brand new Doc Martin's they had bought the day before leaving for the trip got blisters and were happy.

    We took the train to Pilsen from Prague. It was good practice for our trip in three days to Brno. The train station was packed with people. It took us a little while to figure out which platform to wait on but it all worked out .

    The name of the brewery was Pilsener Urquell, Czech's oldest brewery founded in 1842 and known for its Pilsner beer for which it is named. Pilsner is a lager, cold bottom fermented, cold stored, made from soft water and made from a triple superheated wart. 9/10 of the beer brewed in the world is Pilsner so they obviously got something right. The tour was very good and the two hours whisked by very quickly. I think I enjoyed watching the bottles going through the assembly line the most. We were taken through all of the brewing stages both in the old and new buildings. Of course we all got a drink at the end of the tour. We were fortunate that we were able to get onto the 3 pm train to Prague rather than the later train we had booked. We were happily reunited with the girls who were nursing their blisters after a full day of shopping.    Read more

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    We survived Terezin

    August 11, 2023 in Czech Republic ⋅ ☀️ 21 °C

    I had my reservations yesterday when the girls demanded to go to Terezin home of the infamous Terezin ghetto during WW2. Terezin is located an hour north of Prague. It would require a metro trip, a bus ride and a walk. Of course I only had a vague idea of when the bus would leave. It was going to be a hot day. I always get a little depressed going to concentration camps. Who doesn't. Despite my reservations I rose to the challenge.

    We got going early with a 7:30 wake up which is our earliest wake. We made it to the correct bus stop at the correct time. After the bus driver had fought back the masses we were allowed on the very hot bus. Maybe he was trying to warn us not to go but we don't understand Czech.We were the only tourists on the bus. I think he must have been related to the airport driver in Prague but he was driving a bus. I wasn't too bus sick when we arrived.

    The story of Terezin is almost unbelievable. Terezin was a walled fortress city before WW2. The Germans kicked out all of the 2000 inhabitants and used the city as a ghetto for thousands of Jewish people awaiting deportation to the death camps. Despite not being a death camp 33000 people died in Terezin from malnutrition and poor treatment. 155500 people passed through the ghetto, the majority of whom died before the end of the war. 15000 children. We visited the 2 museums in town, the colabarium, the crematorium. We couldn't find the hidden synagogue. It kept getting hotter as the day went on. Cheryl and I broke out our umbrellas for the sun. What I realized was odd about the town was that other than the 2 museum's the rest of the town was fully inhabited. People were living in buildings that had imprisoned Jewish people 75 years ago where many of them had died. If there are ghosts or spirits anywhere they must be in Terezin.

    Not to be outdone by Terezin the town, there was a small fort outside of Terezin where the SS had imprisoned and executed Czech political and resistance prisoners during the war. We walked out in the heat for more death and misery. After a tour of the execution grounds we all had had enough so we caught an even hotter bus back to Prague having survived our one day tour of a concentration camp. Today was definitely not a Disney tour day.    Read more

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    A day at the pool

    August 12, 2023 in Czech Republic ⋅ ⛅ 28 °C

    Cheryl and I needed to have an easier day today after all of the excitement. We went for a leisurely walk in the morning to a coffee shop in a nearby part of Prague away from the busy downtown tourist area. We met up after lunch with the girls who had gone shopping without their Doc Martin's. It had become much warmer in Prague today so we all decided it would be fun to go to an outdoor pool. There was quite a large outdoor pool with a stadium not too far from our apartment so we headed off for a blissful afternoon with the Czechs.Read more

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    Goodbye Prague Hello Brno

    August 13, 2023 in Czech Republic ⋅ ☁️ 22 °C

    Today was our last day at the Chill apartments in Brno. We had a very busy week but felt like we could have done and seen more sites here in Prague. We caught the train to Brno after a short 10 minute walk with our luggage to the train station. It really helped navigating the train station having taken the train to Pilsen earlier in the week. We had a little problem figuring out which car we were on but asked the conductor and he got us shorted out. It was a new modern train but I didn't think it was going very quickly until I noticed that the speed of the train was being displayed intermittently on a monitor which had been displaying the next station. We were flying along at 160 kph. Very impressive. We arrived in Brno at 1 and walked another ten minutes to our Air BNB. I had intended on taking things easy after we arrived but realized that two of the big attractions would be closed on Monday when I thought we could do them.

    Gregor Mendel of Mendelian genetics fame lived and performed his studies at an Augustine monastery in Brno. He was a monk and went on to become the abbot of the monastery. For someone who had failed his education degree, he was a pretty heavy He published his sentinel paper describing inherited genotypes and phenotypes in 1865 but it was largely ignored. There is a small Mendel museum at the abbey with a collection of some of his research notes and books. Mendel also did metrology research and study other sciences. There was his microscope and telescope and various metrology equipment. There was also a pretty good display explaining the concepts of genetics. One could also wander around in the small courtyard of the building where he had grown his pea plants he was studying. It was all quite unique. The girls enjoyed seeing the site and the museum.

    The other site that I wanted to visit was a cold war bunker called Bunker Z. It had been built under the Brno castle in WW2 and expanded during the cold war. The bunker was a little run down and junky. It didn't look like they had put much effort into it for a number of years. A lot of the material hadn't been translated into English. As my son Chris would have said, it was mid despite a hefty admission fee.    Read more

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    A day in Brno

    August 14, 2023 in Czech Republic ⋅ ☀️ 24 °C

    We spent the day in Brno. Brno isn't really known as being a tourist destination site. In fact Rick Steves doesn't even mention it in his book. That said, Brno appears to be a very clean, safe and prosperous city. I find that Czechs don't smile a lot but everyone looks fairly content and healthy. I think when I initially planned this trip in 2019 it was because we could rent a car in Brno but not in the neighbouring city Oleomuc.

    Other than the Mendel museum and Bunker Z, the main 2 tourist attractions were St Peter's and St Paul's Cathedral and the Spilbeck castle in the centre of town. We walked up to the castle through a park with very moderately steep paths. The girls complained about the steepness but we had to remind them that they were mountain women from Alberta. The castle at the top was quite pretty and we walked around the embattlements at the top. The views of surrounding Brno were quite impressive. Madeline and Jada weren't terribly impressed by the Castle having only experienced Scottish castles. They thought it was rather a wimpy castle despite the fact that in 1685, it had withstood a 122 day siege by a Swedish army of 30000 people. That is correct, I said Swedish. After the castle we walked over to the cathedral which had some pretty impressive stain glass windows and a bell tower with a very narrow viewing platform at the top. We also heard the bell tower ring it's bell 12 times a 11 pm. This is a tradition going back to 1685 when the Brnites learned that the Swedes would call off their siege at noon on the 122 day, they rang their cathedral bells one hour earlier to trick the Swedes into ending the siege.

    There is a heat wave in Czech right now with daily temps of 31 degrees. Fortunately it has been cooling off at night. We decided the best place to hang out was the pool so we took a trolley to a public outdoor pool on a hill outside of town at almost the same height as the castle. The view looking over at the castle was also spectacular. Unlike the pool in Prague, it didn't charge per hour so we chilled out for about 3 hours. There was a nice breeze and after a dip in the pool it was very pleasant sitting on a chair in the shade on the grass. Interestingly 97 percent of the Czechs preferred lying around the pool in the sun. Jada and Madeline lay on the grass by the pool despite our warning them about the hazards of too much sun. After about 2 hours they came and complained that they were getting heat stroke and wanted to go. We told them to sit with us in the shade and bought them some waffles and they seemed much happier.

    We left the pool around 4 pm and after having a little break at the apartment headed off to the airport to get our rental car. I had booked it way in advance and at 90 Euro for 3 days thought it would be fun to visit 2 of the UNESCO heritage sites in the countryside around Brno. Google maps has been a great game changer for foreign travel. It tells one with very good consistency how to travel around using public transit. We entered into the phone that we wanted to go to the airport and it directed us to the bus stop at the correct time for the half hour trip. Our hearts sank a little at the airport when we arrived as many of the car rentals were closed as it was now Sunday at 6. Budget was open and the attendant was patiencely waiting for our arrival. We were his last pickup of the day. We picked up the car and everything went seemlessly. Google maps on our phone then helped us navigate back to accommodation. The most difficult part of the journey was finding the correct parking garage. There were 3 and we went to the wrong 2 first before finding the correct parking lot that would accept the QR code from the Air BnB. There was a lot of backing up but both Cheryl and I kept our cool.    Read more

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    Lednice UNESCO Heritage site

    August 15, 2023 in Czech Republic ⋅ ☀️ 31 °C

    Having picked up the car yesterday we were already to kick off our adventure in Southern Moravia. Our first destination was Lednice about an hour's drive south of Brno. The Lichtenstein family who are the crown princes and princesses of Lichtenstein ancestral homeland was in Southern Moravia which had once been part of the Austrian Hungarian empire. The Lichtenstein family had played their cards very well since the 1600s. During the 30 year war they had converted to Catholicism and supported the Habsburgs. When the Habsburgs came out on top they had granted huge land rights to the Lichtenstein family of land seized from none supporters. Their summer palace at Lednice which had several reiterations over the years was absolutely over the top. It was last rebuilt in 1865 and was absolutely magnificent both on the outside and on the inside. They had a large English garden by the house and a large estate surrounding an artificial lake stretching 1.5 km from the Chateau. At the end of the lake there was a minaret. It was really over the top. We toured through the inside. It was a Czech tour but they gave us an English version to read. Beautiful woodwork on the inside. Large vaulted ceilings and large windows. It was all quite spectacularly beautiful. The closest I have ever come to this would be either Blenheim palace or Howard castle but this was more impressive. They had a huge Palm greenhouse made from a cast iron construction-think the greenhouse at Kew garden. After our tour we enjoyed drinks at the Chateau cafe looking out onto the estate. For 30 minutes as I sat there, I felt like a Lichtenstein prince.

    It was getting on to almost 2 o'clock and the temp was up to 30 degrees. My prairie girls all wilt above 28 degrees so we headed back to Brno for a swim at a different outdoor pool.    Read more

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    Moravia adventures

    August 16, 2023 in Czech Republic ⋅ ☀️ 31 °C

    Another day another UNESCO heritage site. Not to be outdone by the aristocracy, the arch bishops of Moravia had their own Chateau in Kromeriz an hour drive from Brno. I was able to convince the girls to get going earlier to avoid the heat. We were away by 8 and made it very comfortably to Kromeriz by 9:30.

    The Czech are crazy drivers. The posted speed limit is 100km per hour but the average speed seems to be about 120 with people flying by at 140. The predominant cars are Skodas and Volvos. They have obviously forgiven the Swedes about the 30 year war.

    The Chateau was beautiful. We did a tour in Czech but had English translations. Lots of beautiful furniture and the Chateau was in Rococo style. The two notable events at the Chateau were that it was used as the Austrian parliament building in 1846 for a year during some civil unrest and the czar of Russia visited in 1885? to meet the Austrian monarch. He had left a 300 kg vase of Malachite and his portrait. After the tour we wandered in the garden a bit , had our lunch and fed the peacocks before the heat got the best of us and we returned to Brno.

    We warmed out in the afternoon and then Cheryl and I in the evening went for a swim at the pool looking out on the castle and Brno.    Read more

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    Punkva Caves

    August 17, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ⛅ 28 °C

    In planning for the Brno part of the trip, I have been flying somewhat solo regarding the planning. Rick Steves doesn't cover Brno at all although he covers some of the areas to the south and east which included the two Chateaus that we had visited. In my research for the trip I came across something known as the Punkva Caves and the Machocha abyss. It certainly sounded tantalizing. I have never been to an abyss before. The TripAdvisor's reviews were favorable but they were mainly written by locals and local guides. An occasional review said there was nothing special compared to other European caves the writer had been in. I had bought the tickets in advance and I was concerned that perhaps I was on to another dud just like Bunker Z. Of course when I did buy the tickets more than a month ago, all but the noon time was sold out which was a good sign. The caves were about an hour north west of Brno. Thank goodness for Google maps. I had read a review of someone who had used public transit but it must have taken them all day. When we arrived we had to pay for parking of course but it wasn't totally clear to me where the caves were. The tourist office indicated to us to walk up this road which seemed quite deserted but then we started seeing glum looking Czechs either walking down or being driven down on a shuttle bus that looked like a train. Czechs always look a little glum though and aren't great smilers. After a half hour walk we arrived in good time and waited for the tour to start. There were 40 of us on the tour. I had warned my Alberta group to come prepared for cooler weather so of course we were dressed for subzero temps. When the tour started and we reached the first cave, it was spectacular. Stalactites mites and nants. Small reflective pools of water. Formations that looked like rippling sheets and angels. The tunnel system just went on and on. It was all beautifully lit. At one point we walked up and down 50 metres of stairs. It was the most spectacular cave system I had been in. The caves had been carved out of limestone by the Punkva river. At one point where the limestone had collapsed we came into the bottom of the Machocha abyss. It was 134 metres deep. After the abyss we went back into the caves where we were picked up by a boat and taken on a boat ride on the Punkva river. The closest thing I had done to this was the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland but this was in a real cave and longer. Jada and Madeline saw a bat and had video of it to back up their claim. I had taken a separate boat than the others but when I arrived Jada and Madeline were waiting with huge smiles on their faces as I think they had enjoyed the experience even more than I had. They said it was a highlight of their trip.

    We drove back to Brno and dropped the girls off at the accommodation before taking the car back to the airport. It was great having the car for three days but I was happy to return it unscathed full of gas to the airport. We all really enjoyed the caves and it's not every day one can say that they have been to the abyss and back.    Read more

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    Good bye Brno Hello Vienna

    August 18, 2023 in Czech Republic ⋅ ☀️ 24 °C

    Yesterday we said goodbye to Brno. We took another high speed train to Vienna. Smooth sailing the whole way. Of course everything is just so close together here in Europe it is a whole lot easier to get around. The only unusual thing that happened was when we got on the Ubahn in Vienna after getting off the train, a young respectable looking man got on and stood menacingly close to me. I reverted to Edmonton transit mode and looked away from him. After about 15 seconds of sticking his finger close to my face he remarked I want to go to prison. And walked down the subway car. About 3 minutes later he walked past us and joined some other young men at the other end of the subway car who I assumed were his friends. Then suddenly a full fledged fight broke out which he seemed to be getting the worst of and he ran past us with the other young men in pursuit. It was all a little unnerving. We made it to our VRBO safely but the cleaning staff were still cleaning. Madeline and Jada declared that they had to go to Brandy Melville so we went off into the heat on this quest. On the way I realized that almost exactly a year ago minus 3 days, I had been on another such quest with Madeline when we were in Montreal last year. Oh the power of advertising and social media. Brandy Melville makes beige cheap quality clothing which they have fooled teenagers into believing is worth buying. After dragging Madeline and Jada out of the store we returned to our Air BnB for an air conditioned leisurely evening.

    Today we headed off to the Hapsburg summer palace. I guess at one time it was in the country but now a short 15 minute ride on the U Bahn from downtown and the Hapsburg winter palace. The palace was built in 1740 to 1750 and in Rick Steves words rivals Versailles in splendour and ornateness. It is large at 1440 rooms. We did the 41 room tour which gave us a good glimpse of the life of Franz Joseph and his wife Sisi who were the true last monarchs of Austria which became a republic in 1918 shortly after the war. Ornately decorated rooms with wonderful frescoes and furniture. I think I enjoyed the spectacular mantel clocks the best. After the audio tour of the castle we wandered around the beautiful garden. I promised everyone a drink- nonalcoholic of course if we walked up the steep hill behind the castle. Just as we were sitting down at the cafe looking back at the castle Cheryl realized that she had lost her small purse from her front pocket with her one credit card and 75 Euros. She wondered whether it had fallen out of her pocket either when retrieving her phone or when we had rested on some park benches. So much for the leisurely drink. We reached our steps but no such luck. We wandered around for a while to find the administrative office. They were actually very helpful letting us use their phone to call National Bank to cancel the card. Of course when we did get through to the emergency line we were informed that no one was available to help us and to call back later. No other instructions. Fortunately Cheryl googled how to cancel a stolen National Bank credit card and we could do it online which we immediately did. National Bank should of had these instructions on the answering machine. No charges appeared to have gone through on the card so it wasn't so bad. Maybe if Cheryl doesn't have a credit card it may even save me some money. We headed back to the apartment as it was now warming up. Daily highs this week will be between 32 and 34. My goal for the week is to do something in the morning and chill out in the afternoon. There was an indoor outdoor pool about a 15 minute walk from our place so I went for a swim and read my book chilled out beside the pool. In the evening we collected Alice another friend of Madeline's from a downtown hotel. Alice and her parents are traveling in Europe for three weeks and we agreed to have her travel with us for the week.    Read more

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    The miracle of the white stallions

    August 20, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ☀️ 29 °C

    When I grew up in the 70s in London Ontario, every Sunday night we would watch the Incredible World of Disney. One of the movies we watched was The Miracle of the White Stallions. It was a movie of how the Director of the Spanish riding school here in Vienna saved the beautiful white lippizan stallions from the Nazis. I don't remember many if at all any of the details but it made an impression on me so I decided that if I ever travelled to Vienna, I would attend a performance. Now because it is the summer, the majority of the cultural events are not happening. No opera, symphony, ballet- nothing. Vienna in August is a cultural waste land. When I realized that there was one performance of the Lippizan stallions while we were in Vienna, I snapped us up some tickets. I was very excited to be going. Now I must confess that growing up in London Ontario my family was not part of the horse crowd. In fact my family was probably the opposite of the horse crowd. My exposure to horses was very limited. My family would have been best classified as the Merry go round crowd. My exposure to horses exponentially increased when I moved out West. The rodeo at Pile of bone days was spectacular. I enjoyed it so much I would go 2 or 3 times. I would even go to rodeos in small towns. I remember going to a rodeo in Val Marie Saskatchewan. That was exciting as the rodeo was in a little hockey rink and from where we were sitting one could almost touch the bucking horses and bulls. I must have seen the RCMP ride several times. What showmanship. I was really pumped for the Lippizan stallions. They were known as the best of the best and I knew this would be a highlight of the trip. I didn't want to ruin the surprise for the girls so I just told them that we were in for a great adventure. We arrived early for the performance as we had general seating. I was quite surprised when the girls had no idea who the Lippizan stallions were however their enthusiasm increased when we got into the riding hall. It was beautiful. The school riding hall was actually part of the Hofburg palace. Baroque architecture very ornately painted. Chanaliers. Their excitement increased as we waited in the heat for the performances to start. I knew of course that they weren't going to start with the best horses first but still they were going to be Lippizans. The performance started and it was apparent that this wasn't the usual type of horse spectacle that I had grown used to on the prairies because it was dressage. I hadn't really given much thought to the Olympic sport of dressage. Aren't all Olympic sports supposed to be exciting.I didn't even know it was an Olympic sport. I would define dressage as horses who have been taught to walk in an unusual fashion. It is what Tai Chi is to the martial arts world. They had trained every last piece of wildness and excitement and adventure out of these animals. At first it was just a little boring. This was the antithesis of a rodeo. As the performance progressed it gradually became more interesting as the level of difficulty increased but it still wouldn't touch the excitement of a rodeo. Still we were able to see the horses perform what I would describe as the floating horse maneuver. I have no idea what the name of it is in German. It is what the Lippizans are known for. The horses do a double kick with their legs and for maybe a second or two they appear to float in the air. I have seen videos of the Lippizan stallions performing this maneuver but it was pretty impressive to see it in person. The girls were very impressed by the performance. We left the hall for the mid day heat. We ate our lunch on the steps of an unused wing of the Hofburg palace before retreating to the air conditioning of our rental. In the afternoon we ventured out to a very busy Viennese outdoor pool but given that it was Sunday and 35 degrees one would have been surprised if it hadn't been busy. I think that I will have to watch the Disney movie again as after seeing the Lippizan stallions in person, it is difficult to know how these animals would have been of any benefit to the Nazis as all they appeared good for was dressage which in my mind wasn't going to win any wars. Give me a horse like the Lone Ranger's horse Silver any day over a Lippizan stallion.Read more

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    Vienna walking tour

    August 21, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ☀️ 35 °C

    Our adventures have been slowed down by the weather. Yesterday hit a high of 34 degrees and today hit a high of 36 degrees. I find that I am good for the morning until noon and then it gets too warm and I hit the heat wall. We retreat to our Air conditioned Air BnB. I have been going in the afternoon to a closer indoor outdoor pool doing a swim and chilling out on the deck of the indoor pool on a chez lounge chair and reading my Kobo reader. It's about a 12 minute walk and I have been taking respite in grocery stores and a post office. By the time I get back I think I am all warmed up again

    Yesterday we got an early start to beat the heat. We were away by 8:15 and we took the number 2 tram downtown to walk around old Vienna. We started at the Opera House and did a complete loop of downtown finishing off at the Hofburg palace. We followed the walking tour recommended by Rick Steves. Some of the highlights included St. Stephan's cathedral, admiring the interposition of the various architectures, looking into the old coffee houses, the plague memorial and Kohlmarkt- Viennas high end shopping district. We even went in a high end Louis Vuitton store which the girls really enjoyed.I think Vienna was heavily bomb in WW2 so there are some very old buildings interspersed with newer buildings. We kept them pretty well occupied until 11 am until they wanted to go off for a coffee by themselves and Cheryl and I headed to Cafe Gerstner for a coffee and to lap up the ambience of an old style Viennese cafe.    Read more

  • West Family TravelsEastern EuropeTraveler

    Belvedere Palace

    August 22, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ☀️ 27 °C

    This palace was more beautiful than the Hapsburg's two palaces. It was located up a hill and looked down on Vienna downtown. The views were improved as there were these large gardens surrounding the palace so nothing obscured the views. The palace was built by Prince Eugene of Savoy, an Austrian general who successfully defeated the Ottomans around 1700. He was actually French but had been rejected by the French as they thought he was too short and too ugly. He was rewarded by the Hapsburg's with great wealth allowing him to build this castle. After his death the palace was converted to an art gallery. It now houses a very good art collection of Austrian artists other than for the famous Gustov Klimt. Gustov was a contemporary of the impressions and painting in somewhat of a similar style. I think he was best known for The kiss. The Belvedere was air conditioned which made for an even more enjoyable experience. We hit the very pretty coffee shop afterwards and had our lunches in the garden before taking the sauna, I mean the non-air conditioned tram back to the apartment.Read more

  • West Family TravelsEastern EuropeTraveler

    The great scavenger hunt

    August 23, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ⛅ 31 °C

    The Kunthistorisches Museum in Vienna is huge. One could buy an annual membership and go once a week and not absorb all of the great art. Rick Steves in such situations recommends limiting yourself to 20 of the most famous paintings which he lays out for one in his book. That way when you visit it doesn't turn into a death march. When we went to the Louvre when the kids were younger I figured out the most prominent pieces of art and made up a scavenger hunt for the kids. Madeline and her friends are 16 so I wasn't sure how that would fly but when I told them about the idea, they were very enthusiastic. I designed the hunt around paintings that Rick Steves had recommended. I asked them questions about the paintings, some objective, some subjective and some philosophical. It included Reubens, Rembrandts, Titians, Coravaggios and more. It took us about two hours but everyone was quite engaged and seemed happy. We were all so engrossed by the game we didn't take many photos. Afterwards we all went to see were we would take the train from on Saturday when we left. I always think this is a good idea as it is quite unnerving if you get lost rushing to the airport. A dry run always ensures things will go better on your departure day.Read more

  • West Family TravelsEastern EuropeTraveler

    A walk of the cottage district.

    August 25, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ☀️ 33 °C

    We are down to the last few days of our trip. Thursday the girls decided they wanted to go shopping so they went off by themselves to shop at some very exclusive stores such as H and M. Cheryl and I went for a walk that I had come across on a travel blog in the cottage district of Vienna. Cottage was an under exaggeration as they were huge mansions many of which had been converted into apartments or embassies although some were still single houses. The houses had been built around 1910 and had been either owned by famous entertainers or people in the construction/architect industries. Cheryl thought that was rather ironic as everyone in our neighborhood with a nice house seems to be in the construction industry. We wandered around the route as the day gradually got warmer. We took a couple hours to finished the route and by then we were quite hot. We stopped for a coffee before heading off to the pool and some refuge from the heat. In the evening Cheryl and I ventured out into the heat to visit Hundertwasserhaus . Hundertwasserhaus is an apartment building built in the 80s by the architect Hundertwasser. It has no straight lines and they have incorporated vegetation into the side of the building with trees and bushes growing out of various balconies etc. The building has social housing apartments which supposedly are not very desirable as they are quite small. It was fun to look at and got us out of the apartment.Read more

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    The treasury and the pathology museum

    August 25, 2023 in Austria ⋅ ☀️ 33 °C

    Today was our last full day for travel adventures. I had bought a combined ticket for the Kunthistorisches Museum and the treasury. It was only 12 Euros extra and the girls had never been to a treasury museum. A treasury museum houses the jewels, crowns and regalia of the monarchy. I have viewed some treasuries of other countries before and could have done without but I thought it would be good for the girls. Well it turned out that the girls didn't want to go. They wanted to sleep in and relax. They have developed travel fatigue. I guess there are only so many churches and museums one can take a 16 year old to. Cheryl and I decided to go regardless. As billed there were lots of crowns, jewels and regalia. They jewels are all so incredibly large that they look fake. Wanting to squeeze as much out of the last day Cheryl and I headed off to the University of Vienna to the pathology museum. There was also a display dedicated to the Viennese pathologist Rokitansky. That is correct I said pathology. Up until the 1960s, there was a tradition in many pathology departments to maintain pathology museums. These museums contained either formalin fixed surgical or autopsy specimens displayed in glass containers or wax creations of disease processes. There were many great examples of advanced tumors, infectious diseases and congenital abnormalities all grouped according to disease processes. I had no idea what smallpox looked like. Cheryl really enjoyed it as well. Interestingly U of A doesn't have a pathology museum but they do have the Larry Jewell pathology room that contains a few examples of pathology specimens. By about 2 pm we were all pathologized out and it was about 36 degrees Celsius so we headed to a McDonald's cafe for some Viennese coffee. McDonald's seems to have become our favorite Viennese coffeeshop plus it is air conditioned.Read more

    Trip end
    August 26, 2023
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