We took the Ubahn for this excursion. We hadn't used it before but this trip didn't require a transfer and was just 5 stops. It's a particularly busy line but it wasn't too bad. You can buy skip-line tickets online but you have to choose a time so we were afraid to do that last night given our mishaps with transportation. You have a 15 minute window to enter or they'll turn you away. We figured we could download tickets when we got there.
It turned out there are machines to buy tickets and we walked right up to one but couldn't use it because it takes Mastercard only and we had lots of Visas. The regular line was short and when we got there, the next available entry was 2 hours later. Not a problem, the park area is free so we walked around it for a little while. One of the activities encouraged on National Day is going to a public place to exercise. There were loads of runners in the park but I'm guessing there's always a lot on weekends. It's a beautiful place to run.
The palace grounds are 435 acres and the palace has 1441 rooms. It was the summer residence of the Habsburgs. Most of the construction of the palace and grounds occurred in the 1740s and 50s. Franz Joseph, the longest-reigning emperor of Austria, was born there and spent most of his life there so the artwork and decoration are about him and his family. He died there in 1916 and it became the property of Austria in 1918. It was used during WWII and became a museum again in 1955.
Since there is no way you can see too much of the grounds by walking, we took a train around the grounds. We hadn't bought tickets for any other parts you can visit like the maze, Orangerie, or Gloriette, all of which would involve lots of hiking, so the train ride gave a great overview of the grounds.
Of the 1441 rooms, you can visit 26 or 40, depending on how much time you want to spend. We chose the smaller package. The rooms you visit are the main ones used by Franz Joseph and his wife Elizabeth. Elizabeth was seldom there, though, because she did not love the husband she was forced to marry, hated court life, and loved travel. You can't take pictures inside the palace.
We saw the Mirror room where Mozart, at the age of 6 in 1762, played for the court for the first time. His father reported at the end, Mozart jumped on the lap of Empress Maria Theresa and gave her a kiss. As an adult he participated in a celebration where he and his rival Salieri were commissioned to write operas to be performed at the same time at the opposite sides of the Orangerie. The audience sat in the middle and could listen to each one by turning. Salieri's Italian opera was the clear winner against Mozart's German one.
We also saw the room where JFK met with Khrushchev in 1961.
Since only a certain number of people are allowed to tour at a time, there wasn't a huge crowd during the tour. The audio guide they give you was the most reasonable one I've ever had. It gave just the facts for each room. They probably just want to keep people moving but in my opinion, every audio guide should be like
For dinner, we went to the cuckoo restaurant that Johnny said we had to go to. It's called Kuckuck and I counted only 3 clocks. It's a very small restaurant so you need a reservation. They have a varied menu and the food is good. I had a stroganov and Lola had chicken with a paprika sauce. We had creme brulee for dessert except it wasn't creme brulee. There was no burnt crust of any kind. It was also chocolate, like chocolate pudding with a sugar topping but flavored whipped cream on the side that was very tasty. Good dessert, the translation was inaccurate.
We found out what we did see yesterday was the rehearsal for the parade that took place at 9 this morning. Given this day celebrates their constitutional law on permanent neutrality, we wondered why they were having a military parade. I did extensive research into Wikipedia and found out every male has 6 months mandatory military service at age 18. Women volunteer for service. The description of their duties is similar to our National Guard.
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