The Opera House

We're 2 minutes from the Opera House but we hadn't been able to have a tour until today. You can get tickets only 1/2 hour before the tour begins and tour times vary because of performances. Today there were 6, some days only 2 or 3. Tours are given in 4 different languages. The English speaker group had to be divided into three separate groups.

The opera house was built in 1869. About half the original remains and the other half that was bombed in WWII was rebuilt after the war. 

The guide told us that originally, going to the opera was mainly a social affair where people talked to their friends, ate, drank, and smoked while the opera was performed without a break. It was Mahler when he was director of the Vienna Opera who added intermissions and forbade eating and drinking in the theater. Reception rooms were added for people to socialize during intermissions.

After the tour, we walked to St. Anne's church. It's a beautiful Baroque church, built in 1518 originally.  It is best known for the frescoes painted in the 1700s.

Unfortunately, there was a mass when we were there so we didn't get to walk around the sanctuary. 

After that, we finally got to eat bratwurst at a street stand. The sandwiches are huge. The brats were delicious.

We're leaving tomorrow to go back to Budapest to fly home Tuesday so we spent the afternoon organizing and packing. Then napping.

For dinner, we went back to the Plachuttas Gasthaus Zur Oper which is across the street. It has a huge outdoor space with heaters that weren't needed tonight. The Plachutta family owns about 6 restaurants in Vienna and are famous for their traditional Austrian dishes. We went for the calf liver and onions. For dessert, we had Kaiserschmarrn. We've seen it listed on a lot of menus, described as cut up pieces of pancake served with stewed plums. Legend has it that Franz Joseph was traveling and stopped at a farmer's house for lunch. The farmer scrambled the pancakes from panic and to hide the mess, he dumped some berry jam on it. The Kaiser loved it so a new dessert, "the Kaiser's mess," was created. There are loads of variations but the ones we had weren't too sweet but sprinkled with powdered sugar. The plum topping on the side was plums that were halved and cooked a little but not stewed. It was surprisingly good. 

And that's the end of the fun part of the trip. Tomorrow we take a train to Budapest, spend the night at an airport hotel, and catch a 6 a.m. flight on Tuesday.