Day 18 - Exploring Vienna

Early in the morning we checked into our new hotel, the Wilhelmshof. The hotel wasn't as flash, and a little further out, but the staff were friendly and the room spacious. While at the hotel, we picked up a Vienna Card which is great value with discounts to many attractions and free use of public transport.

The first place we got to use our Vienna Card was at the Clock Museum. This small museum has some interesting pieces. One of the minders spoke very little English, but was very enthusiastic about some of the items and did here best to share that with us.

The clock museum.

After wandering around the Hofburg and the Volksgarten, we visited the Café Central (which our guidebook describes as the "most splendid of coffee houses in Vienna") for lunch. The food was very nice. For dessert David has the hazelnut mousse and Evan tried a Sachertorte.

Afterwards we headed back to the famous Neue Burg which houses the Sammlung Alter Musikinstrumente - the musical instruments museum - among other things. The collection of instruments here is huge with many historic or unusual pieces. We also had a quick look at the Hofjagd und Rüstkammer, the weaponry museum, in the same building.

Neue Burg.

A display in the musical instruments museum.

A joustling display in the weaponry museum.

To see a little bit more of the inner city, we hopped on the number two tram and did a few laps of the Ringstraße.

For dinner we went to a mostly-vegetarian restaurant called Wrenkh. This restaurant had three menus to choose from ("energy", "balance" and "beauty"). The food here was all very fresh and kept simple - a very nice change. Some interesting combinations of flavours here.