Vienna Part 1

Firstly I have belatedly responded to all of you who have left messages. I did them under various blog entries you wrote on. Hope you can find them. So lovely to get little messages. Thank you!!

I am writing this on our coldest day yet. The day has been fine and the sun was out this afternoon, however the wind was so icy cold that it made our faces ache and our noses run. It has been interesting getting out in the European winter. Our really warm coats, boots, hats, scarves and gloves keep us very warm and we haven't felt the need to be indoors lots, however that wind today targeted our only uncovered place and  it was biting. Far colder than our snowy days. I would say it was coming straight off the mountains if Vienna didn't have such a flat topography!! Anyway....Vienna is an amazing city.It is situated within enormous parks and open green spaces ( although not too green at this time of year). 51% of Vienna consists of gardens and parks! 
We experienced the vastness of their park like areas and some of their amazing gardens at Schonbrunn Palace. This summer hunting lodge, read extravagant palace, of the Habsburgs dynasty shows how the other half live. Room after room, 1441 in fact, of guilded magnificence and opulence. If built to the original plans it would have had 2300 rooms and rivalled Versailles. We also visited Hofburg Palace, the Winter residence of the the Habsburgs, . The vast rooms of tableware, cutlery , linen and ornate table centrepieces as well as the tragic story of Empress Elisabeth, better known as Sisi, was fascinating and made me realise yet again how wealth and happiness are not often partners. 
Speaking of where people reside, we are experiencing inner city living in Vienna at the other size end of the accommodation scale to those palaces. Our Viennese home is an über cool  loft apartment that is small ( read VERY small- probably the size of our kitchen / family area or the Habsburgs card playing room). Within the one room  we have 5 beds, a chair and a dining table with 5 chairs, a small kitchen, and then a  bathroom, separate toilet and a large walk-in storage cupboard. While not in the same league as our friends the Habsburgs it is very adequate!  We are also enjoying the close proximity to all that Vienna has to offer. We are 20 metres from the underground entrance which enables us to get on one of six underground routes and pop up anywhere we want in Vienna, meerkat style! 
Another thing that Vienna is famous for are its cafes or 'coffee houses' as they are better known. There are apparently 2141 of them! Today we visited Demels which first made their famous chocolate cakes and coffee in 1786. We only looked and the kids bought some chocolate for their mates. The bags they use are a work of art in themselves. We also bought a very small chocolate cake that comes in a wooden box and amazing wrappingto celebrate New Year! We did however queue up to have coffee and cake at the renown Cafe Central. This coffee house with its vaulted ceilings and baroque architecture is where other famous people like Beethoven, Trotsky and Freud drank coffee and no doubt debated and argued and set the world to rights, although obviously not with each other! Part of the joy in this trip is to be where others who have left their mark on our world have been before us. 
Now that we are staying in apartments rather than hotels we have missed the Internet - our portal to the rest of the world so cafes also give us free internet. Of course Cafe Central was a more expensive place than our usual coffee, hot chocolate and internet haunt -McDonalds. 
Vienna, like all other European cities also has its fair share of churches. We are beginning to be 'churched' out. However we did enjoy our exploration of St Stephansdom, a key focal point in the city. We enjoyed the magnificence and rich symbolism of the architectural features. We also ventured up the 343 steps of the 129 metre south tower. The steps only getting us 67 meters up. We took the lift up the north tower! Both of these towers gave magnificent panoramic views of Vienna, although we all agreed Salzburg had a more appealing vista perhaps due to being nestled into hills and being a much more compact city. The final part of the church visit was to the catacombs deep beneath the church. There we saw bones lying in the dirt, some still with the last remains of flesh on! We also saw in other rooms bones stacked neatly. Due to the thousands of bodies, as a result of a plague in the 18th century, there was a big shortage of space so the prisoners had to take the bodies out of the coffins, remove any remaining flesh from the bones, wash the bones and then stack them to make space for newcomers! Also in the catacombs are the coffins of archbishops and cardinals. Parts of the Habsburgs are there also. I say parts because three churches wanted to say that the Habsburgs last resting place was in their church. So in the St Stephansdom catacombs their organs are there, preserved in alcohol within containers,  while another church in the city has their hearts and another the remaining body parts. Maybe that's what they mean by Rest in Piece (s)!!!Anyway despite the gruesomeness it was fascinating at the same time. 
Tomorrow is New Year's Eve and Vienna is renown for its big street parties and concerts where 75,000 or more people hit the streets to bring in the new year. This year there will be 75,005! We will report on this adventure in our next blog. JT

The Salzburg Chapter

This was written on the 27th but have had trouble finding an internet connection.

We are on a train today which means it is a great time to let you all know what we have been up to in Salzburg.

Salzburg has been a lot warmer than the other cities we have been to so far. With temperatures ranging from 1 to 3 degrees, no snow fell while we were here but there was still a lot of snow around from previous snow falls.

Salzburg was run by Archbishops for centuries where they used the money from the Salzburg salt mines and local labour to build some incredible buildings. From the fortress you get a view of the city which takes your breath away. A maze of old buildings all the same height lining either side of the river which runs through town. The buildings built by the Archbishops stand out due to their size and grand gardens. The city is then flanked on either side by the fortress and monastery with the alps in the background. A postcard picture.

We went on two tours from Salzburg
The Salzburg Salt Mines:
This tour straddled Germany andAustria. We started off into Germany to see Hiltler's second command base which is just below the Eagles Nest (closed in winter). This command base has now been destroyed but you can see why Hilter build it here. It had views to die for over the alps and down into Austria.
We then came back into Austria and went to the Salt Mines which financed the Catholic church in Salzburg for centuries. It's hard to comprehend that a group whose key message is 'love thy neighbour' spent their time oppressing the poor and spending their money on extravagant buildings to protect themselves or enhance their personal lifestyles.
In the mine we dressed in white Oompa loompa suits, slid down slides which took you deeper into the mine, took a boat across the underwater salt lakes and even crossed between Austria and Germany while under the ground.

Sound of Music Tour:
Salzburg is the home of The Sound of Music, though Austrians are still coming to terms with this as the Sound of Music is not the real Von Trapp story and they have their own film which they prefer (and is historically correct).
Sound of Music Fact 1: If the Von Trapp family had actually gone over the mountains shown in the movie they would have ended up at the Eagles Nest in Germany, rather than Switzerland which is 400km away. Not the desired result!
We saw the Von Trapp's "film villa", the lake where they fell in the water when rowing, the gardens they danced through, the band rotunda where Leisel sang '16 going on 17' to Rolfe and the hills where Julie Andrews starts the movie off with the 'The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music'.
The tour finished by travelling through the Mountains to the Church in Mondsee where the wedding was filmed. The lakes and mountain scenery were amazing. Think of the lakes district around Queenstown with the mountains coming right down to the lake edge but several times bigger and lots more of them in one place.
Sound of Music Fact II: Salzburg has a population of 150,000 and the Sound of Music attracts 450,000 tourists every year.

The rest of our time in Salzburg we spent walking the streets soaking up the atmosphere and heritage. They had some great Christmas Markets with so many Christmas decorations and food. The Festung Hohensalzburg (the fortress) was great.We got to see how the Archbishops lived and the life of the people in their communities. The fortress tower gave you a 360 degree view of Salzburg. Stunning!

Salzburg is famous for being the birth place of Mozart. So we had a look at Mozart's home and his museum. Now we are off to where Mozart spend the later years of his life, Vienna.

BT

More photos

Well here are some more photos...we are not finding it that easy to load up the photos individually on the blog and to add comments...maybe another blogging expert could help us :)
Some of the new photos show where we are staying in Salzburg, in a traditional house at the back of a family hotel on the outskirts of Salzburg (A 15 minute bus ride into town and we are across the road from the bus stop so works well for us. The place has traditional Austrian wooden furniture and fittings and looks out onto farmlands that lie at the foothills of mountains (Also seen in photos). The photos of the bare trees are situated in the lane beside "our Salzburg home." There are some photos from our Sound of Music (the church, snow and lake scenes, the rotunda and lane where Maria sang " I Have Confidence...") and Salt Mine tours( that's us in the white outfits and also the wooden slides we went down under the ground 120 metres below the surface of the land!) Others are Salzburg both by day and night and scenes from our Christmas breakfast. You will have noticed that these blogs are being written by JT and BT and the photos are being taken by our own paparazzi -AT! We are working on GT and KT to get them to contribute in the blog!!! By the way if you know AT she is a prolific photographer -1605 at last count so we have just selected a few!

Here is the link below or use older photo blog to connect straight through to photos

http://photobucket.com/albums/ff460/jennyt123

Merry Christmas to our family and friends!
We are wondering after a week of snow whether there will be any on Christmas Day. We will be doing the Sound of Music tour on Christmas morning and we are looking for a place to go out for Christmas dinner. In Austria, Christmas Eve is their big night. The shops close at midday and people hurry home for their Christmas dinner. Despite all the excitement, the snow and the Christmas markets we have had this week,Christmas is about family. Lots of love to all our family and to our friends, we hope you all have a special day with your family.

Garmisch-Partenkirche - The Bavaria Adventure

We are sitting on a train at the Garmisch-Partenkirche station on our way to Saltzburg in Austria. I've throughly enjoy the two days that we have in Garmisch. 

Garmisch and Partenkirche are two towns which were joined together by Hitler to host the 1936 winter olympics. The towns are divided by a 1m wide river and sounds like it could be the setting to a Romeo and Juliet type village feud. It is situated on the border of Switzerland and Germany and to get there we traveled through Switzerland, Austria and Germany having to cross each border several times.

We spent the first night wandering through Garmisch town exploring the shops and the Christmas Markets which have everything from Christmas decorations to mulled wine and curry wurst.

Yesterday we were picked up by Thomas our German taxi driver/guide who showed us around this part of Bavaria for the day. Thomas was very knowledgable and most patient with us. The highlights of his tour were: 

Schloss Neuschwanstein - 
The castle of King Ludwig II or better known to those Disney fans out there as the castle which you see on the blue background at the the beginning of Disney movies. We approached the castle on horse and carriage winding up the hill as the snow was falling. The design of the castle is incredible, the inside is full of beautiful wall and ceiling paintings inspired by the operas of Wagner. Due to the King's death only 1/3 of the castle was ever finished and was opened to paying visitors within weeks of Ludwigs death.

Oberammergau -
 Is the home of the Passion play which is a telling of the story of Jesus'  life and death. This is performed every ten years by the people of Oberammergau due to a commitment to God made over 300 years ago. They vowed that they would perform the Passion play every ten years if God would end the plague. This he did and every the years since 1634 they have performed this play. The next one is in 2020. I'm not sure if the key message here is to be careful of what we promise God or the faithfulness with which they have carried out their vow. They also have a large woodcarving industry which dates back 500 years. The workmanship is unbelievable with shop after shop filled with woodcarvings with the most intricate detailing.

Ettal (Benedict Monastery) -
This is the home of a ornate old church, a boys boarding school, a university for boys and a brewery which produces Ettal beers and spirits.
On arrival I discovered the one of my heroes Dietrich Bonhoeffer had spend time here near the end of WWII and had involved members of Ettal in his plot to assassin Hitler (Vykarie). This  lead to his death days before the war ended. In lighting a prayer candle here you can only thank God for the strength of Bonhoeffer's character and belief to knowingly sacrifice his life for a cause greater than himself and a lifetime of work that has played a part in creating the world we live in today. And that we would have half his strength in the way we live our lives.

What just blew me away was the natural environment. There is snow as far as the eye can see broken up by leafless trees and giant mountains with shear drop offs along their faces. Rooves with 2-3 feet of snow on them and houses painted with Bavarian artwork and designs on the outside. This palace is awesome...  I've decided that if i ever have a winter home this is where it would be in a rugged natural environment steeped in history and culture.

BT

Reflection 1:
Travelling in planes is boring, tedious and crammed. The analogy of plane travel to a tin of sardines is apt. The only good thing about planes is getting off and arriving at somewhere you want to be. We travelled with Thai Airways to Bangkok and the service was very good and to be fair there was plenty of leg room even though we were in cattle class. We then flew Swiss Air. The plane was an airbus and we were squashed. 12 hours is a long time, especially when its the second lot of flying for 12 hours and the service is mediocre. We belong in cattle class on planes. Flying first class and business seems elusive to travellers like us...we can only dream!   However trains in Europe are another story. We are enjoying travelling first class for a few extra euro. We feel like royalty. There are even waiters who come offering anything you like off the menu, however our cattle class roots lie deep and we feel the need to turn their offers down and eat our ham and cheese rolls and a piece of christmas cake lovingly made by Granny. Who else would travel the world with 3 kg of fruit cake although it weighs decidely less each day! The trip out of Zurich on the SBB Railjet alongside Lake Zurichsee,where the rich and famous live,  was stunning and the landscape was thickly spread with freshly fallen snow. Through many Swiss towns and skirting along the sides of steep hillsides we oohed and aahed at the alpine villages as we headed to Garmisch and back again to Salzburg. The neatly stacked piles of wood at the back of every house continue to amaze us with their order and quantity. We wonder if this is where Heidi and her grandfather lived. This is the way to see the world! Reclining in our leather seats, postcard images of Switzerland, Bavaria and Austria flash past as we travel at 150km per hour make this journey seem surreal. In the end though it doesn't matter which class you travel...as long as you go to new and different places that stretch your worldview and open your eyes to new ways of thinking and help you to understand what lens you view the world through. JT

 "One's destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things.” – Henry Miller

Here are some of the photos from so far

Zurich
Well we wanted snow and we got it! As we emerged from Zurich international airport in -4C, the snow flakes started to flutter down in front of us...and it hasn't really stopped since. Snow in Zurich apparently is a rare occurrence happening only once or twice a year if you are lucky. And we are! We have walked Zurich for 2 days as snow has fallen, experiencing an amazing city of Christmas markets, expensive and extensive shops,winding narrow cobblestoned streets, quaint houses, efficient and punctual public transport and of course a rich history. 
Zurich is at the northern end of the Lake Zurichsee and the city is split by the River Limmat into 2sides, surprisingly called the Old and the New Town. We visited the Grossmunster cathedral, built in 1200 and also renown as the starting point of the Reformation in Switzerland. This is the church where the protestant preacher Zwingli spread his message on 'pray and work.' As a result of the reformation many of the church's embellishments that gave a wordly appearance were removed including pictures, altars, sculptures...even the organ! We also visited St Peterskirche that has Europe's largest clock face of 8.7metres diameter and also the Fraumunster, a 13thC church with amazing glass windows by Marc Chagall. 
But Zurich hasn't all been about church or history or markets!  We have eaten bratwurst sausages, Raclette cheese melted onto spuds or bread-yummy... and of course the ubiquitous cheap travellers' fare of cheese, ham and bread and bread, ham and cheese and...But the best bit of all is it does seem like it's the real Christmas here. The familiar Christmas trees, lights, carols, shops full of decorations and presents are the same as we know...the snow seems to make it feel like it's like that elusive Christmas we longed for depicted on those Christmas cards.
I am writing this from the warmth of our hotel room. While it is cold outside it hasn't worried us. Firstly, the inside of the houses are very warm and cosy, and secondly when we are outside we are putting to good use the thick coats, boots, woolly scarfs, hats, gloves and our many layers of merino that we seemed to spend ages collecting! It's been dark since 4.30pm, however outside the lights are twinkling and inviting so we are setting off to hear the singing Christmas tree (where children dressed in red hats and scarves, perched in a specially scaffolded tree sing carols) and see the Raclette vendor, who awaits our return!
JT

Outward Journey

Today is the start of the Famous Five Adventures. As with all adventures that are seeking out a white Christmas from New Zealand it started at the airport. While airports are the portal to the world they are also a giant waiting place. People waiting to go home, people waiting to explore the world, people waiting for loved ones arrive but everyone is waiting for something. 

As I'm writing this I'm also waiting. We are on our third flight and final flight on route to Zurich. So I'm waiting to touch down to start our adventures around Europe and open our eyes to a natural environment and depth of history that I don't think we can fully comprehend coming from a young country in the South Pacific where snow at Christmas is a thing of story books.

How have we got to this waiting place where we counting down the final four hours of our outward journey. This morning (Sunday 18th December) we left Christchurch after a great wedding for the 'J-Team' to make the trip back to Auckland to join the remainding two members of the Famous Five. We departed Auckland Airport at 3pm to start the journey to Bangkok. 12hrs later we arrive greeted by the bright lights that you would expect from a city of this size. After 2hrs of sleeping in the departure lounge we wandered blurry eye on to our final flight on this leg of the journey. At which point I can't remember to much more as I was sleep before take off. I now feel ready for this adventure to start but until we land in Zurich it is just a matter of waiting.

Waiting for the adventure to start, waiting to walk the Christmas markets, waiting to see the snow fall, waiting for new experiences to unfold.

BT

Getting Ready

It never really dawned on us the time it would take to find all the extra clothing we  need to experience this white Christmas. We have been busy sourcing merino tops and leggings, heavy winter coats, boots, hats, scarves and gloves. We have our itinerary sorted and each member of the famous five is a tour guide for part of the journey. We set off on December 18th, arriving in Zurich the next day. We are also staying in Garmisch, Salzburg, Vienna, Berlin, Rovaniemi (where Santa lives!), Munich and a day in Tokyo on the way home. This is our big adventure and we are starting to get excited!


“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” – Mark Twain