The World Wide Webb

Today I went to Sch ö nbrunn Palace, the summer home of the Habsburgs. It has 1441 rooms so, you know, just a small place for the holidays….. On arrival, you get a timed ticket for the palace, so I had about an hour before I could go in. I used that time to both find geocaches in the HUGE garden and also go into the maze. I got a bit scared when they said that children under the age of 14 can’t go into the maze without an adult, but I am pleased to report that I not only escaped the maze, but also still made it in time for my slot at the palace! The palace included a really good audioguide, which taught me lots that I did not know about the Habsburgs - such as the fact that it was a Habsburg who was the second wife of Napoleon, and mother of his son, and also the important fact that Empress Sisi had ankle length hair! Anyway, it was interesting, and there were lots of impressive rooms. It was then time for a break for dunch, before then exploring more of the gardens, including the pri...

It was an early start in order to get the underground to Donaupark Parkrun, one of only a handful of parkruns in Austria. The event team were really friendly, and the first timers’ briefing scored highly for both information and comedy value! It was impressive just how many places people had come from for this parkrun - there were obviously lots from the UK, but also runners from Australia, India, Denmark, Germany and Afghanistan. The run itself wasn’t one of my finest as I was not feeling it AT ALL, so really did have a park walk instead! Still, it was 5km more than I would have done if I had stayed in bed. As the parkrun was in the shadow of the Danube Tower, I thought it would be rude not to go up it whilst I was nearby! The views were great, and I very much enjoyed a pastry in the rotating restaurant too. I was a little self-conscious in my running kit still but no-one complained - at least not to me! Entertainingly, the restaurant gave an excellent view of the slide that goes outs...

I very much appreciated not having to set an alarm this morning, safe in the knowledge that hotel breakfast is served until 11am. I didn’t need it to go quite that late, but I did enjoy my lie-in. My plan was to start my tourist-y activities at St Stephen’s church, but I did get a bit distracted by shops on the way! When I did make it to St Stephen’s, it was a little overwhelming to be honest - there were SO many people, and so many different options of what you could pay to do and where you could go and when. I took a couple of photos and then scampered back outside. Once outside, I realised that there was an alternative option to the queue to go up the north tower in the lift - I could climb the 343 stairs of the south tower! This, I decided, was a much better idea. It was quite hard going in the heat, but it was nice and quiet and there were good views at the top. By the time I got down, I decided that I deserved an ice-cream. I then had a wander along Graben Street, doing lots of g...