The Science Museum in Vienna has two floors, geologic and human history on the first and biology on the second. We concentrated on the first floor. Each room is extremely ornamented with sculptures and paintings around the very tall ceilings. There is much to see in the old-style cases, with well-done videos included near the walls. Here are a couple of pictures of the general display areas.
I like the European Science Museums. American Science Museums, I am sorry to say, are pretty seriously dumbed down: the assumption is that the audience consists basically of children who know NOTHING and have to have the basics explained, with plenty of room between displays for perspective, I guess. European Museums have displays that are much more compact, with much… much more. There are lots of interesting details, and especially interesting examples of things for those who have some background and can make the intellectual connections. The central museum area, much like the Smithsonian Mall, consists of a variety of extravagantly built structures, here centered around a huge statue of Empress Maria Theresa, the only female ruler of Austria during the regal period; she had 16 children, was on the throne for 40 years and pretty much established the governmental structure until the empire collapsed in 1918 with the end of WWI. The Museum of Natural History (Naturhistisches Museum) is the building beyond the statue.
This one is a reminder to us as an idea for accommodations on a return trip. Our motel this time is a nice one, right near the St. Stephans Cathedral, but pricey. We have tried our hand at finding a good cheap place from a distance, with mixed results. But we had to go a bit into the suburbs, beyond the Ringstrasse around the central area, to get to a English language theater to see the Star Wars Rouge One movie, and near there is this place, with another Pension (guesthouse) in the distance. Irish Pub nearby, which is a good sign. This is one metro stop – and the metro stops are very convenient, with all-day pass at 8 Euros – or an eight minute walk from the museum-quarter near the Maria Theresa statue, and three stops from Stephansplatz. Don’t know the cost or rooms but the location it good. Something to keep in mind for the next visit.
This location is on Kirckengasse near the corner with Mariahifer street, in amongst good architecture and shops, very near the Newbaugasse Metro stop on the U3 line.
While coming back from the concert that first night we ran into an older lady who had just arrived and found herself lost in the middle of Vienna with little idea where her hotel was. We walked the streets for some time before we got her situated. We met her again a couple of days later and had a good Austrian dinner of: fish and chips in the foreground (for me), kangaroo for Kate and an exotic mix for Eleni (here she holds a fried grasshopper) … I’m sorry, AUSTRALIAN dinner, at a local pub.
OK, a couple of pictures from the Technisches Museum in Vienna. The first is of the oldest (1841) existing railroad locomotive in mainland Europe (There are at least a couple of older locomotives in England, and a couple of more in the US). The second photo is an original Lilienthal glider; we previously saw one from Warsaw. I think there are six originals in existence, in Vienna, Warsaw, Moscow, London, Washington DC and I think one in poor condition in Munich.
As anyone who knows me knows, I love old technologies (old planes, trains, cars, phonographs, not to mention old irons). So a visit to the Technical Museum is on order. Here is the oldest locomotive (from 1841) in Mainland Europe, another Lilienthal glider, quite a collection of early (circa 1900) electric-powered automobiles and so forth. I will not bother you with the many early airplane pictures I took here, but will include the name of the museum café – Joules Café – that I hope my energy students will appreciate.
This is the concert hall we visited, not one of the bigger opera houses but still very fancy. Do you get the idea that I was more interested in the architecture than in the music? Kate took pictures of the cornices/corbels/moldings to inspire our carpenter in his work about our B&B and is now talking about a bigger chandelier in our dining room.
Vienna is the home of Strauss and where Mozart did much of his work. There are classical music concerts all over Vienna every night, with period costumed people aggressively working to sell tickets nearly everywhere. We planned to see a concert each night, but what we saw the first night was sort of a Strauss-Mozart hit-parade for tourists and we think the other venues would likely be much of the same tunes, so we did not go to any additional concerts. We did, however, patronize the many street musicians.
Not famous in Austria are kangaroos. However, you see this visual everywhere. Americans are famous for being geographically uneducated, and the American post office is apparently famous for sending mail addressed to Austria, to Australia. So this image is a widely known dig at the American fixation on their own rather than other cultures.
Two things tremendously famous in Austria, and all of Europe, that get very little play in the US at least to my ear and eye. One is the work of the artist Gustav Klimt, whose most famous work is “The Kiss” shown here (and photographed in the breakfast area of our hotel). You can buy this image on clocks, bags, umbrellas, fridge magnets and anything else in the souvenir shops. The other is the Olsen Wells movie “The Third Man,” filmed in Vienna. This is an immediately post-war sort-of detective movie that has a line – famous throughout Europe but which I don’t think I have ever heard quoted in the US – about war and peace and cuckoo clocks (I am sure you can find it quickly on youtube). We ate breakfast here yesterday with a Danish couple that were looking forward to a Third Man walking tour.