Vienna Day 1 - Hotel Kaiserhof and the old town

July this year brought our Silver Wedding anniversary. We had talked about a party but as our friends and family are so wide spread we didn't think it would work. Instead Mirek suggested we take a trip to Vienna where we went on our honeymoon. So on the evening of our anniversary we drove down to Gatwick ready for an early morning flight. We stayed overnight in Crawley and after a brief delay the flight got us to Vienna midmorning. We were booked into the Kaiserhof hotel. It proved the perfect choice. Close enough to walk into town but far enough away to be very quiet. I think they put us in a honeymoon suite.

We had a lovely room with a huge canopy bed and soon after checking in they delivered champagne and fresh fruit. We couldn't have been happier. We spent a while settling in then walked into town to explore.

The hotel was close to Karlskirche which we passed everyday and took lots of photos of.

 I'd done a little bit of prior research on Jugendstil, the Austrian and German version of Art Nouveau and was interested in visiting some Jugendstil buildings. I wasn't disappointed. Close to Karlskirche on Karlsplatz are the famous pavilions by Otto Wagner.

Not too far away we found ourselves outside the Kursalon where we'd waltzed in 1985 and then in the Stadtpark which brought back many memories. The architecture there is beautiful and there is a famous Strauss monument.

There was live music as we walked through and the smells of traditional Austrian food. So we checked out the menu and went back to eat later after investigating the rest of the old town. Then we walked back in the twilight taking more pictures.

This is Karlskirche again. We have a print of it somewhere that we bought after visiting it on honeymoon. Mirek took pride in getting these twilight shots with his new camera. No apologies for all the photos of it included here as it featured heavily in our holiday. And yes, that is me in the picture (my best side!)