{"id":43912,"date":"2026-02-08T05:54:47","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T10:54:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/herrickhomepage.com\/wp\/?page_id=43912"},"modified":"2026-02-08T13:22:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T18:22:12","slug":"day-4-vienna-1-29-2026","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/herrickhomepage.com\/wp\/day-4-vienna-1-29-2026\/","title":{"rendered":"Day 4 Vienna 1-29-2026"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThis morning we left the hotel and went on to the subway to go downtown. Up we popped the Vienna Opera to find our guide. It was sprinkling and our guide had called in “sick”. Another lady directed us to a different lady who would take us around the city. Not too many photos today as it was dark and rainy. The city has so many museums! The Hofburg family built huge buildings all over. After the two hour tour we stopped in a small store and got lunch. They piled on 17 shrimp with light breading and fried. Beside it was a nice salad with vinaigrette dressing. In addition a drink, all for 15 euros.\n\nFor over 600 years the Vienna Hofburg was the residence of the Austrian sovereigns. Over the course of the centuries it developed into one of the most important centres of European history.\n\nIt was from here that the Habsburgs reigned from the 13th century, at first as rulers of the Austrian patrimonial lands, from 1452 as emperors of the Holy Roman Empire, and finally as emperors of Austria from 1806 until the end of the monarchy in 1918<\/strong>.\n\nOriginally a medieval fortified castle dating from the 13th century, the Hofburg was extended by each emperor. The sprawling, asymmetric complex which extends over 240,000 m\u00b2 (258,334 sq feet!) consists of 18 wings, 19 courtyards and 2,600 rooms in which nearly 5,000 people still work and live today.\n\nNext we went to the Sisi museum. Queen Elizabeth in the late 1700’s was called Sisi. She and her mother, her aunt, and her niece had goon to a party where her aunt wanted to introduce her niece to the prince. The prince immediately fell in love with Sisi. They stayed in love all her life. We spent two hours going through her rooms where she lived in the castle. It was really fun to see the rings she had attached to the top of the archway to the next room, in addition were her exercise equipment there and her bathroom with a huge tub! The toilet did not function any differently than todays! The whole mansion was amazing, large rooms with huge fireplaces that have no front access, the fire is in the back, they are huge 15 foot tall ceramic heaters!\n\nAs we were leaving I remembered that they have a riding school- Spanish Riding School Vienna – Famous Lipizzaner Show. We went over to the box office to see if we could at least see something. Nope, but Eileen has purchased tickets online to tomorrow’s exercise class!!\n\nAfter this we went back to the subway and walked to the hotel where we took a break.\nAbout 6PM we decided to take the subway to almost the equivalent of Disney World here in Vienna – note their spelling of Vienna is Wien.\nWe walked 19,850 steps today, another 9 1\/2 miles.\nThe hotel is right across from a grocery store so we get food for breakfast and dinner at times, a wrap or something, the breakfast here is $34, more than it is worth.

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Walking Tour<\/h2>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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This is the Albertina Museum<\/strong> in Vienna, and the statue above the great ramp is the equestrian monument of Archduke Albrecht<\/span><\/span><\/strong>.<\/p>

A few details you\u2019ll appreciate:<\/p>