Fountain on the Austrian Parliament Building, Vienna, Austria
So it seems I cannot keep a regular posting schedule for the whole year. For a bunch of reasons, most of them of my own doing, I keep having some gaps on my content creation, which is one of the areas I'm trying to improve. Since the last post we have travelled to Rome, more on that later, started planning next year's big trip to the other side of the world and also gearing up to the Iceland trip next June.
Horse carriage under Hofburg Palace, Vienna, Austria
This week is the last post dedicated to the wonderful city of Vienna, and I'll leave you with a mixture of images that depict the great architecture found within the city. The top image depicts one of the many horse driven carriages that delight tourists as it takes them sightseeing across Vienna. Oddly, the trip passes through the inside of the Hofburg Palace, on an internal road that crosses the palace under a great domed ceiling shown below.
Ceiling of the Hofburg Palace, Vienna, Austria
Neue Burg Palace entry from the Burggarten, Vienna, Austria
Visiting Vienna during Easter is a bit of a gamble in terms of weather. This photo of the Neue Burg Palace taken on the first day there shows that temperatures were a bit cold, people are wearing heavy coats, and a bit of sunshine would make the sky a bit more interesting. On the other hand, it does capture the mood of a city in the centre of Europe during the colder months, and also made this nice park less appealing to most tourists. Also had to do a bit of work post-processing to remove scaffolding from part of the facade, as it was going through renovations. That is one of the most complicated things to deal with when doing travel photography. You can't just wait until the scaffolding comes down and take the picture then. So some monuments and vistas you must give up on, in Vienna this time I just didn't photograph the St. Stephan Cathedral in Stephansplatz because it was mostly covered by the works being done.
Ankeruhr, Vienna, Austria
One of the most interesting clocks I've found during my travels is the one picture above, located at the Hoher Markt. This beautiful art-deco clock planted on the walls was created by Franz Von Matsch in 1911 and was commissioned by the Anker (Anchor) Insurance Co. At noon, this clock draws masses of tourists as it pipes out organ music and hauls historic figures round the clock.
Wiener Pestsäule, Plague Column on Graben Street, Vienna, Austria
One of the most well known sculptural pieces of art in the city of Vienna, is this strangely named Pestsäule, or in English, the Plague Column. Although also commonly known as the Dreifaltigkeitssäule (English: Trinity Column). n 1679, Vienna was visited by one of the last big plague epidemics. Fleeing the city, the Habsburg emperor Leopold I vowed to erect a mercy column if the epidemic would end. In the same year, a provisional wooden column made by Johann Frühwirth. The column was inaugurated in 1693, after more than 10 years after is was originally commissioned.
The streets of the city centre are filled with impressive buildings and sculptures, and you can fill a very long book just with pictures of them. But since this series of posts must come to an end, lot's more cities and places to show, I selected these two to finish it. On the right is a great example of the ornamental work done on the buildings with statues being added to the facade, both at street level and above. And on the right is another view of the gothic masterpiece that is the Vienna City Hall.
Detail of building in the corner of Bognergasse and Tuchlauben, Vienna, Austria
Rathaus through the park, Vienna's City Hall, Vienna, Austria
With the end of the series dedicated to Vienna, next I'll be focusing on a small set of posts about the city of York and it's Railway Museum. Before that I'll publish a post with the first impressions of Rome, and the dailies I published during our stay there.
Until then,
Keep wandering, keep looking...