Donau

It’s been, like, three whole days since my last post. This probably seems like a long stretch to people who’ve gotten used to my post a day thing, but I can’t exactly keep that pace up now that I’m back in the Real World.1 If I were to hazard a guess, one a week is going to be more realistic an expectation to have.2
Administrative stuff out of the way, though, because it’s time to see some of Vienna. It’s a pretty city, folks! I saw a really cool library the other day, but no pictures for you because I didn’t plan on going there and thus didn’t bring my camera.3
Okay, I’m done teasing you. Today, Anna and I headed out towards the end of the U14 to explore the parks around the Danube.5
It actually took us a while to get started – we were planning to meet at the Donau Zentrum which we were assuming was a park – “Danube Center,” right? But no, it was actually a sprawling mall complex like half a mile from the river. Whoops. Next time we’re meeting at the metro station.
But once we got to the river, hoo boy, was it pretty.

Seriously, look at that skyline:

As it turns out, that’s actually the wrong side of the canal6 for the parks, so we found a bridge with a pedestrian section7 and headed over.
We found some nice Public Art that led to us talking about The Iron Giant for a while.8 Have you seen it? If you haven’t, go watch it.9

And, of course, a cool fountain. What’s a park without some kind of cool fountain?10

Now, did you notice the tower in the last picture? Here’s a better one:

Much like the Space Needle, there’s a restaurant up there. Kinda pricey for us broke college kids, though. But hey, they thought of that, so there’s a nice little observation deck. Bungee jumping optional.11

One thing I’ve been enjoying is how vehement their “don’t do this” signs are. It’s really more of a “do NOT” than a “don’t,” to be honest.

And I’ve gotta say, the couple Euro to get up onto the observation deck is a much cheaper way of getting cool aerial photos than the average drone.

Oh, and the actual elevator? It had a glass ceiling. Which, being your stereotypical boy, I found fascinating.

From there, we headed further into the park. There was this nice little grotto12 that we found, right by the freeway.13

All of the paths through the park were pretty, as well.

Leaving the park took a bit more effort – we took a weird way out that included a bunch of strange bridges to nowhere. It took some parkour to escape from those onto an actual pathway.

But oh, that architecture is cool up close.

And then we were on the other side of the island, heading across a bridge back to the main body of the city. And what do you do on bridges? Take pictures of one of the prettiest rivers in Europe, of course.

Read: classes have started up in full force. ↩

Mostly because one of our classes, a “cultural history of Austria/Vienna” sort of thing, includes a once-a-week trip to somewhere around Vienna. ↩

I would’ve been allowed to take pictures, though – they had a ‘photos okay but no flash’ rule that made me deeply happy inside. ↩

Vienna has a great public transit system; I’m a big fan of the U-Bahn, their metro/subway system. I’ve been favoring ‘metro’ as the term for it, because in a few places (like the end of the U1 where we were) are actually above ground. ↩

‘Donau’ being the local term for ‘Danube,’ of course. ↩

Or river? I’m not sure which is which. That’s one of those things that Google Maps could probably tell me, but where’s the fun in that? ↩

Anna rejected my “climb up onto the metro bridge and just run across between trains” plan. Probably for the best. ↩

The deleted scene sort of thing they put back in for the recent theatrical re-release? I’m a big fan. ↩

Anna ↩

“Very Frank Lloyd Wright” – Anna ↩

I’m kidding, the bungee jumping is much more expensive. And our insurance would murder us. And then not give our families the insurance money. ↩

Well, it looked nice. Up close it featured some trash, a discarded baseball cap, an empty bottle of wine, and a torn-open condom wrapper. Classy. ↩

Autobahn? Whatever. ↩