Wiener Wasserleitungsweg

Apparently in Austria sometimes there are work outings, I suspect possibly just excuses to use spare department money for wine. Anyway, this year for the first time my department had one, where we went for a brief walk in the sun along the path named in the title of this post. After a short time we ended up in the picturesque and wine-filled town of Gumpoldskirchen to enjoy the fruits of its labours and tonnes of very fatty spreads on bread. This is what one does in Gumpoldskirchen.

After the wine drinking was over and everyone was setting out for the somewhat infrequent trains back to Vienna, I decided that I hadn't had enough of the Wasserleitungsweg, and headed off for another hour and a bit, walking through sunset and finally stopping when it was basically too dark to continue. I eventually blundered my way to a train station and went home, much refreshed.

Perhaps I should mention, the Wasserleitungsweg is a path along the slopes at the edge of the Vienna basin which follows the route of one of the large aqueducts that provide Vienna with its famous water. As you were perhaps aware, almost all viennese water is springwater from the alps, piped in two vast aqueducts towards Vienna, the first of which is 140 years old. It is 95km long and the water drops through 270m over its course, meaning that absolutely no pumping is required! The water from a spring in the vicinity of the Schneeberg in the alps delivers around 62 million cubic kilometers of water a year (just over 50% of all the water needed/used) according to the wikipedia article, which is only available in German.

As is traditional, please enjoy the photos I took of the sunset over the vineyards (which I persist in trying to call winegardens even in english nowadays) by clicking on a linky thing.

Der Tom

Todays PS highlights an absolutely incredible installment of NASA's image of the day feature, a photo shot by a crewmember on the international space station showing a view of storm clouds over the atlantic ocean. It is my current desktop, you shall see why!!!

Hochwasser

As you may or may not have gathered, the beginning of June saw a rather wet time for central and eastern Europe. Weeks of unseasonal rain swelled rivers to bursting in Germany, the Czech Republic, Austria, Hungary and many other countries. For inhabitants of many towns, cities and villages, this was a stressful, expensive and for a few even deadly time. I say this as I don't want to make light of all the damage done by the floods in the rest of this post, but as many know, the natural world in excess can be beautiful as well as dangerous.

The swirling floodwaters

The reason that allowed me as an inhabitant of Vienna to spend my time gawking and the high waters rather than worrying for my house is Vienna's rather effective flood defence system. In the 70s a whole second channel for the Danube was dug out, the material excavated from this was then used to build an island separating the new and old channels. The new channel, Neue Donau or new Danube, is usually sealed off from the Danube proper by large gates, making it still water and incidentally the only bit of the Danube that is even remotely blue. Together with the 20+ km Danube island, the new Danube spends most of its time being a much loved recreational area of Vienna, affording opportunities to swim, jog, relax, bike, eat pizza or whatever your heart desires, all in easy reach of the main city but somehow a million miles away.

When the floodwaters appear, the gates are opened and the second channel comes into use. With an almost doubled cross section, the Danube can handle much faster and more voluminous flows without breaking its banks. The gates were indeed opened during the most recent flooding, and like a number of Viennese I went out to take a look at our favourite recreational destination being used for its most important purpose! The danube islan and new danube are without a doubt one of the most effective and thoughtful pieces of town planning I know of, and a great example to the world's cities of how to improve and protect yourself at the same time!

The photos I took of this undeniably rather impressive phenomenon can be found as usual by clicking on a link.

Der Tom

BONUS FINNISH FACT: The finnish word for 'world', 'maailma', is an ancient compound of the words for 'earth'/'ground' (maa) and the word for 'air' (ilma)

Hainburg an der Donau

I am an occasional member of a group of likeminded and extremely international people who like to go for a walk on a Sunday, sometimes this will be an actual 8 hour hike, sometimes a tiny stroll with a bit of culture thrown in. This is the advantage of doing things with non-natives, they are a lot more willing to go see the sights, and/or go see if there are any sights to be seen!

The castle at Hainburg, beneficiary of Richard the Lionheart's misfortune

The Sunday we went to Hainburg was one of those Sundays more tourism than hiking tour. Hainburg an der Donau is a town of about 6000 people situated right next to the danube (the clue is in the name!). It has quite a lot to recommend it, touristically speaking. The town centre is still surrounded by high walls built originally in the 13th century, and these are broken only by some rather large medieval gatehouses, one of which houses the comprehensive town museum. Atop the hill above the town is the castle (Burg) alluded to in another part of the name, the destination for our mild stroll. A real proper castle ruin, not a prettified villa or folly, the castle was expanded and improved substantially using the ransom money England paid to get back Richard the Lionheart! Near to the town proper lies the important Roman crossroads settlement of Carnuntum, and the town also includes a museum featuring a number of roman artefacts (and on the day we arrived, some kind of archaeological conference).

Above, one of the medieval town gatehouses!

Hainburg is also almost directly on the border with Slovakia, and is closer to Bratislava than Vienna. From the castle walls Bratislava can be recognised by some of its more famous sights such as the castle. The train line to Bratislava used to run past Hainburg but now the main line runs somewhere else due to a cocktail of historical circumstances, the modern train service runs on only one line and the stations are tiny... The same S-Bahn that terminates after Hainburg goes past the airport, so the train starts out packed and then very quickly empties as you travel across the dead flat of the Vienna basin towards the widely visible hill behind the town. Geologically speaking these hills mark the edge of the Vienna basin, the very end of one little outlier of the alps and, over the river, the start of the slovakian tatras.


Hope you enjoy the small gallery of images, showing a more typical small austrian town instead of the overgrown and beautiful monster metropolis (hah) that is Vienna.

Der Tom

PS stay tuned for a couple more updates soon, I have already sorted and uploaded pictures for them which is always the slowest task, so I should get round to writing about them shortly.

Tom in Wien and the Land of the Changeable Weather

A long time ago, in a galaxy that just so happens to be the same one we are in now, I decided to go on holiday to the good old United Kingdom! Such a trip is fraught with dangers, mostly the danger that the required scheduling is so monstrously complicated that it grows into a hideous multi-headed creature and eats you. This did not however occur, though somehow my meticulously forged itinerary does still make me a bit uneasy. I remember a time when one didn't have to be organised! I guess that was a time before I had just under two weeks to try and visit as many friends and family as possible while they were scattered across the country and leading busy lives...

The whole trip was something of a whirlwind, in 12 days I visited 7 different places and saw goodness knows how many people, but many were still left out. I regret each and every one but unfortunately unlimited time was not in my possession.

Exeter cathedral

I'll keep the actual itinerary recount brief, as a lot of the time what I was there for were the people, not the places! But there were some new things. A lot of time was spent in London, from which I made day excursions to Oxford (which never changes, actually met a french girl who studied decadence, albeit the literary movement epitomised by Oscar Wilde et al), and Milton Keynes (not half as bad if you go there for a conference about space things). I also made a longer excursion to Exeter, my sister's university town. As well as putting a face to her life and anecdotes of the last years, this afforded an excellent opportunity to be a real proper tourist in my own country. Seen through Austrian eyes, there is a lot to like about the historical towns and cities of Britain!

New College Oxford. What a lawn.

My biggest trip by far was via Ediburgh and Glasgow (briefly) to team up with my friend Gavia for a crazy, spontaneous trip to Orkney! Just off the tip of John 'O Groats this archipelago is chock full of history and scenery and being an island and very northern represents a combination of two of my favourite things! After a train journey to Aberdeen and a short plane hop we had a very enjoyable time, albeit less than 72 hours I think... The scottish weather threw up the usual mix of sun, rain and dramatic clouds which meshed nicely with the 5000+ year old monuments, Viking runes, Viking cathedrals and tasty foods/whisky on offer.

An island in Orkney

Britain is pretty great for a holiday y'all! You should, like, go sometime. A very abbreviated set of photos of my travels can be found by carrying out the usual operation.

Der Tom

PS possibly incomplete list of British foods eaten: fish and chips, curry, boiled beef + english mustard in a bun, devon pasty, victoria sponge, haggis (stuffed in a chicken), cullen skink + oatcakes.

Tom in Wien and the Visit of the Parents

Occasionally, people just plain can't believe what I write on this blog and have to come and see for themselves what's going on here. Of course many of them claim they have come to see me, but am I better than Vienna? We may never know, but for sure the best thing is the combination of us both!

My parents had been to Wien before, so I could dig into some slightly less conventional/ extra tourist attractions in addition to the general Innenstadt/ Kaffeehaeuser/ Brauerei round that I tend to base my initial introduction to Vienna tours on (of course due to the variety available here, I can and do amend this itinerary regularly. Book your places now!).

Among other things we finally got to the (conjoined!) arms and armour museum and the old musical instruments collection. Favourite instrument (you can use handsets to listen to them being played) was definitely the 'Viola de Gamba', at the time called just the 'Viola' as our modern version wasn't so popular. They look beautiful with their strange dropped shoulders and sound great, a differently tuned cello with way more strings. Check one out below!

Among the other things on the itinerary was a trip to the area of the Bisamberg, where we accidentally found an entire wine festival in progress! Result.

And having promised wildlife, I was extremely gratified to find that the Lainzer Tiergarten offered up excellent views of wild boar, a black woodpecker, a slow worm and another queen ant!! Photos of most of these are found in the album accompanying this post, mixed in with a few of the blue and distant hills of the Wienerwald because who doesn't want to look at that???

Der Tom

Quick Trip to Linz

If there is one way in which I approximate almost exactly a native viennese person, it is this: I barely ever leave Vienna. Oh, sure, I go for hikes outside the city limits, but when it comes to actually visiting other areas of the country I have an absolutely terrible record. In a cumulative two and a half years I have been to a few mountainous regions but of the major cities and towns of Austria I have seen very little. I went to Graz for the weekend once, and I have changed trains in Salzburg...

This kind of laziness is exactly why people outside the capital think Viennese people are selfish idiots. Linz is the 3rd largest city in Austria with just under 200,000 inhabitants (dependant, as always, on where one decides the city stops) and is also only about an hour and a quarter from Vienna. Of course, till last month I had never been. As a schoolfriend of mine was also crazy enough (sensible enough?) to move to Austria and now lives in Linz, I finally took the chance of a free day off for the 1st of May to check it out.

To be honest, I did almost no official tourist stuff, but perhaps that allowed me to get a more natural picture of Linz life anyway. The one exception was a trip to the big beer festival/ fairground of the Urfahranermarkt, where I inadvisedly went on a ride and spent the rest of the evening feeling like I had drunk 3 pints of beer despite being sober...

The contrasts with Vienna aren't very strong architecturally, it's Austria so evereything looks amazing, the differences come with the more relaxed, small town atmosphere. If you walk down Linz's main street or go out to the bars, you will meet people you know. I imagine this to be both a curse and a blessing.

Of course, a smaller city means it is even easier to get out into the surrounding countryside, which we took full advantage of. Back in May, it seemed like the lovely weather would stay forever...

I had great fun in Linz, and hopefully I'll be back again! Here's the few photos I managed to get.

Der Tom

The in between spaces of central Vienna

Today's small batch of pictures were taken on a couple of occasions in late April and as such I was a little lost for a theme to put to the accompanying blog post. However eventually something has popped into my Saturday-addled consciousness. Lucky you, internet!

All the photos today were taken in the green/blue spaces of Vienna, but unlike a lot of recent things I have posted, they are all places that can be reached almost instantly in the middle of the City.

The Donaukanal branches off the regulated Danube proper and passes right by the first district before meandering back off to join the main river. At the point where it passes some of the poshest and most elegant of Vienna's architecture it forms a sort of trench between the 19th century plaster la-di-da buildings. The concrete walls of this trench are full to bursting with fantastic graffiti, like taking a part of the south bank and stretching it out a loooong way. Stepping down from street level to this park/walkway/canal/art gallery, in summer encrusted with several 'beach' theme bars and deckchairs, is an excellent thing to do if and when the Habsburg atmosphere of the city centre is starting to get you down!

As for the rest of the photos, we have a buch of my absolute favourite building in Vienna, the Nazi-built flak tower in the Augarten. This *thing* looms ominously out over the second district, clashing rather with the surroundings. Encountering it in the leafy, relaxed Augarten with oblivious children playing underneath it can really give you the feeling that this is some kind of a propped open time rift back to 1945, if only you would dare to climb over the rusting fences...

I guess the tenuous point of this rather waffly post is to sing the praises of all the parks and squares of Vienna (or heck, any city really) that are stuck in between the bits of the city you see every day, and in which you can pause to contemplate or merely change your suroundings utterly with a short walk.

Here's your link, hope to see you round here again soon.

Der Tom

This post brought to you by the objective fact that The Mountain Goats are the best band ever.