So today we're going to Schoenbrunn (beautiful well) palace. Schoenbrunn was the summer, and sometimes not summer, palace for the Habsburg's in Vienna and regarded as one of the most beautiful in the world.
We begin our journey at my local U-Bahn station. I am VERY impressed with the U-Bahn here in Vienna - they seem to be so much more clean compared to Berlin's, but we'll see....
Here is the inside....looking good, eh Riz?...
So I have found that sometimes when you go places, you can 'cheat', i.e. not have to walk UP the hill that the castle-thing is located on. I took a bus up the hill and visited the cemetery right behind the palace grounds.
Any fans of earlier blogs will know that I like graveyards - they are peaceful....
The graveyard gave way to a huge 'natural-style' park. It was nice to be out in nature. I will say it: I like Berlin a lot better than Vienna in that Berlin had WAY more 'green areas'/parks/etc., all around. Vienna is like buildings, buildings, buildings then a HUGE PARK, then buildings, buildings, buildings. Berlin is more, some buildings, small park, some buildings, big park, a few buildings, 2 small parks....
In other words, I was grateful to be in the green again!
And there she be! I LUV EET! Schoenbrunn palace and Vienna at your feet! Love, love the view!
This is the Gloriette. It stands on top of the hill and was built in 1775 as a festival hall and breakfast 'room'.
Here is the inside of the 'breakfast room' - royalty is so funny how dimensions change for them. This is a 'breakfast room'....
But I think it's cool that they have a cafe here. You can make your way up the hill (or if you're smart, cheat and take the bus) and then enjoy something whilst overlooking Vienna and the palace...
Here is one of the pathways near the Gloriette. You can look down and see Karlskirche (Charles's Church from previous post)...
I live just to the west 'out' of this picture - in other words, that building to the far left of the picture, is just a bit from where I live...
Oh little glory (Gloriette), how beautiful you are!
Shazam! Lookin good! Schoenbrunn Palace was the summer palace of the Habsburg's. Begun in 1696, it was added to and added to....
'Nicht schlecht' (not bad) for a summer home, eh? LOL
Here is looking through the waterfall of the fountain at the end of the gardens....
The fountain...
I love how they 'sculpture' the trees...this is my favorite kind of nature...'organized nature', it just seems so beautiful and controlled....
Looking from the back of the palace up at the Gloriette - how would you like to wake up to that every day? ;)
A garden on the left side of the palace...
Luv eet!
Ok...and this is where I think we 'fail'...it's ok...looks ok...but it's not extraordinary. I felt the same way about Versailles - the inside was beautiful, but the outside was like this 'lump'. So I will give a 'fail' to the outside of Schoenbrunn as well - we could have done a lot better ;) But I love the Gloriette and I love your gardens, so don't be too angry at me ;)
Crossing the street to get a last 'big' picture of Schoenbrunn palace I saw these on the road. It made me laugh, 'it's the Berlin wall!' (any fans of the blog will know that in Berlin anywhere you see a line of two-stones like this, it means that the Berlin wall was there....LOL)...
And...THE END! Nice 'summer cottage' Habsburg's...as always royalty's understanding of life seems way skewed! :)
