In 2024 we had all the trips planned since the beginning of the year. Among the advantages was that knowing the dates in advance, gave me the opportunity to invite other friends to come along with us. We ended up being a group of eleven. We didn’t do many things together. In fact, we only had one dinner together one evening. What I loved most about the trip was that I got the chance to walk and talk to close friends in the wonderful city that is Vienna and that it all turned out so good, given we were all in quite different phases of our lives. And we all enjoyed the many, many Christmas markets. For the first time in a long time, there isn’t much evidence of this trip, as it was too cold to take many pictures.
We had a hotel in Prater thanks to the mastermind of the trip, Alina. We were located in a nice place, close to the subway and had an interesting room, with the bed above the bathroom.
We walked to the city centre hunting tables in restaurants. We learned the first night that December is a busy time and people should just make reservations for dinner one month in advance if they all want to be sitting together in historic or iconic or known places. Otherwise, one will end up eating pizza or burgers, which was actually not bad at all.
The only iconic place we managed to get into after careful and strategic planning was Cafe Central where we went Sunday morning three minutes after opening time. Every day the lines were long and we decided to wake up early on the last day and try our luck at getting a table. It work great because we stayed in no queue and got coffee and Apfelstrudel right away. It was worth it to wake up early.
We visited three Christmas markets if I remember correctly, we ate at the Haus des Meeres which was sort of a rooftop restaurant, at a pizzeria in Prater which was run by Romanians, and at a place in the Prater park where food came on rollercoasters.
I didn’t have enough courage to ride the Free Fall Tower like in the autumn of 2023 or the Prater Turm which is something I still aim to do, but I rode the rollercoaster and that was fun.
The thing that I enjoyed most though is seeing the place where Stephan Zweig lives. He is one of my favourite writers and, as I still have readings to do to read all the books he wrote, I got inspired to plan my readings for the upcoming summer.
Make today count!