Vienna trip, part 2
Feb. 26th, 2007 12:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
winterFirm resolutions about writing a proper travelogue have fled in the face of work and a crippling headache that kept me in bed for most of Saturday and Sunday. I'm hoping a slew of pictures and captions will do instead :) In this part, the first days in Vienna and the Opera House.
As I mentioned, the Pension Am Lerchenfeld was a lovely place. The view from the window was very pleasant, with an old church and the prettiest train tracks I've ever seen.
On Sunday, we took a long walk through Josefstadt to see how much it really was on foot to the city centre. Definitely not the 10 minutes advertised - that turned out to be the time if you took the J tram instead. But we did end up seeing the spectacular old city hall, and taking the first of my pictures of mutant Austrian poultry.
Because of the Opera Ball being that week, the Staatsoper was closed for three days and we didn't end up taking in a show there - we opted for Fledermaus at the Volksoper and it was a brilliant production - but we did manage to take a tour that stunned me. The opera house was damaged during the war, but the front remains original, including the Imperial tea room, with decorations that are a ready-made film set.
The frescos in the hallways along the front and decorations of the rooms next to the balcony over the entrance are also original. The impressive chandelier used to be gas-powered and still has all the relevant pipes and levers.
Demolished parts, like the buffet room, were redecorated in the fifties after they were rebuilt. The Austrians seem to be very proud of their modernism, but all in all, after the nineteenth-century elegant opulence, this room looked somewhere between drab and dreadful:
I much preferred the old front staircase, perfect for running down it.
I was under-impressed by the auditiorium, but stunned by the backstage we managed to sneak into. The stage and side stages take up almost a football stadium's worth of room, some 15 meters above, below and to the sides of the part of the stage visible during the show. It's a pity it was too dark to take proper photos that'd show exactly how much room there was.
And at least I got a good pic of the auditorium itself from the stage :) The decorations are too simple for me, I'm afraid. I like my opera houses like I like my operas: dramatic and so much over the top, you feel like flying.
Coming up next: Viennese churches, or why I need an image stabiliser on my camera.
As I mentioned, the Pension Am Lerchenfeld was a lovely place. The view from the window was very pleasant, with an old church and the prettiest train tracks I've ever seen.
On Sunday, we took a long walk through Josefstadt to see how much it really was on foot to the city centre. Definitely not the 10 minutes advertised - that turned out to be the time if you took the J tram instead. But we did end up seeing the spectacular old city hall, and taking the first of my pictures of mutant Austrian poultry.
Because of the Opera Ball being that week, the Staatsoper was closed for three days and we didn't end up taking in a show there - we opted for Fledermaus at the Volksoper and it was a brilliant production - but we did manage to take a tour that stunned me. The opera house was damaged during the war, but the front remains original, including the Imperial tea room, with decorations that are a ready-made film set.
The frescos in the hallways along the front and decorations of the rooms next to the balcony over the entrance are also original. The impressive chandelier used to be gas-powered and still has all the relevant pipes and levers.
Demolished parts, like the buffet room, were redecorated in the fifties after they were rebuilt. The Austrians seem to be very proud of their modernism, but all in all, after the nineteenth-century elegant opulence, this room looked somewhere between drab and dreadful:
I much preferred the old front staircase, perfect for running down it.
I was under-impressed by the auditiorium, but stunned by the backstage we managed to sneak into. The stage and side stages take up almost a football stadium's worth of room, some 15 meters above, below and to the sides of the part of the stage visible during the show. It's a pity it was too dark to take proper photos that'd show exactly how much room there was.
And at least I got a good pic of the auditorium itself from the stage :) The decorations are too simple for me, I'm afraid. I like my opera houses like I like my operas: dramatic and so much over the top, you feel like flying.
Coming up next: Viennese churches, or why I need an image stabiliser on my camera.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
Re: Thanks for the pics.............
Date: 2007-03-01 02:32 am (UTC)