come take a walk with me

As you probably know by now, I work in Vienna but I don't live there. I live about 40 minute drive away, in a small town in the very flat very beautiful east of Austria. So I commute to work by train every day, which isn't really bad, once you get used to it, because it gives me plenty of reading time. Well, not plenty, as there is no such thing as enough time for reading, but it gives me more time as I did have when I commuted by car. 

Anyway. We had our Christmas party last week. It was very simple and laid back. There are just 15 people in my office and we all went to have dinner at a nice Italian restaurant in the city centre of Vienna. Because my last train went at 9 and we just met at 7, I decided to stay at a friend. She has her home just a 20 minute walk away from the city centre. 

So I walked there after our christmas party and walked back to work the next day. And now you probably get the title of the post. 

I took some photos when I walked around in the evening of the beautiful christmas lights that are hanging everywhere in the first district of Vienna and I took even more photos when I went to work early in the morning, wandering along the Danube river, watching the sun rising. 

Now I'm not really a city girl, I prefer the countryside over living in a big city with way too many people crammed in way to little space, but I have to admit, Vienna got me this time. But enough talk from myself. I rather let the pictures speak. And I know the quality of the photos isn't the best, but I just snapped them on my phone as I didn't really plan to see all those beautiful things. So please enjoy them, even if they are a little blurry.

Let's start our walk from my office. This is the street that I walk to and from the tube station everyday. I love, how the light just hangs there. 

I pass the back of St.Stephens Cathedral. There's a little Christmas market right now. I'm going to visit it tomorrow with some friends. 

This is my favourite. It's the "Rotenturmstraße" which means something like "red tower street"! Hence the massive overflow of red. 

These actually dim and light up from time to time. I actually had to wait a while for them to be bright enough to take a picture! 

And that's the famous "Graben"! It's a popular shopping area, if you have the necessary money to go shopping at Gucci and Prada. 

 

And last but not least - St.Stephen's Cathedral. Beautiful, isn't it? 

But let's fast forward. I had my Christmas party, I went to sleep, I got up again and made my way back to work. No need for morw words here! 

Hope you enjoyed my massive photo overload. I love the last one, where the sunlight reflects on the roof of the cathedral. 

Wish you happy pre-Christmas days! Do you have all your presents, yet? I got the present thing covered but am more nervous about our production this year. Just 11 more days until the premiere! Wish me luck! 

a rare sight in Vienna

I slept really bad last night. At first I had problems with falling asleep in the first place. Our neighbour had an argument with another woman, whoever that was. They screamed. They laughed. The chatted. And then they screamed again. Eventually I fell asleep. Only to wake up two hours later as rain was pouring through the open window in our roof. Too bad that our bed is right underneath it. I closed the window. I went back to sleep. Only to wake up three hours later. Don't know why. Had troubles falling back asleep.

At 5:30 in the morning I had enough and got up. I had breakfast, took a shower, drank two coffees (and many more to come that day) and decided to drive to work early. Starting early means leaving early. And so I was in the city centre of Vienna at the ungodly hour of 7:30 a.m. I'm sure that's a time where a lot of city-folks go to sleep!!! Anyway. When I get out of the subway I stand in the middle of the square in front of St.Stephens Cathedral, probably the town's most famous landmark. And it looked like this:

the square in the morning. And it has been raining for three days straight. hence the loomy picture.

Absolutely deserted! I have never seen it this way. I usually go to work at 9, where a lot more people are around. People on their way to work, people going to the bakery, buying breakfast, the early-bird tourists that want to visit the cathedral before it is stormed by hundreds and hundreds of people who want to tick it off their sightseeing list.

the cathedral's entrance

Just look at this place. There's no one. There are no horses. Usually at this place there is a line of carriages, called "Fiaker" which have the one and only purpose to drive the masses of tourists around the famours "Ringstraße". 

walking without stepping into ... well ... "manure" the horses left behind..

When I got out of the office 8 hours later, everything went back to normal. People. Tourists. Horses. It was loud and hectic and smelly. 

I have to admit, I preferred the early-morning-version. Just because you rarely get to see that.

the cathedral. just for you to admire.

left tower

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