2016/05 Europe cruise - Schönbrunn |
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Thursday May 19th
We were still in Vienna, and it was sunny and warm. There was no included tour on that day, and the only optional tour we fancied was the afternoon bus trip to Schönbrunn Palace on the other side of Vienna. I’ve been there once before and found it hard to believe that anyone could see the palace and the extensive gardens in just an afternoon, so we were going to get there by U-bahn and spend the whole day there.
We bought “classic passes” which gave us access to the Franz Josef rooms and the Maria Theresa rooms, the Orangery and Privy gardens, the maze and the Gloriette, whatever that was. That seemed enough for one day, especially as access to the main garden is free.
I’d read up on my Habsburg history so I had some idea about what this all meant. The Habsburg dynasty ruled the Holy Roman Empire for three hundred years and family members were kings and queens of most European countries. Inbreeding finished them off in the 1700s, the Spanish branch first and then the Austrian: Maria Theresa was the last Habsburg empress. She married Francis I of Lorraine and founded the Habsburg-Lorraine dynasty. They had 16 children, including two Holy Roman Emperors and the future queens of Sicily and France (Marie Antoinette), earning her the title of Europe’s Mother-in-law.
Napoleon finished off the Holy Roman Empire but the dynasty continued as Emperors of Austria. The most significant was her great great grandson Franz
Josef who reigned until his death in 1916. He seems to have been a conscientious monarch and a hard worker, but his reign was not happy. His son Rudolf committed suicide, his wife Sisi was assassinated, and so was his nephew and heir Ferdinand, triggering World War I. Karl, his great nephew reigned for two years until the monarchy was abolished.
For our tour of the palace we had audio guides, so we could go at our own pace, sometimes replaying the audio and staying out of the crowds. No photos were allowed, so these are from the palace’s web site. Franz Josef’s rooms range from richly furnished public reception rooms to his almost Spartan private study. He believed in processing his paperwork and began his work at 5 am.
The rooms restored to the time of Maria Theresa are more extravagant, from the magnificent Great Gallery through to the themed reception rooms, like the lacquer and millions rooms. There are also many, many paintings of her enormous family. These paintings were important when negotiating strategic marriages for her daughters, not that they had any say in it.
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Schönbrunn Palace - Orangery & Privy Gdn |
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We had lunch at the Café Residenz, wiener schnitzel of course, and then we set off for the gardens. The orangery is an enormous building, designed to over-winter tender palms and fruit trees, like orange, lemon, fig, and date. The orangery has a wall of windows facing south and an underfloor heating system, another hypocaust. It is still in use though all the plants were outside in May. On show was one of the ancient machines used to pick up entire trees and their pots and trundle them inside.
The privy garden was laid out in an embroidery pattern; still being weeded and planted by an army of gardeners, perhaps a similar 
scene to hundreds of years ago. Surrounding it is a horseshoe shaped pergola, a shady walk.
The main gardens are also formal, but the view was interrupted by cables and gantries and power cabinets; the 
grounds were being prepared for an open air concert.
These jackdaws were everywhere, eager to join family picnics.
Behind the work for the concert was the Neptune fountain, a water park for the gods.
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Schönbrunn fountains (0.36) |
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High above us at the top of Schönbrunn Hill was an enormous arch; this was the Gloriette, reportedly celebrating the “just wars” of Maria Theresa. 
Our passes included a trip up the stairs to the top of the Gloriette for a spectacular view over the garden and palace and distant city. The hills in the far distance are the Vienna Woods, made famous by local boy Johann Strauss.
It’s not very often you get to be in the midst of such a sculpture, so we took lots of pictures including this close up of the perched eagle and the view between the columns.
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Schönbrunn Palace - Garden & Gloriette |
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There were more flowers than I have room for but these were the most unusual, bicoloured peonies, I think.
We skipped the maze just in case we got lost for too long. It had been a good day. We made our way back to the boat through more rush hour crush; we were luckier than the boat’s excursion buses, which got stuck in traffic for an AC/DC concert, delaying dinner and the boat’s departure. Even so some of them complained that they hadn’t had enough time at Schönbrunn. 
Since our return I’ve found this picture on the Web of the symphony orchestra’s concert at Schönbrunn a few days after we left. This is what was under construction.
Shortly after leaving Vienna we crossed the border into Slovakia, close to Bratislava, and then into Hungary. On its return trip the boat would overnight in Bratislava, but there was no stop in Slovakia in our direction.