We finally got to go to one of our favorite little spots for lunch: Trezesniewski. You may find the name hard to say, but the little “brotchen” (sandwiches) are delicious and not expensive.

We spent most afternoon at Belvedere. Belvedere was built by Prinz Eugene of Savoy. Though he had a perfectly good ‘Winterpalais’ in the city, he wanted a princely Palace in the countryside. He built Belvedere, which is actually two buildings–“Unteres” (1714-1718), his actual living quarters when here, separated by the gardens and fountains from the larger “Oberes” Belvedere (1723), used for formal events. All of this is now a public park and museum. Hard to believe this was built by one person, 292 years ago, as a second home. The weather today is really beautiful – blue skies, pleasant breeze, about 70 degrees. Perfect for sitting at the cafe at Unteres enjoying ein stuck apfel strudel!

Belvedere

Fountains in Belvedere gardens

We had never been through the Unteres Belvedere, but it too hosts a museum. There is no furniture from the Prinz’s era remaining, but the rooms still retain their decor. They have a nice display of Austrian artists depicting events in the turbulent Austrian history. Vienna was the seat of the powerful Hapsbug family, and Austria was once much larger geographically than it is now. Read more about some of this here.

Unteres Belvedere

You can see from the photos from Oberes (upper palace) to Unteres (lower palace) and the intervening gardens, Belvedere as a whole is pretty large, but it’s just a small island in the city that grew to surround it, just as the city grew around Schonbrunn.

View from Unteres to Oberes Belvedere.

After returning to the area near our hotel, we had une Melange and a desert at the renowned Cafe Centrale. The cafe has a long history in Vienna (especially in the early 20th century), since 1876, as a place for the literati and political thinkers of the day, including Lenin, Hitler, Trotsky. No weighty matters being discussed here tonight that we could see.

This evening, we walked down the Graben to locate the hotel to which we’re moving, tomorrow; more about that in a later post. Only the cafes are still open at 9pm, but there are plenty of people at the cafes on the Graben and on the side streets and window shopping. Most stores here close by 8pm.

Time to pack up for the move tomorrow!

More photos at Flickr .