Jim Sivesind bought me lunch today (via a Visa gift card he gave me for Christmas) at the Sacher Hotel in Vienna across the street from the Vienna State Opera House.
They are famous for their Sacher Torte which you see above. It's a delicious chocolate cake with a layer of apricot preserves and a dollop of schlag (whipped cream). On the right is Viennese Coffee -- which essentially is a cup of schlag and a splash of coffee.
Lunch was great and in one of the prettiest dining rooms I've ever been in.
After lunch I toured the Vienna State Opera House. It's a beautiful facility that was mostly reconstructed after WWII (the tour guide was quick to point out it suffered from Allied bombing.) The building was originally built in the 1860s -- and I won the quiz when the guide asked us to identify when the Intermission Room was built. The chandeliers gave it away as the 1950s. But she stumped me later by asking us to name the only Opera written by Beethoven (Fidelo). (I may be on vacation, but I'm still competitive.)
Anyway, I really liked Vienna and enjoyed seeing what to me appears to be so much Art Deco architecture.
While I'm thanking folks -- thanks to Jackie Steinman for helping me figure out some problems with my new digital camera. It was only allowing me to take around 10 photos in the lowest resolution. Turns out the manufacturer didn't provide a memory card at all. I got one today which supposedly will allow me to take 500 photos in good resolution. I think that will be plenty.
Tomorrow I'm off on a 6:30 a.m. (ouch) train to Venice. I'm staying in smaller hotels in Italy so I'm not sure what my Internet access will be like. But I'll be blogging as I can.
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