Saturday 28 June 2014 Vienna

Sunny 28C

I had booked a Segway tour of Vienna to start at 10am but when we arrived they had no record of our booking although I had spoken to the girl at 5.30pm last night. This was unfortunate as the tour was full, so we consoled ourselves with morning coffee and strawberry strudel with vanilla cream (I would call it custard) at Gerstners on the Karnerstrasse.

We visited the tourist information office and found there was an English speaking tour at 2pm of the centre of Vienna so decided we would take that tour to get orientated. I hit the shops for an hour and Chris went off wandering with the camera. When we met up he had lots to show me and took me to the Hofburg Palace, showed me the outside of the Museum of Natural History and the Sisi Museum, the Spanish riding school and many of the beautiful buildings which were Palaces along the Ring road.

By 2pm we were at the Tourist Office and had found our guide but 5 mins after the tour began she cancelled the tour due to illness and refunded our money. So today has not been a huge success for tours.

This evening we went to the Ballet at the Vienna Opera House, the performance was Nurejew (Nueryev) Gala 2014. We had to pick up the tickets after 5pm for a 6pm start so arrived around 5.15 and collected the tickets. This gave us an opportunity to look around the Opera House with only a few people around.

It was interesting watching the crowd arrive dressed in a variety of clothes from shorts though to very well dressed men and women. One gentleman had a white suit, a hair style out of Monte Python or Star Trek and a very sparkling evening bag that any woman would be proud to own!

Our seats were in row 10 and slightly off to one side, the view was quite good but all Sydney-siders should appreciate the wonderful Opera Theatre at the Sydney Opera House for Ballet with uninterrupted views from all seats. The performance began at 6pm and it was a series of acts from many ballets. All began with a short introduction on a screen projected above the stage of the rehearsal of the performers of the ballet they were about to dance. Rudolf Nureyev choreographed all the ballets we saw tonight. There was a mixture of modern and classical but they were all excellent, some went for just a few minutes where others were a scene or two form the Ballet.

There was intermission after 5 different ballets. We returned to another 5 ballets and thought the performance was over at 9pm, however there was still the 3rd series which began at 9.15 and ran until 10.30. The final curtain calls went on for 15 mins and included dances from all the ballets performed throughout the evening.

It was a spectacular event and we enjoyed it very much. On our way home we stopped off at a café for a snack as we had not had dinner. Looking back at the amount of food available during intermission we should have realised and eaten at the theatre.

It's been a beautiful warm day and we hope tomorrow will be the same as we are booked to do the Segway tour in the morning.