Confessions of a Castleholic

How time flies! It's been a year since I visited Vienna and while it rained for almost a week straight, it still remains one of my favourite holidays ever. Vienna simply is a city of my kind, full of history, architecture and culture. There are so many things to do and see, that one week (with trips to Bratislava and west of Vienna ) is in no way sufficient to see all of it. Still, here are my five favourite royal things to do and see in Vienna - in no particular order as that would just be cruel! Gartenpalais Liechtenstein Vienna can be full of tourists and some of its most famous attractions *cough* Schloss Schönbrunn *cough* can even be overrun by tourists. And so the Gartenpalais Liechtenstein was a breath of fresh air. The tours aren't exactly cheap but they were also some of the best I ever had! They started with a glass of bubbly, continued with amazing art and had some of the most knowledgeable guides I ever experienced. (And yes, I enjoyed this one even a ...

My last day in Vienna was last Tuesday and I'm finally coming around to also share my impressions of the last day with you. Sorry for that and thank you to all those who sent me kind messages during the last week and a half sharing their stories of Vienna and more or simply saying how much they enjoyed my travelogues. Here there are once again in case you missed any: Vienna Day 1: First Impressions Vienna Day 2: Hofburg, Imperial Crypt, and More Vienna Day 3: Belvedere, Karlskirche, Furniture, and More Vienna Day 4: Schönbrunn, Liechtenstein Times Two, and Not Much More Vienna Day 5: Artstetten, Melk, and Other Bits Vienna Day 6: Art Museums and Sachertorte Vienna Day 7: Best of Bratislava and More  And now onto my last day: I had actually planned to visit the famous Ringstraße , a circular road surrounding the Innere Stadt district of Vienna built between the 1860's and the 1890's in place of the city walls, on a sunny day. However, as good weather never ca...

Did you know that Vienna and Bratislava are the two European capitals located closest to each other (not counting Rome and Vatican City)? Oh, you did?! Well, then it won't come us a surprise to you that I simply popped over the border to Slovakia today to discover Bratislava a bit. To be quite honest with you, I didn't really know what to expect of Bratislava. Until this morning, the city mostly was a blank page for me. I only decided to go there for the day rather spontaneously and the only thing I knew about the city I knew from a brochure accompanying my train ticket to go to the Slovakian capitals. So I simply took a bus from Bratislava's main station to go to the city centre and off I was to discover this unknown (to me) European capital. My first stop was St. Martin's Cathedral where I learnt something new: Shame on me, but I wasn't even aware that Bratislava once was the capital of the Kingdom of Hungary... ... and as such the coronations of 11 k...