Vienna, Day 5

For our final day in Vienna, we escaped to the countryside. We decided to take a day trip to the Wachau Valley, including a leg on a boat on the Danube River. First we made our way to Westbahnhof (the West train station), where we purchased a combi ticket with rail, boat and culture tickets all included. Then we boarded a train to St. Pollen, west of Vienna. There we changed to a one car train headed to Melk.

The main attraction in Melk is Melk Abbey, found by following the signs “Sticht Melk” ever upward.

The Abbey is a beautiful yellow and white complex overlooking the river on a bluff.

We exchanged our vouchers for tickets, then went for a tour of the gardens while waiting the meeting time for the English tour.

The pavilion building was a lovely pastel pink stucco, with weathered gray wood shutters and a plethora of roses in full bloom in all colors of the pink spectrum. The other gardens were mostly a tended forest with paths and occasional flower gardens.

The tour took us through a history of the abbey, founded in the 1100s by the Benedictine order from Italy. Waiting in the stairwell, we learned that the pink and yellow colorings were typical of Baroque era buildings, echoing an obsession with pink marble and gold.

We saw the Imperial wing, where the Empress Teresia stayed when she visited from Vienna. The hallway, 600 ft long, is further enhanced by varying the height of the ceiling along the corridor to make it look even longer.

The dining room similarly used faux painting to emulate the look of marble (only the doorway surrounds are actually stone) and to elevate the ceiling, which is actually flat and only extends 6 feet above the molding.

The church is in the center of the compound, viewed from the rampart that looks out over the town and river.

Most impressive was the library, with shelf after shelf of gorgeous leather and gold bound books in Latin, Greek and Hebrew. The four cardinal virtues stand in the corners, marking the different areas of study. Many more rooms have newer volumes in modern languages.

As we exited the tour, we saw the fabulous baroque church interior, but couldn’t really look around as noon services were beginning. The abbey is still a working abbey, with 30 monks in residence and a school for local children.

Afterward, we wandered through the picturesque old town of Melk, stopping for lunch next to the central fountain. Joren enjoyed his pizza, complete with hard-boiled egg slices and large peppers. Keenan and I tried the Cordon Bleu, our substitute for schnitzel.

We popped into a few shops, collecting a few pieces of pottery, then wandered down hill toward the boat docks to board the Prinz Eugen.

We sat on the top deck, where I got a crimson sunburned V on my chest, watching as castles and vineyards floated slowly past. One hill was said to produce 57,000 liters of wine.

About an hour down river, we disembarked at Dornstein, billed as the prettiest town in the Wachau valley.

We climbed the steep passages up to the winding main street with picturesque shop signs.

After we walked the full length to the scenic overlook, we returned more slowly, stopping in the occasional shop looking for treasures (read chocolate). This area is renowned for apricots, so everywhere we saw apricot liquors, candies, jams and juices. We stopped for apricot spritzers (soda water with a shot of apricot nectar) and sweets. Joren and I had chocolate sundaes while Keenan tried the apple strudel.

Eventually, we walked out of the old part of town to the Bahnhof, only to learn from the closed building and posted signs that the train only runs on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Fearing that we might be stuck in Dornstein, we decided to double time it back to the boat dock, where there was one more pickup that afternoon. After getting there and checking the schedule, we realized that the time we remembered for pickup was actually the last departure time from Melk, so we just sat and waited for the boat rather than climb back up to town for less than an hour. When the time for the boat’s arrival came and went, we really started to contemplate the hotel back at the top of the hill. Fortunately, the boat was just running late, 20 minutes behind schedule, and we were able to make our way to Krems.

In Krems, we had more than a mile walk to the train station, through a thoroughly citified area. Luckily, we arrived five minutes before the train to Vienna departed. We made it back to the hotel by 9:00, tired and footsore, to grab a piece of cheese with a roll from the lounge and fall into bed.