Vienna is Supa

I have had three very full days in Vienna and I have to say I really like this city. As the locals would say "it's supa".
I spent my first day walking around the city. I walked for just about 6 hours with a few breaks for coffee and food. The apartment is a really short walk to the Innere stadt area. I headed there to see Stephansom, a gothic church. After that I walked through the shopping area to Hofburg which I was told was the winter palace of the Habsburgs. After seeing this area I wandered over to the Albertina which is one of the art museums. I decided to fork over for the admission here since they recently acquired a huge collection of work - mostly Picasso's from some local family. After that I headed to the Naschmarkt which is sort of like Pike Place Market. Lots of vendors selling fresh produce, meat, etc plus lots of food vendors. Since it was Saturday it was pretty crowded but very cool.

I definitely needed to eat and since I was FREEZING cold I decided to try a Ramen place up the street. I know - Ramen in Vienna. Vienna actually has a diverse food scene with lots of new options popping up often. I'll probably do a separate food entry later.
So, yesterday I jumped on an early train and headed to Melk which is about an hour west. I had made plans to catch up with an old college friend, Cindy Sincock, who has lived in Austria for nine years now. We randomly connected on Facebook about a month ago and I remembered that she lived over here. She lives in Linz which is about another hour further west. We chose Melk as the halfway point and they also have this huge Benedictine monastery there. Apparently everything is closed on Sunday except for this place. After we toured the monastery we headed to Spitz to try heuringen. This was very cool. This area is wine country for many Austrian wines. The heuringen allows the wine producers to sell their wine on the premises of where they produce but in addition they sell local meat, cheese, and bread from surrounding farmers. Each winery takes turns being open and selling their wine and their neighbors food. It was very cool and the food was so great. After we ate, Cindy and her daughter Emma kidnapped me and took me back to Linz. I saw their town from a hilltop view and then they dropped me at the train station for my ride back to Vienna.
Today is my last day in town before jumping on the train to Prague tomorrow am. I spent today viewing the Schonbrunn which was incredible. This is a massive royal palace and garden. It was really amazing.
Tonight I have tickets to a show which I'm slightly worried is the Viennese version of a luau. I was stopped on the street by a man in costume. I know. He was standing next to a ticket office for the broadway shows and he had info that I had just viewed in the tourist office (doesn't mean it's good) and seen in my guide book. It's music and dancing and costumes. Yeah. So, we'll see how it goes. It might be really nice or so-so. We'll see. I'm just excited I can stay awake past 7pm right now.