I had the pleasure to spend three days working in Vienna in mid December. Here are some photos from that trip.
Showing posts with label Vienna. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Vienna. Show all posts
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Tuesday, June 02, 2009
Articles in Expressen
It seems like Expressen published several of my articles the last few weeks.
I never see the paper versions, which contains more photos and sometimes maps.
But now and then I discover the web versions.
Like this hotel guide to Sevilla, that I wrote just a week ago or so. Blog entries here.
Or this article about wine in Vienna, that I produced earlier this spring. Blog entries here.
Or my pub guide to London. Blog entries here.
I never see the paper versions, which contains more photos and sometimes maps.
But now and then I discover the web versions.
Like this hotel guide to Sevilla, that I wrote just a week ago or so. Blog entries here.
Or this article about wine in Vienna, that I produced earlier this spring. Blog entries here.
Or my pub guide to London. Blog entries here.
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Glorious Vienna!
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Our last day in Tansylvania was used for recouperation and relaxation. We did some walking and lots of reading, and I worked a bit with my photos. In the evening, we boarded a one hour delayed but surprisingly comfortable night train to Vienna. Although it doesn’t help with comfortable beds when you are woken twice by border police, at 03:00 and 03:30.
Arriving in Vienna at ten in the morning, we took a pit-stop in one of the simple and retro-chic Aida-cafés scattered around the city. It felt like their Mozart tarte was the right way to start a day in Vienna.
Checking in at the Rathaus Wein & Design is always a pleasure, especially when you are invited to their opulent breakfast buffé. We just had to eat a little bit more. The room was also a delight, although we did not have much time to enjoy it.
Instead we headed for the Gustav Klimt-exhibition at the Belvedere. A must in Vienna for me. I am especially fond of his paintings with women, they seem to vibrate with lust in a very sensual way.
Afterwards, we found our way to another one of my Vienna favourites, Café Alt Wien on Bäckerstrasse, where a beer and a sausage provided new energy.
It feels like Vienna changed a lot the last few years, to the better. Nowadays, their focus on wine and design is paying off, with more and more cool design shops and even cooler wine bars opening up. We ended up at one of the latter, Unger & Klein, where we tasted a number of good local wines, some of them very good. My favourite (and I think Anders’ as well) was a typical white wine from Vienna, a mix of different grapes from different estates, produced by Krist.
A slight hunger reminded us that we had a date with Vienna’s biggest schnitzels, at the classic restaurant Figlmüller. I was impressed when Anders almost all of his cyclopic wiener-schnitzel, save for a microscopic triangle. Even I couldn’t achieve that.
The evening proceeded at another wine bar, the very buzzy and popular Wine & Co, close to St Stephansplatz. Austria has come a long way with their white wine, and I hope I can go back one day for a visit dedicated to their grape products.
Monday, March 17, 2008
Nostalgic in Cairo
Hello, back again. I am afraid I have been extremely busy lately, and neglected my private blog somewhat. Also, my travel blog for MSN takes a lot of time.
As usual, I have been doing a bit of traveling. Last week, I visited the big travel fair TUR in Gothenburg, Sweden. It was great to be back in the city where I once studied, and also fun to meet old and new friends in the travel business, and editors from the major Swedish travel magazines. Managed to sell a few nice stories that will keep me busy this summer. About what? Can’t say yet, but it is going to be fun.
I also met two old friends from University over a beer at the friendly Polish restaurant Kraków. It’s funny how little we change over the years – we agreed on that we were pretty much the same persons as when we studied together, more than 15 years ago.
Friday, I took the train to Stockholm and stayed over at Lotta and Per. Lotta used to work in Jerusalem, so that is were we met. Both of them are really nice and generous persons, and Lotta and her always cheery mood is dearly missed in Jerusalem.
Anna, another Swedish friend in Jerusalem, was also visiting Stockholm and staying at Lotta’s place, so we went out for dinner the four of us. I really enjoy keeping up contact with good friends like this, I find it a pleasure but also important. When you live an international life on the move, it is far too easy to loose contact with people, even if they are important for you.
Saturday saw me attending the Swedish Paragliding Association's annual meeting. I am the editor of their magazine Hypoxia (which I very much enjoy producing) but I have not been able to meet the board before. So this was a most fortunate occasion. The meeting was held in conjunction with a big adventure fair, where most of the Swedish diving industry exhibited. So I could say hello to a few old colleagues and friends from my diving years while there.
In the evening, I went to my favored Stockholm drinking venue, the Czech pub/restaurant Soldaten Svejk. Their beer is poured with utmost care and love, and of the very best quality. The food is recommendable as well, if you like the heavy cuisine of central Europe (which I do).
My old University friend (and nowadays customer – he asked me to write the travel blog for MSN) and regular Svejk-company showed up as well, nowadays a somewhat rare event since he lives on an island in the Mediterranean right now. Later on, Maxson, another friend from the University of Journalism, joined us for a glass or two. Fun!
I called it a day rather early, which was wise, considering I had to go up at four the next morning to go to the airport. Sunday was a looong travel day for me. First a flight from Stockholm to Vienna. Then another flight to Tel Aviv.
In Tel Aviv, the Israelis managed to call in 13 staff members just to arrange for my transfer between flights (something that is normally done without any staff at all other airports in the world). It took them an hour to figure out that I was not going to blow up any planes this time either. I mean, they check me in and out every time they see me at the airport outside Tel Aviv, which is very often. Paranoia is a strong understatement when it comes to them.
Anyway, in the end, they let me enter the airports waiting lounge, where I sat for more than three hours, before it was time to board my flight to Cairo. Landing there late in the evening, I took a taxi to the fancy Cairo Marriott Hotel on an island in the Nile.
So here I am, in Cairo again. There is a nostalgic feeling in the air when I walk the narrow and crowded alleys of the souk – I visited Cairo three times in the 90’s, but have not been back since. Most of it is exactly the same. Maybe the buildings are slightly crumbling somewhat more, maybe the traffic is a notch worse. But the same kind of wrinkly old seen-it-all men sit at the corner cafés, smoking their shishas (water pipes) and sipping their tea.
I like it.
As usual, I have been doing a bit of traveling. Last week, I visited the big travel fair TUR in Gothenburg, Sweden. It was great to be back in the city where I once studied, and also fun to meet old and new friends in the travel business, and editors from the major Swedish travel magazines. Managed to sell a few nice stories that will keep me busy this summer. About what? Can’t say yet, but it is going to be fun.
I also met two old friends from University over a beer at the friendly Polish restaurant Kraków. It’s funny how little we change over the years – we agreed on that we were pretty much the same persons as when we studied together, more than 15 years ago.
Friday, I took the train to Stockholm and stayed over at Lotta and Per. Lotta used to work in Jerusalem, so that is were we met. Both of them are really nice and generous persons, and Lotta and her always cheery mood is dearly missed in Jerusalem.
Anna, another Swedish friend in Jerusalem, was also visiting Stockholm and staying at Lotta’s place, so we went out for dinner the four of us. I really enjoy keeping up contact with good friends like this, I find it a pleasure but also important. When you live an international life on the move, it is far too easy to loose contact with people, even if they are important for you.
Saturday saw me attending the Swedish Paragliding Association's annual meeting. I am the editor of their magazine Hypoxia (which I very much enjoy producing) but I have not been able to meet the board before. So this was a most fortunate occasion. The meeting was held in conjunction with a big adventure fair, where most of the Swedish diving industry exhibited. So I could say hello to a few old colleagues and friends from my diving years while there.
In the evening, I went to my favored Stockholm drinking venue, the Czech pub/restaurant Soldaten Svejk. Their beer is poured with utmost care and love, and of the very best quality. The food is recommendable as well, if you like the heavy cuisine of central Europe (which I do).
My old University friend (and nowadays customer – he asked me to write the travel blog for MSN) and regular Svejk-company showed up as well, nowadays a somewhat rare event since he lives on an island in the Mediterranean right now. Later on, Maxson, another friend from the University of Journalism, joined us for a glass or two. Fun!
I called it a day rather early, which was wise, considering I had to go up at four the next morning to go to the airport. Sunday was a looong travel day for me. First a flight from Stockholm to Vienna. Then another flight to Tel Aviv.
In Tel Aviv, the Israelis managed to call in 13 staff members just to arrange for my transfer between flights (something that is normally done without any staff at all other airports in the world). It took them an hour to figure out that I was not going to blow up any planes this time either. I mean, they check me in and out every time they see me at the airport outside Tel Aviv, which is very often. Paranoia is a strong understatement when it comes to them.
Anyway, in the end, they let me enter the airports waiting lounge, where I sat for more than three hours, before it was time to board my flight to Cairo. Landing there late in the evening, I took a taxi to the fancy Cairo Marriott Hotel on an island in the Nile.
So here I am, in Cairo again. There is a nostalgic feeling in the air when I walk the narrow and crowded alleys of the souk – I visited Cairo three times in the 90’s, but have not been back since. Most of it is exactly the same. Maybe the buildings are slightly crumbling somewhat more, maybe the traffic is a notch worse. But the same kind of wrinkly old seen-it-all men sit at the corner cafés, smoking their shishas (water pipes) and sipping their tea.
I like it.
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