Things to do in Vienna

Vienna was an imperial capital for six centuries. The plan still shows it. The Ringstrasse runs where the city walls stood, and the Habsburgs lined it with museums and ministries.

Inside the Ring

The old town is dense, and it is walked. St Stephen's stands in the middle. Its south tower rises 136 metres, up a stair of 343 steps.

• Hofburg — the winter palace: imperial apartments, the Sisi rooms, the riding school.
• Kunsthistorisches Museum — Bruegel and the Habsburg pictures.
• MuseumsQuartier — Schiele and Klimt at the Leopold, modern work next door.
• Naschmarkt — the long market strip on the Wienzeile, best before noon.
• Coffee houses — Central, Sperl, Landtmann; one order buys the table for hours.

Palaces, wine hills and the Prater

The rest sits outside the Ring, a tram or metro ride away.

• Schönbrunn — the summer palace, the Gloriette above it, a zoo founded in 1752.
• Belvedere — two baroque palaces, and the room that holds Klimt's The Kiss.
• Prater — the big wheel of 1897 and the long park behind it.
• Grinzing and Nussdorf — the wine villages on the northern slope.
• Zentralfriedhof — Beethoven, Brahms and both Strausses in the composers' plot.

Some 700 hectares of vineyard lie inside the city limits. No other city in Europe keeps more. The Heurigen pour the year's own bottling at wooden tables.

Where the roads out lead

Vienna sits within a day's drive of three other capitals.

• Bratislava — eighty kilometres downriver, close enough for a half day.
• The Wachau — Melk abbey and Dürnstein, with vineyard terraces between them.
• Hallstatt and Salzburg — three hundred kilometres west, a long day out and back.
• Mauthausen — the camp memorial, usually combined with Melk.
• Prague, Budapest, Cesky Krumlov — full days by car.

Practical

• Weather. Summers reach the high twenties, winters sit near freezing, and the wind off the plain sharpens January.
• Christmas markets. They open in mid-November and run through Advent, the busiest stretch of the Vienna year.
• From the airport. Trains reach the main station in about twenty minutes for a few euros. The direct line into Wien Mitte is being rebuilt, so check what runs.
• Sundays. Shops close by law; museums and cafés do not. Do the shopping on Saturday.
• Tipping. Say the sum you want to pay as you hand the money over, five to ten per cent above the bill.
• Coffee house rules. A glass of water comes with the coffee, and nobody hurries you out.
• Booking ahead. Schönbrunn, the Sisi rooms and the riding school sell timed entry, and do sell out.