This past weekend I got to go on a trip with my program to Styria. Styria is a region located in Southeast Austria and was absolutely beautiful to tour!! We left early Saturday morning and drove for three hours to a small open-air museum. We did a walking tour which took us through different houses preserved from each region. All of the houses reminded me of the movie "Heidi" (the adorable one with Shirley Temple) because of the picturesque scenery and of course the sheep (:
Do you think I could move in, live off cheese, milk, and quilting!? Bummer the tour guide said that they didn't do much quilting. After the tour we went to lunch and I had Wienerschnitzel and pancake soup, both very typical menu items in Austria. The pancake soup was fabulous. check it out. http://www.deliciousdays.com/archives/2007/04/17/pancake-soup-are-you-a-cheater/
Then we continued on to Styria's capital --> Graz. Graz is the second largest city in Austria and has had a long tradition of being a "student city." I really enjoyed being there because the mean age did seem to be a lot younger! We went on a tour of the city with the funniest tour guide ever! And he gave us great ideas of things to do on our free night out.
The tour took us through monuments, churches, a really cool organic festival (mom you would have loved it) and finally the BEST part of the day! There was a CHOCOLATE FESTIVAL!! Schoko-fest 09, I kid you not is dedicated to the fine food of chocolate. Each person can buy a spoon and go around to different stations with mini chocolate goodies to try. I had chocolate fondue, Lebkuchen (ginger bread), truffles, crushed chocolate bars, chocolate pancakes, 100% pure chocolate, hot chocolate, and most fun of all, chocolate syringes. Needless to say, pretty much every one had a tummy ache by the end...Well worth it.
We went to our hostel for dinner and then had a free night ahead of us. Luckily, we chose one of the best weekends to go to Graz. The city had SO sO much to do. One night out of the year all of Austria takes part in this tradition called Lange Nacht der Museen. It is where every museum is open past hours until 1AM. People get one ticket for the whole night, which lets you into all of the museums with a bus to shuttle you to and from whatever ones you would like. It was such an experience. We started by taking a short nap to fuel up for the long night ahead and then headed first to the armory museum in the center of the city. At this museum you had to take a guided tour...and of course the only guided tour available was in German. Although my Elementary I German skills are superb, ha I had some trouble understanding what was going on. It made for an even more fun experience when the group I was with made up our own interpretations. Even with the language gap it was interesting to see so much legit armor from so long ago. We went through at least 5 floors of aisle after aisle of armor dating from the 12-17 centuries. (I think, once again my German is not that good)
After the armory tour we went to Graz's modern art museum (Kunsthaus Graz) which had an Andy Warhol, Wool, and Newman exhibit. very neat and somewhat weird to see such iconic American art in Austria. The museum and the architecture was awesome. It reminded me of a giant whale, or peanut, or something cool. Sarah Weston would have loved it. (:
Then we hopped on a bus (this is now about midnight) and headed to the magnificent Schloss Eggenberg. It is a castle located on the western outskirts of Graz. It was built for Prince Han Ulrich von Eggenberg (1538-1634) who was not a Habsburg but was chief minister to Emperor Ferdinand II.
The castle was awesome and especially cool to see at night. We got to go through the living quarters and the decorations were so INTENSE. Two giant chapels on the premise and I think we saw at least 15 living rooms. Who cleaned that place?
By the time we finished there the whole group was exhausted. We headed back to hostel and crashed! It was a fabulous day in Styria. Stay tuned for DAy #2 in Styria...
This picture does not even begin to show you the beauty of Styria's wine country. Commonly known as Austria's Tuscany, Styria's grapes are in full swing. We took a bus through all of the beautiful hills and stopped at many vineyards on the way where we could purchase wine, honey, chestnuts, and other goodies. My personal favorite is the Austrian specialty called STURM. Sturm is a fall tradition and it is wine that has not completed the fermentation process. You all can look up the chemistry of it, all I know is that it tastes like YUMMY grape juice for the red wine or lemonade for the white wine. Because the liquid is still in the fermentation process it cannot be stored for a long time and the bottle cannot be sealed (they cover it with tin foil because a cork would just pop right off.) It is a huge tradition and only is around for a couple of weeks. Let me just tell you yummmy! However you have to be real careful because it still has an alcohol content of 10% and will give you a really bad tummy ache (sturm in your stomach) if you drink too much...something to do with the yeast and fermentation process. Everyone should come over to Austria, quickly, and taste for yourselves!!
