A Place Both Wonderful and Strange – Tash & Ricki's Career Break Travels

Taylor Swift is the catalyst for many surprising events. She constantly breaks music records, triggers seismic activity with her concerts…and has even influenced the direction of our career break travels.

I wouldn’t class myself as a Swiftie, but I enjoy her biggest hits and the draw of her historic Eras tour was too much to ignore. As we were due to travel east at the end of summer anyway, Ricki acquiesced and agreed we could make a stop in Austria to attend one of the three shows in Vienna. 

Perhaps Swift’s “Cruel Summer” would have been a more apt piece of musical inspiration for this post’s title as our time in Austria did not get off to the best start.

In the classic grouping of “bad things come in threes” and in increasing order of inconvenience/disappointment:

1. A vending machine at Vienna airport, which was overpriced to begin with, did not release my snack purchase, while I was already reeling from…
2. A piece of luggage containing virtually the entirety of my wardrobe did not make our connection in Frankfurt and I would not be reunited with it for two days 
3. As you are probably aware, the concert which was the entire reason we (and about 199,999 others) were in Vienna, was cancelled on just less than 24 hours notice.

Don’t worry, despite the negative start, this post is not going to be a tale of woe.

For one thing, we have to wonder if the prayers of our Salvadoran friends did indeed save us from the impact of a terrorist attack, though we will never know just how credible the threat actually was.

For another, lured by our European presence, some of my best friends including my sister had also made the trip to Vienna. Ok, Miss Swift might have had something to do with it too, and for that I can’t be too mad we missed out on the Eras tour.

And let’s not forget, Vienna is no bad place to end up. After all, I’ve been to a stadium gig in Sunderland before¹. Straight on the heels of Mexico City, Vienna is another city that Ricki and I have visited before. But that was only as a daytrip from Bratislava, so we were keen to see more.

If I’m visualising Austria, often the imagery includes a sprinkling of snow, but that was definitely not the case on the ground. A persistent heatwave had kept the city baking through July and August. So I was pleased Kirsty and Gary were happy to mix up sightseeing with frequent stops for snacks and radlers. It was so nice to be in a climate where we could enjoy beer garden culture. Probably less nice for Kirsty and Gary, who are frequent blog readers, and probably didn’t need our clumsy retelling of our travel tales in person 😉

In between (and after a morning spent buying an emergency wardrobe), we made stops to the Hundertwasser Haus, Schloss Belvedere, and a Swiftie-mobbed Stephansplatz.

Hundertwasser Haus

Schloss Belvedere

And Kirsty “elevated” our travel game with some spots found on Tiktok…

Finally, there was a chance to catch up with all my Swift-loving companions at the Prater amusement park.

While Ricki, Kirsty and Gary headed off for some more radlers, I was pleased Alex, Derek, Becky and Ryan were up for a couple of rides. The swinging chairs might be the best vantage point for the whole of the city!

It was great to see some of my favourite people after being away from home longer than ever before.

Another advantageous ill-wind of being led to Vienna was landing ourselves a housesit 20 minutes outside the city. Pet owners Sandra and Chris would be heading to Mongolia for three weeks and after successfully applying through Trustedhousesitters, we were delighted to be selected by them to care for their Hungarian rescue dog, Ivy.

In exchange, we would have free accommodation during high season. It was a chance to recharge our batteries after a busy few weeks – in between plenty of dog walks of course.

The local area – could do a lot worse for the daily dog walks

The housesit was even better than expected, partly due to Sandra and Chris being such lovely “hosts” and almost kindred spirits. They were kind enough to let us stay with them for a couple of nights before they departed, and we enjoyed getting to swap travel and life stories. Having handed over to them in person at the end of their trip, we can also now add Mongolia to our wishlist. Although maybe not in the extreme self-drive mode they took!

Best of all was our time with Ivy. She has possibly spoiled us for other dogs, being so well trained and very chilled. Unless you chanced upon a squirrel, rabbit, deer or parasailer that is.

Our average monthly step count got a serious boost in three weeks, as we strolled with her around the town of Munchendorf, or went further afield to some of the many beautiful hiking spots in Lower Austria.

Laxenburg Castle Park

Although the temperatures might have remained high, there are so many forest paths that it’s easy to stay comfortably in shade.

Myrafälle

Mödling and Anninger trails

And to cool off one day, we lounged a few hours away an an “outdoor bath”.

I’m not aware of many Brits treating Austria as a summer holiday destination, but I really recommend it, particularly for those of an outdoorsy persuasion.

Altogether it was a very successful first housesit, and something I’m hoping to incorporate into future travels. And if it’s of interest to you, whether a homeowner or sitter, you can benefit from my referral code for money off the annual membership. Even if this stay is the only one we do this year, the membership fee has more than paid for itself.

Some exceptions aside, I’m a great believer that everything happens for a reason and this exactly sums up our month in Austria. We might not have caught the Eras tour but we couldn’t be upset with what we received instead. For the month of August, although there was some initial disappointment, we just had to Shake It Off and live our Wildest Dreams in Style (look, there’s a limited amount of upbeat Swift material I can draw from!).

Tash’s Treats

Treats indeed – this felt like one of our more extravagant legs, at least the time spent in Vienna city. Amongst the many radlers, of course we had to indulge in apple strudel and sachertorte. 

Despite the summer heat, we also managed to fit in some of Austria’s hearty fare like wienerschnitzel and dumplings, as well as leberkäse sandwiches (a bit like meatloaf).

A concept we had never come across before but really enjoyed once Chris and Sandra introduced it to us, was weinbaus. Local wine producers have the opportunity for a set period of time each to open up their stores as bars and cafeterias. For instance, you may walk past one and see that it has a two week opening period advertised, essentially a pop up bar.

At just over a euro a glass, its not only great value, but delicious wine as well. But that last part seems to be pretty true for all Austrian vintages!

1. I jest, Sunderland is perfectly fine. Not sure I’d want to wind up there for a month though. ↩︎