One thing I really wanted to do while in Vienna was go see the Vienna Boys Choir. I’ve never actually heard them sing but have heard about them so thought it was something I must do while in Vienna. They sing every Sunday morning at a mass at the Hapsburg Palace in the city center, in a little chapel inside the palace walls. We had seats in the last row of the balcony, and although the balcony was only about six rows deep, we actually couldn’t see anything because there is no stadium seating in a chapel that’s hundreds of years old. The mass was in German, put the priest said the homily in German, Italian and English. The first voices we heard singing sounded way too old to be a bunch of pre-pubescent boys, but because we couldn’t see what was going on the three of us who went just kind of looked at each other with confused glances and mouthed to each other, “I didn’t expect them to sound this old….”, but it turns out what we were hearing was actually the men’s choir who sings along with the Vienna Boys Choir. Once we heard what sounded like the female half of choir chime in, we knew we were in the right place.
After the mass the Boys Choir came onto the altar and did an encore performance of two songs, and by standing on our last-row chairs (hey, other people were doing it too) we could see them and we got a great view and some great pictures and videos. They were amazing, amplified by the fact that when I think of 10-year old boys I think of sweaty ADHD ridden children. These kids were poised, professional, and extremely talented.
After the mass, we had brunch in the courtyard of the palace and watched a vendors set up tents for some sort of festival. We had no idea what the festival was for, but after brunch Megan and I walked around and looked at all the vendors and went inside some of the tents – the one where you put on drunk goggles and tried to catch a ball (halirious I must say), the circus tent where you got to walk on a balance beam and play with other fun circus toys, and the badmitton tent where we played one-on-one until the wind got too strong and prevented the birdie from actually making it over the net. After the festival, we wandered into the park next to the palace and roamed through rose garden. We were there at the end of spring/early summer, so many of the roses were wilting but there were some that were still gorgeous, and there were more types of roses that I have ever seen in any one place.
Our final stop of the day was in the State Hall Library, one of the national libraries of Austria which is housed inside the palace. As you may have learned by now, I love libraries and this one did not let me down. It wasn’t a functional library as much as a museum, but walking into huge room with forty-foot high ceiling and walls lined wall to wall with old books felt like walking into the library in “Beauty and the Beast.” There were ladders on wheels that allowed you to reach the upper levels, and little hidden doorways disguised as bookshelves all over. Behind the hidden doorways were little rooms full of more books. I could totally picture Viennese royalty hanging out in there (but wait, did they even know how to read?....ok, I would hang out in there all time if it were my palace). The State Library was one of my favorite places I visited in Austria.
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