Today we were able to get up at a decent hour without being too tired. First, we had to register our stay at one of the government offices. Austria requires that all visitors notify the government at any time that their stay exceeds 3 days. It was a pretty easy process. From there we headed to see some of the buildings/attractions in the city center. Curt had already been around some of the area, so he was our tour guide. We viewed Karlskirche (Church of St. Charles) from the outside. It is in one of the large city squares (Karlsplatz) and has an attached park area, so it is definitely one of the places that tourists and locals like to gather. We have a guided tour later in our trip, so we didn’t visit the inside.

The church was commissioned in 1713 by Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI to honor Saint Charles Barromeo. Barromeo was a great healer of plague sufferers.

The columns depict scenes from the life of St. Charles Barromeo.

Actress Hedy Lamarr was born in Austria as Hedwig Kiesler. She married in a small chapel of this church in 1933.

Next, we visited the city market, Naschmarkt, to eat lunch. Griffin went with spaghetti, a safe entree; I had goulash and Curt had a bratwurst.

We did not choose this for our meal!

After lunch we explored the market some and then headed over to Stephansplatz to see Stephansdom (St. Stephen’s Cathedral). Part of the building is being cleaned, so it is covered in scaffolding, but you can definitely still see how intricate and beautiful the gothic architecture is. Griffin has been with us to see so many churches on our travels that he automatically asked if we were going to go in. We weren’t able to tour the church, but got to take a few pictures. We plan to come back for their guided tour in English.

Construction began in the 12th Century. No other buildings in the surrounding areas can be taller than than the spires on the cathedral.

This modern building is right across Stephansplatz from the cathedral.

We visited one more church, Peterskirche (Church of St. Peter), where we got to see the baroque style. We were only able to view a small part of this church as well due to a service.

Construction on this building began around 1701 after the old church burned in 1661. The Church of St. Peter was mentioned as early as 1137, but it may have been older since it is believed that a church built by Charlamagne in 800 existed in this location.

We also had a chance to pass by a nice fountain and some monuments. We only stayed out for about 5 ½ hours since we were still a little tired from the traveling. We had a quiet dinner in at our apartment with some things that Curt had previously picked up at the grocery store.

Vienna Pestsaule (Plague Column): This memorial replaces a simpler memorial that was placed here during the second bout of the plague in the 17th century. It was built in 1693 and is 69 feet tall.

Griffin liked? this display in a store window. Either that or he thought it was strange.

Griffin found out that Curt’s European cell phone provided by the Study Abroad program has the snake game on it and now wants to play it all the time.