Expert: Claire Symons - 5/25/2010

Question
Hi - My husband and I plan to visit Europe mid July for 8 days. Our main halt will be at Paris, where we will spend about 5 days... We are not very fast paced people and do not travel with a fixed itinerary of places to finish, if we like a place we could well vegetate there a bit! We are not very  historical sight seeing people either... I would call us essentially 󷡬k, hang out, chill out people, we love picturesque picture post card places, pretty cafes, good food... Just to give you an idea, we simply LOVED Heidelberg, but for a two day stay, no more. We're not that into beaches. Museums do not give  us a high either. We both LOVE good food, and both of us enjoy the stage, musicals and operas.

Given this intro, what would you suggest for us in Austria - let's say for 3-4 days. Waiting to hear from you, bye - Vidya

Answer
If you just want somewhere beautiful to wander around, Salzburg would probably be your best bet. Innsbruck is beautiful too, with the Alps rising up behind the city. If you want to go to Vienna, you can go to any of several operas or symphonies. If you want to go cheaply, you can do standing room in the back - but that is fairly cutthroat. You will need to show up really early and stake out your place. Some people tie scarves to the railing of standing room to mark their spot and generally people understand that, but not always. The options I can think of are the Volksoper, Musicweirin (not sure on the spelling), Vienna Symphony and the Vienna Opera. All of the performances are spectacular. Vienna is a great city to just walk around because it is fairly small compared to other European cities. Try heading out to Schonnbrunn (imperial summer palace). I hope that helps. Enjoy!