Hunting Hazelnuts, Fall in Vienna.

Playing ukulele in the kitchen

10/21/2011

As the summer ended and days got shorter, Vienna slowly turned into a nice crisp fall. We spent this last season balancing work, adventure, and awesome meals with our various roommates!

Hiking up to the Heurigen

Heurigen

The Heurigen season hit us pretty hard this year. A Heuriger is a wine tavern which sells the wine that it's vineyard produces. During fall, all the vineyards up on the hills surrounding Vienna are loaded with Wieners (Viennese people), drinking their fill, laying in the sun, listening to music, and strolling through the vineyards. 

Trying to eat grapes while playing Ukulele

 It's an incredibly nice way to spend a lazy Sunday. We managed to head up to the hills a few times, and relax, Wiener style.

Our kitchen table on a regular basis

Restaurants at Brunnenmarkt (right next to our house)

Playing "Golf" by the Belvedere palace

A view from Parliment

Brunnenmarkt with Mortiz, Fanny and Analise

Parliment in foreground, Rathaus in back

Fanny and Moritz(our August-September roommate)

At Dragonerheufel, the beach area on Alte Donau

Homemade travel chess set

Our daily tram stop

Church by our tram stop

Every morning on the way to work.

Sturm

Sturm is an amazing thing which should definitely be part of our fall season from now on. Sturm could most easily be translated into “Grape Cider” (the literal translation is “Storm”). It ranges from 2-5 percent alcohol, but has an awesome taste. You can buy it at almost any restaurant in Vienna, I even think I saw it at Mcdonalds! It costs about 2.5 euro for ¼ liter, and it's definitely worth it.

Sturm, is made by local winegrowers, and needs to be sold with a few days being made. We bought a big 2 liter bottle from a vitner(winemaker), at Brunnenmarkt for 4 Euro, and when I asked how old it was he said, it was from Monday. It was saturday! That sturm was fantastic! Each day you store it, the more alcoholic it gets. After about a week though, it will probably go bad. 

Waiting for the train to Zentral Friedhof

Picking hazelnuts

Hazelnuts

Vienna is full of harvestable foods, you just have to look for it! We collected nettle for nettle tea, hazelnuts, and walnuts. We got our biggest score with hazelnuts at the Zentral Friedhof, the central cemetery. Believe it or not, I collected about 4 pounds of them right next to Beethoven's grave! What a good find!

Inconspicuously picking hazelnuts next to Beethoven's resting place.

The Mother-load!

A hazelnut pod with treasure inside!

Hazelnut score!

We spent one crisp fall afternoon walking around the central cemetery, and found it really interesting. It is very old, and in one or more of the sections, there are many stones which have been overturned and seem to have been shot at, many, many years ago. We found Beethoven's, Mozart's, Shuberts, and Strauss's graves.

Old, knocked down gravestones

Thumbs up, Mozart!

October marks our last month here in Vienna! We'll finish off the month, and then we're headed to Italy to begin our journey into organic and sustainable agriculture!