John advised an early start to beat the crowds; he was right; we managed our tour of the Palace with relative few people around and when we returned to the entrance we had to literally push our way through the crowd. To get there we caught the #58 tram for a short ride to the palace entrance. This is another site of an Andre Rieu concert of which I have the DVD. As we walked from the gates to the entrance steps I could in my mind’s eye see and hear the music of the concert; looking up we could see the ballroom windows behind which the Debutants waltzed to Strauss’ beautiful Roses of the South. On the tour we later walked through this ballroom. We were supplied with a voice box which gave us a commentary in English; far better than a tour guide as I could hear every word. The palace decor and art while ‘being very good‘ was not as excellent as was the castle of King Ludwig II we visited while in Munich. After our tour of the castle we decided to walk around the extensive grounds. At the rear there was a large grassed area on which were well laid out gardens of colourful flowers, back dropped by a huge pond and waterfall, behind which was a grassed hill leading up to a gigantic archway from which we viewed the whole expanse back to the castle and grounds and beyond to the city of Vienna. Surrounding the fore mentioned there were many avenues of green trees with seats placed at frequent intervals upon which we sat to cool ourselves on what was probably the hottest day we have experienced on our tour. We came across nice neatly laid out rose garden so we sat nearby on a seat in the shade; a light breeze cooled us as we looked across the rose garden at a huge old style glass house which held displays of fauna and flora from around the world including a Kowhai, a hebe and a totara tree from Neuseeland. Moving on after an ice cream for lunch we climbed to the Gloriette at the top of the hill the top of which provided a splendid view back down to the Palace with part of the City of Vienna as a backdrop. There were numerous walking/cycling tracks in the grounds through the trees with many people using them. Other attractions in the palace grounds were: - horse and buggy rides, a small yellow and green road train, cafes a zoo and a wagon museum. About 4pm we had fish and chips with salad which served as our evening meal. The salad was unusual but very nice; I have never seen Fay each much salad but she ate this entire one. We caught the number 58 tram back to our hotel after having spent the whole day at the Palace. We enjoyed our day.
Photos. 1 Gardens and the Gloriette at the top of the hill. 2 The gloriette at the top of the hill. 3 The View from the top of the hill.
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