Vienna (May 24)

Around the Dom a lot of these cute huts have sprung up with food and drink, hand blown glass, jewellery, that sort of thing.

My first job was to find a cafe with internet.  It took me a while.  I did come across a chair like the one in Paris at the fondation Cartier.  It's called a Proust chair here and will set you back 640 euro.

I ended up back at Cafe Central.  How could I pass up a cake with a name like "Kiss of Springtime".  It was as nice as it sounded and looked.

At the moment it's all Klimt all the time as the city celebrates 150 years since his birth.  My friend had told me that the exhibition at the Leopold Museum was a good one to see, so off I went.  I passed by the stables to the Spanish Riding School.

and they were just leading some horses back in - from a show I guess.

 Funny hats.

At the Albertina there's an exhibition of Monet to Picasso (as well as a Klimt one of course), and the steps have been painted in a Monet-esque way.

The Leopold is in the Mseums Quartier part of the city.  I loved the atmosphere here.  A large central area between various museums has interesting outdoor seating that was in full use on this gorgeous day.

The exhibition I went to centred on Klimt's long-standing relationship with Emilie Floge who was his contant companion, even though he had numerous lovers and fathered many children with them.  Was it only a close friendship, was it sexual?  No one really knows.  But there was constant letter writing between the two - hers have been burnt, but his to her remain - 400 notes, letters and postcards, and every single one of these was on display, winding through the rooms which contained more context to what Klimt was doing at the time.  Wonderful stuff.  There were large reproductions of 3 pieces that he was commissioned to produce for the university - which caused an absolute furore, sadly they have been burned.  There were beautiful Van Gogh-esque landscapes, and an insight into the inspiration for his golden period.

Back at the Dom, I patronised one of the cute huts.  I had a boar sausage with mustard and horeseradish, and a himbeer something or other - a raspberry flavoured punch with a bit of alcohol I think - very nice.