Kevin and I arrived in Krakow on New Years Eve. Ania had arranged for us to have a very special New Year's Eve Feast. It was a glorious affair. Here we are all celebrating!
And this is the 12 course meal we had. It was delicious and much fun to be served all these interesting dishes.
The Dessert Course!
The restaurant is Pod Aniolami which means under the angels and we were under lovely gingerbread angels hanging from the chandeliers.
A deer watched us from behind the Christmas tree.
With so many courses, Ania and I had time to go exploring. We found lovely private rooms upstairs with beautiful shopki.
The last course was a full meal featuring Roast Pig which was flambeed in the dining room!
After dinner, we celebrated on the very crowded Rynek with champagne!
Ania's house was lovely in the snow.
The garden house was too cold to spend much time in but it smelled lovely as the logs are now filled with sweetsmelling beeswax. The artist carpenter who built Ania's house added beautiful carvings such as the eagle over the door
Inside was a Christmas tree full of beautiful angels handmade by Monica.
We loved sitting in the Garden Room watching Napo and Leon enjoy themselves,
And reading,
With a snowy view outside,
And Ania's elegant wood stove keeping us warm and cozy.
We had delicious meals, fixed by Ania and Kaja in Ania's kitchen. The window view this time was the lovely white snow instead of the garden green of summer.
Leon would like some of Kevin's obiad!
One day, Ania brought up a pumpkin from the cellar and we made pumpkin soup.
We walked in the national forest across the road where last summer I had seen farmers scything the hay.
And, along the road to the small city centre, we saw horses in the snow.
Monica took us into Krakow.
Where we saw those familiar places--St. Mary's Church,
The Monument to the great nineteenth century Polish poet, Adam Mickiewicz,
Kevin's favorite painting, Ecstasy! (Museum Under Remont)
Our old digs where little seems to have changed!
Our friend, Piotr.
Ramon joined us for coffee.
We had wonderful and restful days in Poland and on 4 January, we flew into Vienna, where we enjoyed art.
We found this triomphe l'oeil in the Belvedere which is full of the most amazing art. We spent an entire day there, with lunch in the lovely cafe. And, in the second floor lobby we sat on red velvet balls and screamed loud enough to make the chandeliers dim and shake!
We also loved the Leopold (which has a very good cafe) and the Wien Historical Museum.
We saw this large painting by Gustav Klimt was on a post card that Helen once sent me.
We loved the laundry scenes done by Egon Schiele. He often painted this particular village where his mother was from. He died in the flu epidemic of 1918 along with his pregnant wife. He was only 28.
Another artist who impressed us was Albin Egger-Lienz. This is a portrait of his daughter in her crib!
This photograph by Leopold Wittmann was taken in 1899.
This poor boy is selling pretzels, or bagels, like the ones sold in Krakow. This painting by Peter Fendi was in a large Biedermeier exhibition at the Wien.
We found these pretzels/bagels still sold in Krakow! Isaac Singer remembers these in his childhood memoir A Day of Pleasure.
And, for evening entertainment we attended wonderful musical events held around this beautiful city.
After nice dinners, of course.
The events included dancing. And, in one, Kevin performed, playing triangle with the musical quartet.
We enjoyed the atmospheric coffee houses.
Walking around magnificent Vienna in the snow was especially fun!
A great holiday.
Coming home took 26 hours--Vienna-Munich-Chicago- Charlotte-Columbia. Long because of snow and increased security after the underwear terrorist. We did get an upgrade on Lufthanser!
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