Austria Local Custom Tips by globetrott Top 5 Page for this destination

288 attractions in & around Vienna for 49 euros !

This is a great deal that makes sense mainly for all tourists staying more than just 2-3 days in Vienna and intending to explore also the wider area around the city of Vienna !
Of course it also makes even more sense for everybody living in Vienna or Niederoesterreich !
With this ticket you may use the following attractions in Vienna 1 time each:
1)Siegmund Freud Museum
2)Schloss Belvedere
3)free dayticket for the park-train in Park Schoenbrunn
4)Haus der Musik
5)Riesenrad
6)Wagenburg (the royal carriages in Schoenbrunn)
7)Schatzkammer (treasury) in Hofburg
8)Heeresgeschichtliches Museum
9)Museum imSchottenstift
10)Wuestenhaus Schoenbrunn
11)Narrenturm
for these 11 attractions in Vienna you normally pay more than 49 euros already AND in addition you get many more attractions outside of Vienna :
Melk - Wachau - Ruine Aggstein - Schloss Grafenegg - Semmering - various cablecars and trains...
all of them are included in just 1 price : 45 Euros p.P. for a total of 288 attractions !
20,- euros for children, who did not have their 16th birthday before April 1st 2010.children under 6 are free !
Some attractions can be visited 1x, others as often as you want for almost 1 year
Unfortunately their web-page is in german only !
You will get some kind of a Creditcard to show at the entrance of each attraction.
You can buy this ticket at all places in Vienna and Niederoesterreich, where newspapers are sold (we call them Trafik) and also at every Raiffeisen-bank !

Website: http://www.niederoesterreich-card.at/noecard

Klimt & Schiele FREE of charge every 1st Sunday !

This is a way to save some money, when you come to Vienna on the 1st sunday of any month: See Klimt & Schiele-paintings FREE of charge every 1st Sunday of the month!
Museum am Karlsplatz shows a lot of interesting exhibits and on the 2nd floor you will see their Klimt- and Schiele-Paintings among many other great paintings. Taking photos is no problem there !
Every sunday this museum is free of charge for their permanent exhibitions ! You simply go there and ask for the free ticket at the counter. Dont make the mistake to buy a ticket there for the extra-exhibitions, because you would have to pay that also on sundays.
The free part is the PERMANENT exhibition, and that is also a lot more interesting than most of the exhibitions they have as well, but change them every few weeks.

-----------------------------------
This museum is just about 100 meters from the Karlskirche.
Get there by tram #1, #62 or metro U1, U2 or U4

Website: http://www.wienmuseum.at

N.Y.E. in Vienna ? - take the Sylvesterpfad

Millions of tourists will come to Vienna at New Year's Eve and lots of them will come to attend the special atmosphere there on the traditional "Silvester-Pfad" !
Silvester-Pfad is the name of various festivities in Vienna on December 31st, when all of the inner city of Vienna is full of different shows, food-stands and when you are able to dance in the streets ( IN CASE that you find enough place to do so !!) In front of the townhall / Rathaus you might get dancing-lessons for viennese-waltz, beginning at 02.00p.m. and at night you might dance there as well in the open air, another open-air-dance-floor will be on Graben.
Silvester-Pfad starts at 02.00p.m. and has an open end, although the official end is at 02.00a.m.!
Be aware of the fact that the city of Vienna will be terribly crowded that day, especially close to Stephansdom, where Bummerin, the biggest bell of Austria will ring at midnight !
Pfad is the expression for path and along that path you will find the right place for your kind of music :
Boogie Woogie and Rock n’ Roll live will be at Lugeck
Samba & greek melodies will be at Freyung
Music of the 80s, 90s, and today will be am Hof
and so on...

Tipping or not ? How to do it right in Austria ?

Tipping in Restaurants, taxis ect. in Austria:
I read many "tips" on VT, that it would be usual to add 10%-15% to the bill...
But THAT is simply not correct, as most people in Austria simply ROUND UP the bill like here:

2,70 --> 3,00
27,30 --> 28,00
246,20 --> 250,00
The only idea behind that kind of tipping is, not to get back a lot of small change and of course it is up to you to give a little extra for some excellent service !
I work in Hotel & Restaurant business since more than 20 years now, and of course I know, there are guests, who tip a bit more on a special occasion, for EXTRA&SPECIAL service - sometimes simply in order to impress a nice waitress...

BUT travelers on an ordinary budget ABSOLUTELY will NOT NEED to tip more than rounding up to the next full Euro !!!

ALL restaurant bills will and have to include the service-charge (gratuity) already in the amount that is printed on the bill, thats the austrian law (b.t.w. also in germany and Switzerland thats the same), so the gratuities are payed anyway and the extra tip is extra and it is totally up to you, whether you give a bit or maybe nothing at all !

Falconry & Flying falcons at Burg Werfen

This is a great adventure for the whole family, just take a look at my photos, the audience is sitting there watching, while eagles and falcons are flying in a short distance to them, you can almost touch them !
In the "Falkenhof" of Burg Werfen there will be daily performances of falcons flying in just a small distance from the audience, that is a really great experience !
Normally I never cared about such performances, BUT this time I had payed for it in my ticket already and it started exactely when the guided castle-tour was over, so I had a look and it was one of the best shows I ever saw : a lady and a man took position at different places of the large falconry-court, one of them had the falcon, eagle and other birds sitting on the arm and after a signal they were flying to the arm of the other person and landed there again, passing by the people in the audience without even noticing them, although the distance was less than 1 meter in many cases. It is a pity that my digital camera is very slow and takes a picture about 3-4 seconds after I press the button, so all I could do is press the button as often as possible and hope for some good snapshorts.
Some of them are quite good, some could have been better, next time I will be there with a more modern camera...
The Falconry-performances are in the "Falkenhof", step down the stairs at the restaurant, pass by the Casemattes, get out into the next court and walk down the steep path to the right !

Website: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/1ffe4/4e394/

Almabtrieb

Every year in autumn you might be able to watch a special spectacle in all the villages around of the higher mountains mainly in Tirol, Kärnten, Vorarlberg and the County Salzburg: Almabtrieb is an annual event in the very late summer or in autumn: It is the day when the cows and other animals are taken from the higher alps in the mountains back into the farms. For that event the animals will be decorated with flowers and you will hear their bells already a long time before you will see them coming.
Be prepared of the roads beeing totally closed for cartrafic for several hours on such a day, but it is also great fun to watch this spectacle. Also the farmers and alpine "cow-boys and -girls" will wear their very best alpine costumes.
My photos here were taken at an Almabtrieb in Switzerland, but Tirol is very much the same that way and the link below will show you the calender for Tirol regarding the Almabtrieb-dates.

Website: http://www.almabtrieb.net/Almabtriebe%202010.htm

a lot of fun at the cemetery

This austrian tourist-attraction in Tirol, about halfway between Innsbruck and Kufstein is mainly ment for people, who understand some german !
The Museumsfriedhof in Kramsach is a museum of funny tombstone-inscriptions.
The Museum-Friedhof of Kramsach is a small openair-museum that you will find inside of the garden behind of a company that obviously is producing modern tombstones and started collecting old and funny inscriptions that they found in various cemeteries of the area of Bavaria and Tyrol. They have a souvenirshop as well. Go inside, there is no entrancefee for the museum and it is a lot of fun to read these inscriptions, BUT You actually have to understand german in order to really enjoy this.

This museum is open for visitors
daily between 09.00am and 06.00pm
Unfortunately PHOTOGRAPHY IS FORBIDDEN THERE !!!
Thats why I printed just some of the texts here :
--- --- --- --- ---
Hier schweigt
Johanna Vogelsang
sie zwitscherte
ihr Leben lang !
--- --- ---
Hier liegt mein Weib
Gott sei es gedankt
Oft hat sie mit mir gezankt.
Oh lieber Wanderer
geh gleich fort von hier
sonst steht sie auf
und zankt mit Dir !
--- --- ---
Hier liegt Martin Krug
der Kinder,Weib und Orgel schlug
--- --- ---
Hier liegt in suesser Ruh
erdrueckt von einer Kuh
Franz Xaver Maier
daraus sieht man
wie kurios man sterben kann !
--- --- ---
Hier liegt Johannes Weindl
er lebte wie ein Schweindl
gesoffen hat er wie eine Kuh
Der Herr gebe ihm
die ewige Ruh !
--- --- ---
Hier leigen begraben
von Hunden verschlagen :
Drein Schaf, a Kalb
und a Bua
Herr gib ihnen die ewige Ruah
--- --- ---
Hier ruht der Brugger
von Leichteiten
er starb an einem Blasenleiden
er war schon je
ein schlechter Brunzer
drum bet für ihn
ein Vaterunser !
--- --- ---
Hier ruht die ehrsame Jungfrau
Maria Feilmoser
auch ruhet da ihr
unschuldiges Kind
Josef
--- --- ---
Oh liebe Rosina,
so manche Nacht
haben wir mitsammen zugebracht
bis der liebe Heiland kam
und Dich wieder zu sich nahm
---
Hier liegt begraben
die ehrsame
Jungfrau
Nothburg Nindl
gestorben ist sie im 17.Jahr
just als sie zu brauchen war.
... ... ... ... ...
Christ steh still und bet a bissl
hier liegt der Bauer Jakob Nissl
Zu schwer musste er buessen hier
er starb an selbstgebrautem Bier.

---

www.museumsfriedhof.at

Website: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/1ffe4/4ff79/

A special event in each September: Almabtrieb

Almabtrieb is an annual event in the very late summer or in autumn: It is the day when the cows and other animals are taken from the higher alps in the mountains back into the farms. For that event the animals will be decorated with flowers and you will hear their bells already a long time before you will see them coming.
Be prepared of the roads beeing totally closed for cartrafic for several hours on such a day, but it is also great fun to watch this spectacle. Also the farmers and alpine "cow-boys and -girls" will wear their very best alpine costumes.
My photos here were taken at an Almabtrieb in Switzerland, but Tirol is very much the same that way and the link below will show you the calender for Tirol regarding the Almabtrieb-dates.

Website: http://www.almabtrieb.net/Almabtriebe%202010.htm

Schleicherlaufen in Telfs 2015

Schleicherlaufen in Telfs is a carneval-event that takes place only every 5th year, and the next time is in 2015 !
It is not easy to translate Schleicher into english, but "sneaker" might be a good explanation : they have a bell fixed at their back and they have to make sure that this bell stays calm, this is why they have to move very cautiously.
Schleichers will always have a mask, a flag and some pretzels and very elegant socks.
New Schleicherhats are made for each Schleicherlaufen and they are really great works of art, I think I saw around 50 different such hats at the Schleicherlaufen 2010.
The tradition of the Schleicherlauf goes back at least to the 15th century as it was mentioned in old documents already in 1571. But the way it is celebrated nowadays is a tradition that was started in 1890 and since then it took place every 5th year, except of the times of WW II.
Around 500 participants will be in the performances and only men are allowed to participate !
There are mostly around 20.000 spectators, in 2010 the entrancefee was 8 euros for standingplaces.
The Laninger-familyclan is another typical row of characters of the "Schleicherlaufen" and they are decendants of local farmers whose brothers had herited the farms and they had to search for jobs somewhere else and were mostly living in wagons like vagabonds, offering all sorts of "services" for the local farmers, everything from prostitution to sharpening of knifes and scyths, playing music etc.
Mostly they were so poor that they could not even aford a horse and so the whole family had to tear the wagon.Togeather with the grandparents "the Naz" is sitting in the wagon, the Naz is a just small child, but smoking and also spitting at the audience, so be carful, when you see him !
The Big-game-hunters were my favorite characters at Schleicherlaufen. There is an elephant and a camel, there is an orang utan in a cage, there are apes and bears running wild, a lama with 2 riders, an oistrich with a rider and a giant turtle as a part of the parade of Schleicherlaufen. They also have a wagon and while they are doing the parade they will make also a performance with a trampolin and saltos etc.

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Telfs is just about 25 minutes west from Innsbruck and you can drive there on the Autobahn / highway, BUT dont forget to put a vignette (a highway-sticker) on your windscreen ! Ordinary roads will go there as well, but you will need a lot more time.
By train it is easy as well, the trainstation is called "Telfs-Oberpfaffenhofen", but make sure to catch the right train, because not every train that is leaving Innsbruck into the western direction will also stop there !

Website: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/1ffe4/4e90b/

Tipping in Restaurants, taxis ect

Tipping is a sensitive thing and you will hear a lot of different meanings about it. In many "tips" on VT you can read, that it is usual to add 10% to the bill...
THAT is simply not correct, as most people in Austria simply ROUND UP the bill like :
02,70 --> 3,00
27,30 --> 28,00
246,20 --> 250,00
The only "sense" of that kind of tipping is, not to get back a lot of small change and some kind of apprechiation for a good service !
I work in Restaurant business since more than 20 years now, and of course I know, there are guests, who tip a bit more on a special occasion, for EXTRA&SPECIAL service - sometimes simply in order to impress a nice waitress...
BUT travelers on an ordinary budget ABSOLUTELY will NOT NEED to tip more than the way it is explained above!
Nevertheless I saw bills with the printed statement "Tipps are NOT included !"
In my opinion this is a misleading statement because nowhere in the world Tipps are included in any price, because a tip is always a plus to the price you have to pay.
By the austrian Law the Gratuities have to be included, so our system is contrary to the US-system where gratuities are mostly not included and the wages for waiters are really very,very low.
In Austria a waiter is earning a lot more money by the employer than a hotel-receptionist or a chambermaid !