Inside knowledge. It’s not as important in some places. Paris, for example, is hard not to enjoy, as are Tuscany, and sunny happy places like Byron Bay. Travel is easy where the sights and culture of destinations reveal themselves spontaneously. But there are other places where what lies on the surface is only a fraction of what is available underneath – in Bologna, for example, Melbourne, Dubai. And my latest to add to the list, Vienna.
I needed a stop-over on my way to Dubrovnik this year – a difficult place to reach directly from Dubai - and rather than flying Al Italia or Air Croatia from Rome, I opted for Vienna (and the better reputed Austrian Airlines).
When friends and acquaintances discovered I was going to Vienna, they generally erupted in glee. “I LOVE Vienna!” they would tell me. “Ooh the music!”, “Deliciously old-fashioned!”, fun, beautiful, genuine, they would say. They had lived there, studying, working, spent two months shacked up with a ski instructor in the off-season. One would say they built me up.
I found a pretty and clean city with very little soul. Read more »With love from Sarah @the_hedonista
