Tag: museum

Babel & Backhuhn

Published on 28 October 2025

Last full day of this trip, still in wonderful Wien! It’s a Tuesday, so the museums are all open again, including the Wien Museum and Kunsthistorisches Museum.

Lots of walking around ahead, so a small breakfast won’t do today. The Morgenmuffel at Café Goldegg was exactly what I needed: basically an English breakfast in a baguette. And a basket of chips…

The Wien Museum was being renovated last time I visited, but today I finally got a proper introduction to Vienna’s history!

Kaffeefabrik, on the other hand, was indeed open last time I was in the city, but definitely worth a revisit.

Caffeinated again, I went to check out where all those Bruegel paintings ended up: in the Kunsthistorisches Museum apparently. Best known of his paintings there probably is the Tower of Babel, but I recognised several others. The Roman collection was quite impressive as well!

By this time, breakfast was largely digested, so I headed to the Bitzinger Würstelstand for a Käsekrainer sausage. Well, I was unpleasantly surprised by a very long queue—there was none when I passed it the day before—so I went to Würstelstand Südtirolerplatz near my hotel for that cheesy sausage instead.

In the evening there was one more bar completely new to me to discover: Die Freunderlwirtschaft. Not that many (craft) beers on draught, but there was a surprisingly diverse selection in the fridge.

achtundzwanzig was the perfect place to meet up with a friend again, and enjoy some Brew Age beers.

The last stop tonight was Gastwirtschaft Stopfer, for the Ausgelöstes Backhuhn im Körberl. A great ending to my last night in Vienna!

Wieder in Wien

Wieder in Wien

Published on 27 October 2025

To break up the return trip a bit—and because it’s a great city—I decided to have a two day stop in Vienna. I’ll revisit familiar places, visit some new ones, and of course enjoy the architecture, food, and beer!

Upon arrival of my sleeper train in Wien Hbf, I could already see my hotel from the platform. How’s that for nearby? When I presented myself at the reception desk of the ibis Wien Hauptbahnhof—fully expecting to just leave my bag there—I was informed my room was already available. Keep in mind, it was only 8:30 in the morning! Since I already had a shower—albeit cold—on the train, and I had tickets for something starting at 10:00, I just hung my MacLaren kilt to air out a bit, and headed out again.

Since breakfast isn’t provided on the Dacia Express, a quick stop at 15 Süße Minuten was in order, for a small breakfast of fresh rolls, butter, and chives. Deliciously simple, and simply delicious!

So the thing I had timed tickets for, was the morning exercise at the Spanische Hofreitschule. Let’s say it was not quite what I expected: it really was just little exercises of a couple of horses and their riders, two thirty minute sessions of that, and just a tiny bit of explanation just before and after each session. Not a rehearsal for the afternoon performance or anything like that. And no photos of the actual training allowed! I wasn’t surprised that halfway the second session, people already started walking out…

After lunch at Leberkas-Pepi, and a coffee at NÜD, it was time for the apparently very popular Haus der Musik. Is was more experience than museum, but it was a bit too busy for me to experience much…

After some shopping at the Original Salzburger Trachtenoutlet—you’ll have to wait until next year’s Oktoberfest to see what I bought—a coffee, at Koun Coffee this time.

I then finally went back to the hotel for a shower—hot this time—and a change, before heading out for my first beers. Unfortunately Hanf & Hopfen was closed this week, so instead I had yet another coffee a little down the street, at Coffee Junkie.

This means my first beers of the day were at Mel’s Craft Beers, where I spent quite a long and pleasant time.

Before imbibing more, with just a small breakfast and a rather small lunch in me, I had to really eat something a bit more substantial. The Waldviertler Knödelgröst´l at Waldviertlerhof was exactly what I needed!

A quick stop at Wombat’s bar—which in despite of serving some craft beer, very decidedly had a hostel vibe—and of course I finished the night at Ammutsøn, where I celebrated Zwanze Day in 2022.

Pastrami & Pubs

Pastrami & Pubs

Published on 23 October 2025

The second and already last full day in București I used to tick off some more local food boxes. It was also the day that a large number of hashers with the same destination as I arrived, which usually means one thing: bar crawl!

I had breakfast in my hotel: rather unusual for me on any day but the last one of a stay, but since it was automatically included in my booking, I better use it! There I already bumped into another hasher from BMPH3, who had also arrived the day before.

I skipped the coffee in the hotel—it it ever any good anyway?—to try some in the nearby espresso bar Coffee District instead.

Today’s museum of choice was the Muzeul Municipiului București, the municipal museum. I actually had to pay separately to be allowed to take photos, and it cost me more than the museum ticket itself!

After another coffee at the Sfinx Espresso Bar, I headed to the Obor Market to try some mici, as supposedly the best ones are to be found at Terasa Obor. There was a short queue, but luckily not as bad as I’ve seen in some vlogs! Simple but tasty, and that’s another one from the list!

To continue checking off food items, I set course for In House Pastrami & More for something I never realised was originally Romanian: pastrami.

After a last coffee at the rather fancy Sloane Specialty Coffee, it was time to get to the hotel and change, in preparation for tonight’s programme…

And the evening activity was the Bucharest H3 Pre-Lube Bar Crawl! It started at the Hop Hooligans Taproom—which I definitely wanted to visit—but I had no clue where it would lead us after that. Luckily most bars did not feature on my Wednesday itinerary, so I didn’t put my liver at risk by squeezing in all the bars on my wish list for nothing. After QP Pub, Londohome, and PaRdon Pub, we ended up at the Ironic Taproom, where I had been the night before. Well, I thought I had, but apparently the space next door was also part of it, with another thirty different beers!

Roman-ia!

Roman-ia!

Published on 22 October 2025

A new day, a new country! It’s absurd I hadn’t been to Romania yet, considering you can’t even spell the country’s name without “Roman”! Ready to discover which local dishes and beers Bucharest has to offer!

My Ister sleeper train wouldn’t even arrive until just before noon, so I had plenty of time to take in the views of the Carpathian Mountains and the Romanian countryside. Such a late arrival had the benefit I could check in straight away and have a shower at my ibis Styles Bucharest City Center. My room even has a balcony! Although judging by the presence of an ashtray there, it might have something to do with the prevalence of smoking in Romania…

Since I didn’t pack much of a breakfast for my train ride, I enjoyed The Pulled Pork Sandwich—and coffee of course—at Meron even more.

Time to delve into some Roman history at the Muzeul Național de Istorie a României. Here they have casts of all the reliefs of Trajan’s Column, and full-size replicas of the base and top of the column. With the Museo della Civiltà Romana now closed, this might very well be the only place where one can still see casts like this! There’s also a lot of gold in the museum, but I’m not much of a pirate…

The museum was smaller than I expected, so I already had some time to visit my first beer destination in Bucharest: the Ground Zero Beer Taproom.

Another coffee at Origo, and since I still had some time left before my dinner reservation, I already had a couple of beers at Ironic Taproom.

Then it was time to start ticking off dishes of my Romanian cuisine list! Although it’s quite touristy, even experienced travellers and locals recommend Caru’ cu bere as the place to go for local food and a unique experience. Three checks in one go for me: zacuscă, tochitură muntenească, and papanași. While the main dish alone would have been enough to fill me up, they seemed to have given me a double portion of the dessert. So while every course was as tasty as I could hope for, it left me feeling quite stuffed. Maybe I should have joined the dancers when they asked me!

Then it was Beer O’Clock! No seriously, that was the name of the bar! They only serve their beer in half litres though, which is not ideal for tasting… Next door at Tap Craft Beer everything was available in a much more reasonable 200ml size, so I had a couple of beers there.

The last stop for the night was the NoRoom Taproom—serving Maktoob and OneTwo beers—a place so small I first couldn’t find it, and literally no room to sit inside.

Budapest by Day

Budapest by Day

Published on 20 October 2025

After catching up on some sleep, it was time to properly discover Budapest: visit a museum, do some sightseeing, and finally eat something local!

First things first: breakfast and coffee at the London Coffee Society. The Hangover 2. 0—think breakfast burrito meets shakshuka—certainly was enough to get me started for the day!

And that start involved some climbing, all the way up to the castle, to visit the Budapest History Museum.

Coffee at the heavily goat themed Zërgë, and then some proper sightseeing, in daylight this time.

Then it was finally time to eat something typically Hungarian: lángos. I headed to the Hunyadi Square market hall, because there is supposed to be a food stand there serving pretty authentic lángos, according to some Hungarian vloggers, but when I got there, it was closed due to renovation works! Luckily—while having a coffee at Cube Coffee Bar—my new Budapest friend suggested an alternative, so thanks to her I was eventually able to tick off this particular box at Gozsdu Lángos Bizstro.

With this greasy snack in my stomach, I was ready for some beer! Of course I drank (at) Onlygoodbeer, or Csak a Jó Sör as it’s called in Hungarian.

Beer Point turned out to be a weird mix of craft and macro beer, so I didn’t stay for long. HOPAHOLIC on the other hand had a great selection, and as it turned out, I had stumbled upon a tap takeover by Metalhead, a Bulgarian brewery.

Then I was ready to tick of another box on my Hungarian food bingo, but the restaurant I picked turned out to be a daytime affair, and had already closed at five! So instead, I had a quesadilla dinner—and beer of course—at Beer Brothers.

The last stops of the evening were the Gravity Brewing brewery and taproom—an awesome space, with a great view on the shiny brewing installation—and MONYO Tap House.