Austria

That old sign on this building, which now has multiple tenants, is for the Burgerspitalfonde von Eduard Bohm, founded in 1870 (although it isn't clear to me if this is also the date of the building). When I ran a websearch on this company, I got a lot of hits for the Italian-Austrian (later Czech, and still later Nazi German) General Eduard von Bohm Ermolli. However, it is unlikely he as the founder of this fund, whatever its purpose, as he would have been only 14 years old in 1870.

This is the Peterskirche, or St. Peter's Church, not far from St. Stephen's Cathedral. Completed in 1733, the Peterskirche remains an active Roman Catholic church to this day.

Here's another view of St. Stephen's Cathedral, seen from Jasomirgottstrasse.

Again, as I've said elsewhere, I don't do too many car photos. However, this was the oddest car that I saw while in Wien, so it was worth a look. It doesn't look too sophisticated at first glance, appearing to be a Smart Car ripoff, but actually it's a production electric car introduced in 2012 (it wasn't clear whether this was a 2012 or 2013 model). It's meant primarily for city use, and the base model has a top speed of only 45Km/h (28 m.p.h.). However, for longer trips, it's possible to order it configured for 80Km/h (50 m.p.h.). It wasn't clear to me whether this one had that option. The official range of each variant is 100Km, which is far from ideal, but adequate for light city driving. After all, the Chevy Volt has been tested at 56-83Km at a much higher price, so it's not like the competition is very stiff. Teslas can get as much as five times this range, but they're literally ten times as expensive.

Here's a front view. While small, some crash protection has been built into it, allowing it to exceed Austrian safety standards. It's one of the lightest cars ever put into production, though, weighing only 450Kg (992lbs.) (some sources put the weight at 474Kg., which is still lighter than an F1 car), which makes it lighter than an F1 car. In fact, it's so light that it is sometimes classified not as a car but as a "heavy quadricycle." In spite of entering the market three months into the 2012 model year, the Twizy ended up being the best-selling plug-in electric car in Europe for 2012, with a 28.5% market share of all electric vehicles in France. In the "heavy quadricycle" class, it held a near-monopolistic market share of 89% in France.

This plaque marks the building where Vivaldi spent part of 1741, the last year of his life. This plaque doesn't make it clear if this was the location of the saddlemaker's house where he died. Today, this building is the Sacher Hotel.

This is another historical marker of sorts, reminding visitors to the Sacher Hotel that this was where the Austrian "Sachertorte" was invented. Built in 1876, the Sacher Hotel, or Hotel Sacher as it's sometimes phrased, remains an active and successful luxury hotel with a coffeehouse for serving original Sachertortes.

Here's a wider view of the hotel, showing the coffeehouse on the ground floor. Unfortunately, it was hard to get a good angle on the building, as the streets were too narrow to back up enough. The building is quite large.

This was another near-futile attempt to get more detail of the hotel. As you can see, it also has a casino.

Here's a cameraphone shot of the relatively modern facilities of the Schwartzenberg brewpub. Presumably, this one is owned by the Schwartenberg family, but if so it isn't the only brewery with the name. There's another one located in Protivin, in the Czech Republic.

Here's one of the coasters. The design is completely distinct from the ones made by the Protivin brewery, being a different shade of green, featuring a portrait (I don't know which Schwartzenberg it is) and an Austrian flag, but lacking the coat of arms.

This was the dark, unfiltered, unpasteurized beer on offer. That it was good was unsurprising, as brewpub beer is generally excellent because it is usually rich, fresh, unfiltered, and unpasteurized.

Because I've never brewed beer, it wasn't clear to met whether these vats were for fermentation, aging, or storage. I note that they have vents on the top, but they could just as easily be for loading or emptying the tanks as for draining off carbon dioxide, so to me, a layperson who's never brewed beer, they don't mean anything to me. Does anyone know?

This is the El Pulpo Spanish Specialties restaurant in Vienna, with the 750 Jahre Wiener Hafner 1234-1984 commemorative mosaic on the right. It is meant to celebrate the 750th birthday of the Hafner stove fitting company. Surely, few local businesses today can still claim a medieval history, so it must put Hafner in a very small group of survivors. www.wien-konkret.at/wirtschaft/handwerk-wien/berufe/hafner/hafner-geschichte

This is the Palais Equitable, mentioned earlier, which was originally the local headquarters of the Equitable Life Assurance Society of the United States. Built in 1887-1891, it was the first building in Stephensplatz to include the beginnings of a U-Bahn entrance, although the U-Bahn wasn't actually opened until 1978, 91 years after construction of the Palais Equitable began.

Here's a closeup of the Hafner mosaic shown earlier.

As I recall, this wasn't the first or the last Royal Enfield motorbike that I saw on this trip. I was very surprised, as I thought these were discontinued decades ago. Indeed, the originals were, in 1971, but they remain in production in India, as the Indian branch plant never went out of business, and ended up buying Royal Enfield's brand in 1995. Of course, this could also be a vintage bike, but why would I see more than one during one visit to Vienna? If anyone knows more about this apparent revival in Enfield's popularity in Vienna, or what the exact year or model of this bike is, it would be interesting.

This was yet another brewpub, out of the many in Vienna.