After the Christmas Markets close down, Vienna sets up a big ice skating rink all around the Rathaus (city hall). We finally took the kids on Monday night after I saved upwards of 50 euros by hunting down used ice skates all across Vienna for two weeks. Not sure it was worth the effort, but it is nice to be able to go without having to rent ice skates.
We picked the best day to skate because it was the warmest day we have had in a month and because it was raining just a little bit, the ice skating rink was almost empty! It is nice to have the ice to yourselves when trying to keep track of four kids who can’t really skate. Luckily we put water proof clothes on them because the ice was a little wet and there was a lot of falling down. The kids quickly learned that they all really wanted to skate with Dad because he is much better at skating than Mom and therefore better equipped to help them! Marion gets to go ice skating one a week with her kindergarten, and even though she says she is not very good, she really got the hang of it by the end of the night!
There are a lot of skating paths to choose from which is really fun. It is a little bit like an ice skating maze. On one path there is this awesome snow globe that the kids really liked. Oliver says that skiing is WAY easier than ice skating.
After ice skating we headed over to the food booths for dinner and dessert. The kids really enjoyed spaetzle and kaiserschmarrn for dinner. Lucky for them Daddy came with us and the kids enjoyed lots of yummy dessert. They each got to pick out a krapfen (filled donut) with their favorite filling. James was so excited that they put letters on the donuts. His had an E for Erdbeer (strawberry) and he thought that was so awesome. We also tried a really amazing coconut cream cookie and a chocolate chip pastry.
Oliver was excited to take a picture with the Coca Cola bear. We don’t drink soda much, and if we do it is almost never Coke, so Coca Cola is automatically the most amazing soda ever. Elora snapped a nice picture to prove that Dad really did come with us. We hope to have many more ice skating adventures before winter is over!
