Vienna City Hike Path #4 – Jubiläumswarte

I woke up with low energy on Saturday – probably because I stayed up late watching movies Friday night.  Still, the sun was coming out and it would be warmer than on Sunday (-2, but -7 degrees with the wind chill), so I focused on how much I enjoy being out in nature in order to get myself off my computer chair and out the door. Even waiting for tram 49 down the street I considered turning back, but I knew this wasn’t an intuitive message – it was the kind of mental noise that stops me from doing things I enjoy.   Already, it was late – almost 1pm.  Instead of doing all the city hikes in order, therefore, I found the shortest one on the list, City Hike #4 – Jubiläumswarte – 7.2 km and an estimated 2.5 – 3 hours.

I’m really glad I got out.  It felt good to be moving and seeing new things.  This trail went through parks, hillside garden communities, forests, etc. No vineyards this time.

Sure, it was colder than last week, but after a few minutes on steep inclines, my hands warmed up. An advantage to the cold weather was that there was no mud this week.  Instead, there was a dusting of snow on the higher elevations (hadn’t seen snow since Christmas in Canada).

At the top was the Jubiläumswarte tower.  I saw someone going up and so I worked up the resolve to do it – it would be a shame to have climbed all the way up here and not see the view, even if I was still in low gear.  You can understand, therefore, why I had mixed feelings when I realized he had climbed over a shoulder-height winter fence to do it – something I wasn’t willing to do.

There were a lot less people than the other hikes, and only 1 restaurant near the very end.  I didn’t want to eat there because soon it would be dark, and I didn’t know how far I still had to go.  At one point, I added about 20 minutes to my trek when I took a wrong turn. There are lots of signs, but sometimes, it’s just not clear with all the criss-crossing trails and my assumption that the biggest of the 2 paths in front of me was the correct one was wrong.  Oh well… no big deal.  When I did catch up to creatures of the human variety, I was instructed to turn back. Even with that detour, the whole trail only took me 2.5 hours.

When I got back to my neighbourhood at 4pm, I decided to try a vegan restaurant called Loving Hut.  I had a coconut curry dish that came with rice and salad for 8 Euros.  It was quite good and very welcomed as I hadn’t eaten since my bowl of porridge at 9am.

I’m glad I pushed myself.  Who knows how long the trails will still be safe to walk – a bit more ice and I wouldn’t have wanted to be up there.  And even with that outing, I still have plenty of time to do my packing, laundry, cooking for the week ahead, and work on my quotes project.  I’m sharing a quote a day on my public Facebook Page.  Here’s one from last week.