We had a quiet day in Vienna this Thanksgiving eve.

We wanted to go to a coffeehouse this morning, since Vienna practically invented them in the 1700s. People would sit around and drink coffee and read or write or talk to their friends.

The oldest Viennese coffeehouse is Cafe Fraunhuber, but we didn’t know that when we walked in. I was looking for a place to have breakfast and we wandered in there.

It was old, that’s for sure. It doesn’t look as though it has been updated much for decades. Back in the 1780s, Mozart and Beethoven would come into this coffee house to entertain the customers with their piano music – not both of them at the same time, of course. As I enjoyed a breakfast of scrambled eggs and some good Viennese coffee, it was interesting to imagine the two composers had spent time there.

We headed to the center of the city where there were many people put and about. We went into the gigantic St. Stephen’s Church and then headed to a couple of holiday markets which are fun to walk around. They all have different foods and interesting gifts for sale.

photos: hot chips on a stick at a holiday market; the coffeehouse we visited; a mulled wine mug. You can keep it or get a refill in it. Or both.