You can forget Paris and Rome! For me, Vienna is THE most elegant city in the world! Even in the middle of winter, cold, damp and grey - Vienna has elegance, charm and sophistication (at least of the Central European variety) that’s hard to top.

The Viennese are obsessed with opera (the city of fewer than 2 million people has no fewer than four opera houses) but even more obsessed with dance and most particularly, the Viennese waltz. There are many dance schools around the city, teenagers are strongly encouraged by their parents to take dance lessons and there’s a dance season during which many waltz-oriented social events take place. And it’s not just the dance itself, but also the culture and custom that go with it (not least the formal dress) that's critical for any Viennese who wants to make it to learn!

So unsurprisingly our first outing on arrival in Vienna was to a famous dance school to be taught (in a little under an hour) the rudiments of the waltz and the custom that accompanies it! I guess if you look like the pretty, beautifully figured and dressed 20-somethings who demonstrated how it should be down, waltzing is easy! An enthusiastic teacher tried his best to show us the steps and turns, but with the exception of the very embarrassed-looking 15 year old boy in our group who turned out to be quite a budding Fred Astaire, our attempts at being Viennese are not a great success!

We have an hour at the end of the lesson to change into the very formal outfits we’re instructed to wear for the traditional New Years Eve Gala held in the grand ballroom of Vienna’s old Town Hall, the Rathaus. We all look pretty smart!! Even the 15-year old boy is sporting a tux and the two teenage girls in our group look as expected - although mostly still far too “cool” to actually interact with anyone else. The oldest member of our group (if not by age, then certainly be appearance) stumbles on entry to the Rathaus and ends up in a crumpled heap on the ground. Shaken up, but fortunately nothing broken, he’s hoisted to his feet and later in the evening he’s up and “waltzing”.

We eat, drink and “waltz” (well, at least shuffle) our way to midnight and a pretty spectacular new year firework display of which we get a great view from the Rathaus balcony overlooking the masses jammed into the square below.

A short night later and we’re back out in a caravan of horse-drawn carriages driving through the near deserted streets “inside the Ring” that marks Vienna’s boundary of the old Imperial city. The few tourists around on this very cold first day of 2019 are fascinated by our caravan and seemingly having taken enough photos of the grand old buildings, we’re now the main attraction!

New Year’s Day in Vienna means the famous concert of Strauss family hits performed by the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra which is broadcast around the world. We get to watch also, but not at the concert hall itself (tickets are reserved for the rich, famous and well-connected of Vienna) but instead on TV screens set up in the dramatic basement banqueting space of the 19th century Palais Coburg (built by the family from which Prince Albert and subsequent generations of the British Royal family sprang). 

In addition to the concert though, we also get a rather extensive and very delicious brunch buffet. Back out in the street later, we see the “lucky concert goers” stampeding into nearby restaurants (a former Austrian president is spotted heading into the Palais Coburg). As we head off for an afternoon in the Vienna Woods, I can only think that we lucked out!!