Events

Schonbrünn Palace was the home of the Hapsburg monarchs until 1918

The inaugural International Austrian Cultural Olympiad will take place in the summer of 2024 in Vienna. Students and families will be offered a range of accommodations at different price points including hostels, inns, and hotels. The International Austrian Cultural Olympiad program details will be updated on a continual basis throughout 2021, 2022, and 2023, but we are currently looking into the following possible activities, some of which would be optional:

Competitive Events
-Austrian cooking lessons and an Apfelstrudel bake-off competition
–Viennese waltz lessons with an optional “Tanzen mit den Sternen” dance competition at the Closing Ceremonies
-Buzzer Quiz tournaments on Austrian history and culture in both English and German
-Model Austrian Parliament and historical Simulations of the Congress of Vienna and the 1914 July Crisis
–Model UN at the United Nations offices in Vienna, with committees focusing on the UN agencies that are headquartered there, such as the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs and the International Atomic Energy Agency
-English and German language debates on matters of contemporary Austrian culture
-Musical Talent Show featuring vocal and instrumental Austrian classical, opera, folk, and popular music
-Scavenger Hunt in the historic city center (Innere Stadt)
-Family Quiz Night
-Great Alpine Trading Game (interactive game focusing on the Austrian economy)

The Ferris Wheel (Riesenrad) in the Prater crowns the Vienna skyline at dawn

-Policy Task Forces examining contemporary challenges in Austrian society (e.g. migrant integration, climate change, demographic shifts, etc.)
-Symposium (students present a research paper on Austrian culture and defend their thesis before teachers, professors, and cultural luminaries)
-Nature tour and hiking in the Wienerwald (Vienn a Woods) followed by a Yodeling Tournament on the Kahlenberg

Other Events and Sightseeing
-The centuries old Prater Amusement Park with its world-famous Ferris Wheel
-The Jewish Museum of Vienna and memorials and monuments to Vienna’s victims of the Third Reich
-Where modern psychoanalysis began at Freud’s former practice, now the Sigmund Freud Museum
-Running Club with tours en route past historical sites, including a stretch where the first sub-2 hour marathon was run
-Visit to houses of the great composers including Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, and Haydn
-A gastronomic tour of Viennese coffee houses with a special focus on Viennese pastries
-Concerts and outdoor musical performances, including the Vienna Summer Music Festival
-Tours of the former Hapsburg palaces including the Imperial Hapsburg Treasury at the Hofburg, and Schönbrunn with a visit to the Irrgarten labyrinth.
-A behind the scenes look at the Vienna Zoo, the world’s oldest
-Museum visits to the Kunsthistorisches (Art History) Museum, Naturhistorisches (Natural History) Museum, the Klimt Collection, and the Heeresgeschichtliches (Military History) Museum

The Baroque Melk Abbey overlooks the Danube in the Wachau region outside Vienna.

-Offbeat attractions like the Globe Museum, Esperanto Museum, the Catacombs of St. Stephen’s, the Hundertwasserhaus und Kunsthaus Wien
-Lunch at the city’s main market, the Naschmarkt
-A day in the Wachau countryside with a Danube Cruise, a visit to Melk Abbey, a bike ride from there to the ruins of Dürnstein Castle (where Richard the Lionhearted was kept prisoner) and a train ride from Krems back to Vienna
-Dinners at traditional restaurants such as Figlmüller (the spiritual home of Wienerschnitzel), Heurigen, and Biergart’l im Stadtpark, as well as a traditional dinner at home with an Austrian family
-Book Club featuring selections by Austrian authors, as well as Patrick Leigh Fermor’s Between the Woods and the Water (widely acclaimed as one of the best travel books ever written)
-Optional Post-Trips to Prague and Budapest or to Salzburg and Munich