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Saint Charles Church (Karlskirche)
Karlspl, Vienna Austria
 Not one of the oldest churches in Vienna (circa 1715), but truly one of the grandest. AZooNY's hat visited this cathedral while the alter dome or cupola was being restored and repainted. And what a treat for the eyes... |
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| Up we go,.. into the cupola and higher,
where the frescos by artist Rottmayr are being restored. |
 Quite incredible to visit the peak of the dome, where not too many have been in last 300+ years. |
At the top of the dome, there is still more steps to the real or "lantern" peak... |  |
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Don't get too crazy with the hat!.. it's a long way down... |
| From the top, all of Vienna is visible. |  |
Hard to believe that really only the 17th century construction and artist workers have been up here (oh, and the AZooNY hat now) |
 True gold leaf at an incredible height... or actually incredibly shinny gold paint that looks like the real thing. And the fancy marble used... well that's painted too. Very impressive that this high up, many ingenious steps are taken knowing that everything will be viewed from far far below. Even the murals are warped and stretched to be in the correct perspective from below. They must have had a clever computer program to figure all this stuff out... |
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Here we're up on the scaffling
that was set up to carefully remove the giant hat from it's perch. |
 Note the perspective of the artwork on the dome... all ment to be viewed from the church floor. |
One of AZooNY's favorite spots. Maybe someone
else will get to see this again in another 300 years or so..