Austrian Neutrality and Pumpkins, Hurrah!

There are a generous smattering of public holidays over the course of a year here in Austria, and since we're still generally unused to the flow of these days off, they tend to pop up and surprise us.  Granted public holidays wouldn't be nearly as notable if the grocery stores remained open, but, alas, lack of food availability will always be something of an attention-grabber in my book.  Today, the 26th of October, is Austria's "National Day"; a day on which we are basically celebrating the day the country's Declaration of Neutrality was signed. Side note:  they were basically forced to do this by the Soviet Union, but whatevs...Austria is neutral!  Hurrah for not publicly declaring allegiance to anyone...who may or may not be Nazis.

The city of Vienna is celebrating their National Holiday this year with a military showcase in Heldenplatz (the same place Hitler announced the Anschluss) which I find singularly odd in combination with the increase of support for radical parties in the recent election.  So...yeah...weird holiday.

Outside of making sure the fridge was stocked, we honestly took little note of the date today.  Instead, we decided to jump at the chance to enjoy a rare pumpkin festival in the hills of outer Vienna.  Each year on the last weekend of October the Viennese flock to the hills to enjoy all thinks squashy.  (because pumpkins, as we Americans know them, are just lumped in with the rest of the squash family and are all called "kurbis") On public transportation it took us about an hour (a tram, a train and a bus) to get out into the hills, but it was worth it.  The Vienna woods (and even the grape vines!) are in absolute riotous Fall glory.

We met up with some friends and got to enjoy what will likely be some of the last of the season's Sturm and some fantastic pumpkin cream soup. After the girls stubbornly waited forever in line to have their faces painted, we decided to ditch the crowds and head into the woods for a stroll that was basically a celebration of Fall in itself.  Nearly every tree had turned a delightful shade of yellow, and as we walked, golden leaves showered down lazily around us.  The girls and their friends spent most of the hike running through the leaves carpeting the ground, yelling warnings about trolls and advising us on the best ways to avoid them.

Once we were out of the woods, we declared it was time to pick our pumpkins; two little ones for the girls and a short, squat lump of a pumpkin for Mama (something tells me this one's fate will find it in the stock pot for some homemade pumpkin cream soup)

Even though we weren't signing any declarations or publicly supporting the military, I think we still had quite the holiday.