Weissenkirchen, Austria

October 9, 2016

Today we are in Weissenkirchen, Austria and our planned trip is to the Melk Abbey.  The Benedictine Abbey sits atop a hill over looking the Wachau valley.  It is a Unesco site and deservedly so, but that also meant no pictures, so I’ll add either the pictures I bought or ones I found online just so you can get an idea of its splendor.

We entered the abbey through open air court yards that led into the main body of the Abbey.  As you face the abbey, the left side is set up as the museum that leads back to the library of over 90,000 editions.  The right side of the abbey is the private area of the monks and a school which hosts 900 students from grade 5 through high school.  Our guide told us her twin daughters attend the school but she wasn’t sure about her son, he was “lazy” – he doesn’t have the grades she told us.  She also showed us her house from the abbey.  She said it was $800 Euros per month for 2 bedrooms (about 1,00 sq ft), but that was from a salary of $1,200 per month.  Fortunately they have her husband’s income.  The average price of a house in the town that sits beneath the abbey is $300,000 Euros, so she said most people who live there are renters.

My friend Alida had told me her son went to school in Austria, but it wasn't until I got home and mentioned to her my visit to Melk that she told me that is where he went to school.  She told me the Benedictine monks are very different from our image of monks.  They make a good living from the abbey and the lands around it (vineyards), many drive BMWs, many have girl friends outside the abbey.  But if Alida's son is any indication of the education provided, it is exceptional.

The items in the museum were amazing.  One was a traveling altar that was 1,000 years old.  A cross with Jesus on it over 800 years old.  They had vestments the monks wore for different services.  To look at the fine stitching done hundreds of years ago was just amazing.  There were pictures of a beautiful gold cross encrusted in jewels.  Our guide said it comes out once a year for one day for the public to see.  Finally we reached the library, which is still active.  She noted books missing – you can still contact the library and check out books for research.  No books can leave the site but they may be reviewed in rooms within the library.  There are 8 rooms that contain books of which we saw two.  In the center of the room were samples of hand written books that were over 800 years old.  It was incredible to see the precision of the writing and the hand drawn graphics.  To think someone sat at a table and wrote the volumes we saw in that room was just incredible.

1,000 year old traveling altar

Painted ceiling

Chapel Altar

Christ on the Cross.  The wooden cross is over 800 years old

Library ceiling

Another view of the main library room.  There are a total of 8 rooms and over 90,000 volumes.

One room of the library.  The center display is where the hand written books were open for us to view.  If you didn't know they were handwritten you might think they were created and printed, that is how fine the printing and artwork is.

Part of the vestments worn by monks

Coffin.  Our guide told us that these coffins were positioned over a grave and once the funeral was over, the lever was pulled and rather than the coffin being lowered, the bottom opened and the body was dropped into the grave.  This way the coffin could be used over and over again.

Different views of the exterior of Melk Abbey

We finished the tour of the abbey and returned to the boat to sail through the Wachau Valley.  It is a lovely valley spotted with small towns with beautiful old churches, buildings and remnants of castles and fortresses.  We enjoyed the sites until we finally exited the valley and all headed off for dinner.