Graz: Nov. 3, 2025–Nov. 9, 2025

I’m going to weekly updates instead of daily updates.

3 Nov 2025
4 Nov 2025
7 Nov 2025

3 Nov 2025

Another one of those “passed by it dozens of times but just noticed it now”; there’s faded lettering on the building façade: translates to PAGL CANDIES.

Someone must have overshot the curb at the parking spot and hit the building next door to where I live.

Advert for Wasa flatbread. Text is “Wasa / Finally! / A harder protein shake.”

Wasa / Endlich! / [picture of Wasa Protein+ package] / Ein harter Proteinshake.

2025-11-04

I decided to take a trip to Köflach, a city about an hour away by train. Then I saw that Bärnbach has a museum dedicated to glass art, and decided to go there instead.

Bärnbach

I saw these on the way from the train station into town:

They are all-in on solar here.

Bärnbach written vertically bottom to top (rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise). The second A is a red arrow poiting upwards.

Sign with § 57a ; below it two concentric circles. The outer circle has number 1-12 like a clock; the inner circle has numbers 23-29 clockwise starting at the top.

This has something to do with getting your car’s safety checked 🇦🇹.

Trees in foreground and midground; in background, mountains whose tops are covered in snow.

Wooden fence with added pieces of wood at angles to the fence slats.

Church of St. Barbara

This is a church which was renovated by artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser. He was a great artist, and also a pretty strange dude 🇦🇹 (Click the “Englisch” link to see it translated.

Tree decorated with flowers and stalks of plants.

More about these arches later...

Side of church tower. At top, an anchor with letters lambda and omega; at bottom, a person on knees praying in front of a cross.

Fountain in foreground; church tower in background

Three-level fountain with a black sphere on top

Front of church. From top, gold dome with cross, clock, sundial, and archway.

St. Barbara

Colorful mosaic tiles at base of a pillar of the church.

Hundertwasser was apparently really into mosaics.

Pillar covered with blue and red irregularly shaped mosaic tiles

Red and orange mosaic patterns around a circular window; the result looks like a flower

Church roof, tiles in green and light blue form an octagonal pattern.

Wall of church, painted with large, irregular rectangles.

Mosaic of Jesus and Mary, with three dead soldiers in WWII uniforms.

This mosaic is dedicated to...

Unseren Gefallenen 1939-1945, with a German iron cross

Our fallen 1939-1945. Um, OK.

At left, wood statue with frowning person who has two very long legs. At right, a totem pole-like wooden sculpture with a chess knight’s horse head

There are quite a few archways on the church grounds, each with a symbol of some religion on it:

Triple archway (four columns, three arches)

Japanese Kanji for “nihon“; between the two symbols is a mosaic red sun.

Archway decorated with two long-horned antelope-type creatures in repose; between them a prayer wheel mosaic.

Arch with crescent moon and star at upper right

Arch with three irregular circular shapes design

Arch with native American religious symbol

On the way to the glass museum:

Mosaic Apotheke symbol in shades of blue, with orange and black highlights

Even the local apothecary got into the mosaic motif.

Sculpture of mother bear on hind legs with two cubs on all fours

Garden ornaments of whimsical gnomes and a Tintin-like person

Reliefwork beehive with a large bee carved underneath.

Wall art of a long-haired man with moustache and goatee smoking a cigarette. He is wearing a gray shirt open to reveal a white t-shirt.

Across the street from the museum.

Bärnbach Glasmuseum

This was well worth the € 8 admission fee. These pictures are in no particular order, just as I saw things as I walked through the museum.

Multicolored glass spheres hanging from ceiling

Re-creation of a workshop showing oven, tools, and some blown glass.

This disc...

Poster showing Jefferson Memorial and pictures of an artisan producing the disc.

...is like one that was made for the Jefferson memorial

Display showing examples of bulls-eye panes (rectangular panes of glass with color bullseye patterns in them)

Display showing red, green, blue, and white glass crystals in jars

Vase whose neck consists of intertwined glass tubes

At left, a white urn with brown spots and blue interior. At right, a translucent green sphere with white highlights

At left, a clear bowl on two “supports”, one green and one blue. At right, a large glass blow with a blue top and green bottom

View of lower floor displays from upper floor

At left, a fluted blue vase; at right, yellow fluted vase and dish

At top, cobalt blue dish with holes around edge; below a cobalt blue vase with stubby handles

Glass pitcher, pestle, and flask (looks like an Erlenmeyer flask) from 1st century CE

I think these are from the 1st Century CE. How they survived this long I have no idea.

At left, drinking glass with red vertical stripes; at right, what looks like a funerary urn with handles.

Glass sculpture with intersecting tubes of black and clear striped glass

Two glass flagons with a dragon motif on the handles and near the base.

At left, a wine glass with a trefoil shaped stem; at right, a fish

At left, a vase with spots of orange, red, green, and blue. At right, a vessel that curls into a spiral at the base. It is tinted orange at the top.

Two wine glasses, one extremely tall. Both have intricately designed stems with empty space in them.

At left, green fluted-top vase. At right, a sphere with multi-colored patches in it.

Green glass fish. At its right, a transparent green glass

From left to right, an orange plate, an abstract orange sculpture, and at right a vase that is primarily blue but clear at the top.

Four drinking glasses with ornate decoration. The one in the back is red with cut-glass design near the base.

Large green goose and two smaller goslings

At left, red pitcher and four red glasses. At right, clear vase with flowers painted on it.

Four ornately designed drinking glasses. The one at left has green highlights.

Closeup of glass with green glass elements

Two floor lamps. The bases are white with orange spots, then transitioning to orange. The upper part is cobalt blue. They look like large drinking glasses.

Very large beer glasses and bottle of Almdudler herbal soda

Apparently the giant beer glass is a Guiness World Record holder.

Display of various glass globes with different colors and shapes in them

Orange vase. Coming out at the top are twisted strands of glass in green, orange, and red, looking much like Medusa’s hair.

Blue goblet and ddrinking glass. They have geometric circular designs.

Abstract glass sculpture with a red helix around a central blue portion.

Orange glass bowl with lines radiating out from a central point.

Large variety of glassware. At center back is a large disk with brown, green, and blue sectors.

Abstract sculpture of what appear to be women’s legs wearing high heels. The legs are pink, green, blue, clear, and red.

Top section of floor lamp. The top has the shape of red flames projecting from the center.

Display case with drdinking glasses, a goblet, a jar, a bowl for holding candies etc, and a long scepter-like object with spiral blue and yellow lines along its length.

Variety of glass bottles for commercial products

Five drinking glasses in the same style in orange, green, red, blue, and black. All have circular “holes” in the coloring.

Glassworks available for sale in a variety of shapes and sizes

The museum gift shop has a lot of really nice articles for sale.

Bärnbach → Köflach

It was still pretty early in the day, so I decided to walk to Köflach (about 5,4 km away; a 1 hour 16 minute walk). I am glad I took the path that didn’t have a lot of buildings on it. The weather was perfect (about 15°C); the sky was clear, and the landscape was just gorgeous.

Along the way, you pass by Piber, where they train the Lipizzaner horses. That’s why you will see a lot of horse-themed photos.