The ACTB Welcome Reception was held in Vienna City Hall

Vienna City Hall

Vienna Ice Dream

The famous, Gothic-style Vienna City Hall was the venue for the opening-night reception of this year's Austrian and Central European Travel Business (ACTB).  One of the largest and most beautiful of European municipal buildings, the Vienna City Hall is also one of the most accessible public buildings in the world in the sense that the municipal government of Vienna makes the City Hall available for functions and events such as this reception as well as Vienna's famous Life Ball, the biggest charity event in Europe and one of the continent's most glamorous events of any kind. 

The Vienna City Hall is not only a place for work and work functions; in a true spirit of belonging to the people of Vienna, the City Hall hosts a continual calendar of events and exhibits open to the general public throughout the year.  Not that you need a special event to come; interesting exhibits are always on display, and it's fun to visit just to take a ride on the paternoster lift, rarely seen these days.

In winter, the City Hall Square is transformed into a lively winter wonderland with quintessentially Austrian panache.  The Vienna Ice Dream 2012 just opened on 20 January with a newly designed ice rink of more than 7,000 square metres. In 2011, more than half a million skaters enjoyed iceskating on the atmospheric rink between Vienna City Hall and Ringstrasse that covered 6000 square metres. This year, the rink has been expanded to 7000 square metres and the skating trail through the park is three times as long as last year.

While the first night of this year's ACTB may be fun, much work will be done over the next two days as buyers and vendors meet to discuss agreements to increase tourism numbers and revenue in the region. 

Though Austrian Airlines offers fine service aboard its aircraft, the airline offers only limited service beyond Europe.  It is Emirates that provides Vienna with its most important air links with cities across the Asia-Pacific region—which means one of the world's most elegant destinations is served by one of the world's most elegant airlines.