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Winter semester break: Five things to do with kids in Vienna during the holidays

Austrian children have their Semesterferien, a week off school, during the month of February. In Vienna, the holidays start on February 4th. Here are five things to help them enjoy their time off.

Published: 3 February 2023 16:52 CET
Updated: 6 February 2023 13:52 CET

Winter semester break: Five things to do with kids in Vienna during the holidays

Rathaus Park's is a go-to place every winter in Vienna. (Photo by Datingjungle on Unsplash)

February is a much beloved month among many students, as schools go on a short one-week holiday and families take the opportunity to travel. The break takes place on different dates each year and varies depending on the state.

In Vienna, the break starts on Saturday, February 4th, and ends on Sunday, February 12th.

READ ALSO: What’s happening in Vienna in February 2023?

Many schools and families take this time to travel to the west of the country, where Austria’s best skiing resorts are located. However, if you are staying in the capital for the next week, here are a few suggestions of places to take your kids to – many of them for free.

Spielcenter in Wiener Rathaus

The Vienna City Hall will be transformed into a giant play centre from February 9th to 11th, open from 2 pm to 7 pm. Families with children up to the age of 13 can try out board games and games at the Game Zone, have their face painted as their favourite animal or superhero, design their own games in the workshop and build robots.

You can read more about it HERE.

Wiener Eistraum

For those who prefer to be out in the fresh air, there is an excellent possibility just outside of the City Hall, as the Wiener Eistraum ice skating area is still open. In addition, several skiing paths can even take you uphill and downhill. Families are welcome, even with smaller children, as the city rents out age-appropriate gear.

You can read more about it HERE.

READ ALSO: Here are over 20 things you can do in Vienna for free

Theatre for young audiences

Also, parents can find the Dschungel Wien in downtown Vienna, a theatre house for young audiences. There, on the first vacation weekend, the play “Leinen los!” for children aged five and up can be seen at 4 pm each day. Puppeteer Michael A. Pöllmann brings little wooden puppets to life.

In addition, the Children’s Theater is showing the play “Cosma Superheroine” for kids nine and older during the semester break, in which the protagonist takes care of her hard-working father.

You can read more about it HERE.

Online coding classes

Over several Fridays at 3 pm, children ages 8 to 13 can learn how to write code, develop websites, or programme apps and graphs online. The events are part of the CoderDojo club, a worldwide network of coding clubs for children and young people.

The kids playfully discover technology and learn online (via Zoom). There is no need to register.

You can read more about it HERE.

READ ALSO: One day in Vienna: How to spend 24 hours in the Austrian capital

Wiener Winter Circus

Immerse yourself in the fascinating realm of the circus ring – for children from 6 to 13 years. A winter fairy tale with ponies, goats, ducks, pigeons and surprises awaits you. The circus attraction brings international artists, funny clowns and adorably arranged animal acts.

The show takes place on several weekend dates, and entry for kids costs €12.

You can read more about it HERE.

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Vienna Festival director Milo Rau hits back at anti-Semitism accusations

As the conflict in Gaza sharply polarises opinion, “we must be inflexible” in defending the free exchange of ideas and opinions, the acclaimed Swiss director told AFP in an interview this week.

“I’m not going to take a step aside… If we let the antagonism of the war and of our society seep into our cultural and academic institutions, we will have completely lost,” said the 47-year-old, who will inaugurate the Wiener Festwochen, a festival of theatre, concerts, opera, film and lectures that runs until June 23rd in the Austrian capital and that has taken on a more political turn under his tenure.

The Swiss director has made his name as a provocateur, whether travelling to Moscow to stage a re-enactment of the trial of Russian protest punk band Pussy Riot, using children to play out the story of notorious Belgian paedophile Marc Dutroux, or trying to recruit Islamic State jihadists as actors.

Completely ridiculous

The Vienna Festival has angered Austria’s conservative-led government — which is close to Israel — by inviting Greek former finance minister Yanis Varoufakis and French Nobel Prize winner for literature Annie Ernaux, both considered too critical of Israel.

A speech ahead of the festival on Judenplatz (Jews’ Square) by Israeli-German philosopher Omri Boehm — who has called for replacing Israel with a bi-national state for Arabs and Jews — also made noise.

“Who will be left to invite? Every day, there are around ten articles accusing us of being anti-Semitic, saying that our flag looks like the Palestinian flag, completely ridiculous things,” Rau said, as he worked from a giant bed which has been especially designed by art students and installed at the festival office.

Hamas’ bloody October 7th assault on southern Israel and the devastating Israeli response have stoked existing rancour over the Middle East conflict between two diametrically opposed camps in Europe.

In this climate, “listening to the other side is already treachery,” lamented the artistic director.

“Wars begin in this impossibility of listening, and I find it sad that we Europeans are repeating war at our level,” he said.

As head of also the NTGent theatre in the Belgian city of Ghent, he adds his time currently “is divided between a pro-Palestinian country and a pro-Israeli country,” or between “colonial guilt” in Belgium and “genocide guilt” in Austria, Adolf Hitler’s birthplace.

Institutional revolution

The “Free Republic of Vienna” will be proclaimed on Friday as this year’s Vienna Festival celebrates. according to Rau, “a second modernism, democratic, open to the world” in the city of the father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, and artist and symbolist master Gustav Klimt.

Some 50,000 people are expected to attend the opening ceremony on the square in front of Vienna’s majestic neo-Gothic town hall.

With Rau describing it as an “institutional revolution” and unlike any other festival in Europe, the republic has its own anthem, its own flag and a council made up of Viennese citizens, as well as honorary members, including Varoufakis and Ernaux, who will participate virtually in the debates.

The republic will also have show trials — with real lawyers, judges and politicians participating — on three weekends.

Though there won’t be any verdicts, Rau himself will be in the dock to embody “the elitist art system”, followed by the republic of Austria and finally by the anti-immigrant far-right Freedom Party (FPOe), which leads polls in the Alpine EU member ahead of September national elections.

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