Mödling

Founded in the 10th century, Mödling has a delightful town center, now free of cars. Centuries-old buildings, most of them one- or two-story, give the town an intimate scale. Note the domineering Gothic Pfarrkirche St. Othmar on a hill overlooking the town proper, a Romanesque 12th-century charnel house (where the bones of the dead were kept), and the town hall, which has a Renaissance loggia. Later eras added Art Nouveau, which mixes happily with the several 16th- and 17th-century buildings. Composers Beethoven and Schubert spent time here in the early 1800s; Mödling was one of Beethoven's favored residences outside of Vienna.