About Graz
Graz is Austria's second city and one of its quiet pleasures — a university town whose entire Renaissance and Baroque centre is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The action starts at Hauptplatz square and climbs the Schlossberg, a wooded hill in the middle of town topped by a freestanding 28-metre Clock Tower (Uhrturm) from 1265, reachable by funicular, lift cut through the rock, or a zigzag of stairs. Across the river Mur, the friendly-blue blob of Kunsthaus Graz — the 'friendly alien' — anchors a thriving modern-architecture scene, with the Murinsel artificial island floating beside it. Don't miss the 17th-century Eggenberg Palace with its planetary symbolism, the Landeszeughaus armory (the largest historic arsenal in the world, with 32,000 weapons), and the cafe-and-Buschenschank culture that comes with being so close to the Styrian wine country.