After finding Jourdan and Celia by the Opera house we did what I love best in new cities, wandered! None of us had any specific plans or requests apart from seeing the city so off we went. St. Stephens cathedral with its beautiful roof and spires, we found Mozart's house where he died, the Hofburg palace and the continual stream of horses and carriages on the cobbles kept us entertained. The list of sights and neck craning architecture seems endless when trying to recount everything we saw.
We found lunch in the Naschmarkt, a whole series of food stalls with a strong turkish influence. I managed to give us an accidental tour of the university while trying to find us a shortcut to the markets. Luckily a nice guy in a white lab coat pointed us in the right direction! In the afternoon we visited the Albertina. As much as I would have loved to explore more of the museums unfortunately my budget didn't quite stretch to a 10 euro entry to each. However the Albertina was great and we all tried to act cultural while looking at the Picasso and Monet paintings.
After a decent amount of time wandering the streets we finally settled down to a huge meal of Wiener schnitzel and a very large beer. Definitely the most meat I've eaten in a while and I devoured every bite. Would be rude not to!
The next morning we were up early to make the most of our time and headed out to Prater, the theme park/fair with the giant Ferris wheel that is iconic for Vienna. It was a bit of a ghost town with us being too eager and most of it yet to open. Some interesting statues kept us entertained before we decided we were too cheap to go on the giant Ferris wheel and opted for the baby one instead. A wander over the Danube and Danube Island took us back towards the city where we sampled some Mozart cake (horrifically sweet chocolate cake) and coffee before leaving Jourdan and Celia and heading to the Schönbrunn Palace.
The palace was amazing with huge gardens, fountains and a ton of tourists. We treated ourselves to a Grand Tour of the palace which gave us an awful lot of history that I had no idea about previously. The rooms inside were pretty incredible with gold everywhere. The Austrian tour guide had an amusing sense of humour, very German. Her little quips and attempted jokes along the way made the time whizz by. All of a sudden we were in a mad dash to get back to the hostel and get our bags before catching the metro across town to the bus station and our departure for Prague. Lets just say I'm really glad I never have to see those people again as I was suffering in the heat with a pack on my back. So much so that I got changed as soon as we got to the bus station. The joys of backpacking in the European summer!
The bus ride to Prague was relatively uneventful. I find it quite interesting how quickly it changes when crossing the border though. From a very affluent, clean country to our dinner stop in Czech on the 5 hour ride. We were surrounded by homeless people drinking and a rather strong urine smell, admittedly we were at the bus station so I can't really judge but it was pretty different to the Vienna one. The road also went from smooth as silk to bouncing along a slightly rutted motorway which did not help my Woolworths bladder.
Rach is here until the morning of the 1st so a couple of days to explore Prague. Laura is already here and we're joined by Jourdan, Celia, Tessa and Renee before heading to Olomouc on the 3rd for a training camp for World Uni Orienteering Champs. The currency is 1 CZK to 0.06 NZD, a welcome change after a week in Switzerland and the slightly less expensive Vienna. Given that this is also my last country before heading to Sweden I think I'm going to have to splurge just a little bit on some shopping, will try not to get too out of control!
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