Vienna was still as gorgeous as I remember. I first visited the city when I was 14 as part of People to People Student Ambassadors (in which you are supposed to be an "ambassador," but really it's an excuse to travel on your parent's dime). honestly, I think it may have been a little young to send a 14 year-old on a three week trek through Europe because all I can really remember from the trip is spending countless hours in a bus, eating pringles (and not much else since European food was still "weird" to me at this point), listening to the Pure Moods II CD over and over (don't judge), and spending the only few hours we had in Zurich in the chocolate shop (Teuscher) - which was beyond completely worth it. but I can say that I remember Vienna having a lot of big, pretty buildings. and my memory definitely served me correctly, as Vienna wasn't any different than what I remember.
we arrived in the city a-ok from Prague, though it was a little bit before we could find our hostel (after walking in literally circles for a good half hour we came to discover that our hostel was literally just around the corner from the train station. awesome). the hostel itself was really cool and a very nice, clean place to stay. it even had it's own bar in the basement (complete with a free drink on your first night of check in)! Furi Kuri and I kind of each did our own thing in Vienna - which was probably one of our better decisions. I wanted to do the more classical visiting of the palaces and see all the fancy jewels and such (hey, I live on the UES for a reason) while Furi Kuri wanted to do more of the artistic, off-the-beaten-track scene. so we split up agreeing to meet at a certain point later in the day (which didn't exactly work out according to plan when I waited at the designated meeting spot for 4 hours before dragging myself back to the hostel only to have her come back there about an hour later saying she got lost and ended up at the wrong church - now if you know her, this is not a surprise to you). while Vienna was gorgeous and I loved all things royal there, it definitely wasn't my favorite city of the trip.
however, we did take a day trip to the Wachau Mountains for a bike ride and wine tasting tour. and no, we didn't end up in a ditch somewhere, clutching a wine bottle by the end of the tour - although that would make for a really funny story. it was more along the lines of have a tasting of these three wines at this vineyard, hop on your bike to this vineyard, have a tasting of these few wines, bike, wine, bike, wine. we did have lunch stuck somewhere in there too. and we made some great friends along the way! towards the end of the day we hiked up to the Durnstein Castle ruin that apparently at one point held Richard the Lionheart captive. it honestly didn't look too much like a castle, but it was definitely up high enough on the mountain to provide a gorgeous view!
now our trip wouldn't be one of "our trips" without a little adventure. and although it seems like Vienna was smooth sailing, she was saving it all for the end. we had to catch a train to Budapest at 7:45. by the time we left, dropped everyone else off, made it through crazy traffic we arrived at our hostel at 7:30. we still had to get our luggage out of storage, run to the train station, wait in line to buy our tickets (no mom, we didn't do the "right" thing and buy them before), and legit run on to the train probably seconds before it pulled away from the station. however, we were smart enough this time that when we bought our tickets we got seat reservations instead of risking the chance of sitting next to a large, smelly eastern European man that is trying to have a conversation while you are clearly giving him the signal of "I-have-my-head-phones-in-for-a-reason-so-I-don't-have-to-talk-to-anyone." which of course they never understand. le sigh.
p.s. - I didn't end up buying a bottle of wine to bring back home with me because I wasn't schlepping that halfway across Eastern Europe. however, I did end up getting a bottle of this tequila, cinnamon, and chili stuff that's actually really good (and it was a really small bottle) and a bag of rabbit shit. yeah, you heard me correctly - rabbit shit. it's actually dark and milk chocolate mixed together in a little ball that probably could pass as rabbit shit, but it tasted soooooooo good. so needless to say, none of it made it home.
(Rathaus, Vienna's City Hall)
(some of the wine we got to taste)
(the ruin at the top is Durnstein Castle)
[view from (almost) the top of the castle]
now our trip wouldn't be one of "our trips" without a little adventure. and although it seems like Vienna was smooth sailing, she was saving it all for the end. we had to catch a train to Budapest at 7:45. by the time we left, dropped everyone else off, made it through crazy traffic we arrived at our hostel at 7:30. we still had to get our luggage out of storage, run to the train station, wait in line to buy our tickets (no mom, we didn't do the "right" thing and buy them before), and legit run on to the train probably seconds before it pulled away from the station. however, we were smart enough this time that when we bought our tickets we got seat reservations instead of risking the chance of sitting next to a large, smelly eastern European man that is trying to have a conversation while you are clearly giving him the signal of "I-have-my-head-phones-in-for-a-reason-so-I-don't-have-to-talk-to-anyone." which of course they never understand. le sigh.
p.s. - I didn't end up buying a bottle of wine to bring back home with me because I wasn't schlepping that halfway across Eastern Europe. however, I did end up getting a bottle of this tequila, cinnamon, and chili stuff that's actually really good (and it was a really small bottle) and a bag of rabbit shit. yeah, you heard me correctly - rabbit shit. it's actually dark and milk chocolate mixed together in a little ball that probably could pass as rabbit shit, but it tasted soooooooo good. so needless to say, none of it made it home.
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