Casa D'oro Luciani Vienna

... real garden along with a palace, so I really enjoyed it.

I made my way back through the gardens and walked up to the viewing terrace. It had an amazing view of the gardens, palace, and Vienna beyond. I sat down to have a snack and enjoy the view, but then it actually started to rain. And not just a light rain either, it was quite a heavy shower. I actually had to use my umbrella for the first time this trip. Thankfully, it only lasted 10-15 minutes.

I had one last stop ...

... of humor. And anyway, can there really be an expression for 'just rescued from drowning?'

It blows me away to think how little time I have left on this trip, especially since I was so ready to be home in Asia. I will just try to make the most of my last 2 weeks in Europe and get some more good stories for you guys, on a day when my brain has a little more sleep to come up with witty storytelling.

Off to the next cafe!

... to the Karlskirche which is just a magnificent cathedral. The entry fee was 6 euros which Darren felt was a bit stiff but as the church was being renovated the ticket included the use of an elevator right up to to the top of the dome. The cathedral had an awesome vault with a golden plate with the word for god carved into it so the light from the window behind shone through and around it. The marble and carvings were incredible as were the frescoes painted on the ceiling of the ...

... Cathedral (Vienna's St. Stephen's is gothic where Budapest's isn't). On our way out, we needed a "break" and wound up striking up a conversation with the owner of a Greek restaurant right outside the garden. He found out that Chris had a connection to Greece and immediately asked us inside and offered us each a glass of wine on the house. While we still wanted to lunch by St. Stephen's, we ...

... that it was raining for most of the time we were driving through the park, we had already been driving for 4 hours, it cost 28 euros to enter, and we still loved it. We saw mountains galore (even the highest one in the eastern Alps), alpine glaciers, kilometer-long waterfalls, the works. Check out our pics. On a stranger note...Alpine Austrians seem to have a nearly-unhealthy obsession with their mountain marmots. Yes, marmots. Giant beady-eyed gophers. At least that's ...

... ended up spending the rest of the day there and ended up having dodgy but brilliant turkish food from one of the market stalls (unfortunately gaynor talked me out of buying the Lenin medal I had my heart set on). So the day that had started so gloomily ended with in the blazing glory of new dawn... We had found ourselves a slice of Vienna that we liked and felt excited to be a part of. On the way back to our hostel we bumped into Prue and Sinead from Cesky Krumlov ...

... with the exception of Canada of course, but I live two minutes from that border, so it doesn't really count). I have been planning this trip for the past year. Everything went incredibly smoothly in planning for this trip which I am very thankful for. Our group left from Franklin Pierce University yesterday afternoon with a van full of all of our luggage and a shuttle bus filled with the 12 students and 1 alumni in ...

... Dinner at 7:15 PM... White Out Party at 9:00 Party (white clothes under blacklights)... End Day Twenty-Three. Drinks Imbibed on Day Twenty-Three: Beer - Zipfer Urfyp, Kaiser Shots - *******, Vanilla Schnaps, Stawberry Schnaps, Kiwi Schnaps, Chocolate Schnaps, and Clear Schnaps Mixed Drinks - Contiki Special, Jagerbomb

... the ruins of Kind Ric*************heart's prison (called Durnstein), have a tasting of homemade jams (which were aaaaaaaaaaaaamazing), eat a traditional Austrian lunch, and swim it all off in the Danube! What really made the tour though, was the fact that we had to drive about an hour to get to this region, which was WELL worth it. The Wachau valley is BEAUTIFUL and I would have never seen it had the prospect of a wine tour not been involved. It was really ...

... so it wasn't hard to understand. The whole family was around for one complete day, during which we went through all the Hundertwasser stuff I've spoke of before, then wandered through the first district for quite some time. We went up to the top of Stephansdom, which was quite cool. Big bell and a good view. We wandered through several of the major squares in the area - Hoher Markt, Judenplatz, and Am Hof. I found several things unintentionally - the old Rathaus (city ...