Hotel Bellevue Vienna

... br><br>Auch wenn wir schon oft in Wien waren, der 1. Bezirk ist nach wie vor sehenswert. Im Moment wird gebaut und restauriert ohne Ende. Ganz Wien kam uns vor wie eine einzige riesige Baustelle.<br><br>Wir waren aber ganz froh, als wir am Sonntagabend - sehr unsanft - wieder in Zürich gelandet waren. <br><br>Der nächste Besuch ist jedoch bereits geplant und bringt sicherlich auch noch ein paar schöne Bilder und Eindrücke.<br>

... known as Sissy) who married the Hapsburg ruler Ferdinand who ruled the Austro-Hungarian empire in hte 19th century. Sissy had a charmed but tragic life and sufferred depression and obsessions so her life was similar to Princess Di and tragically Sissy was assassinated and then the media and people made her memory the stuff of movies, novels and she was revered more in death than life. The tour took us through the palace apartments so was ...

... uneven seems to be the theme here - but surprisingly, it works. Vienna, Austria and Bratislava, Slovakia are the world's closest capitals at 60km apart. So one day I took a trip to Slovakia - yes for the day. Slovakia has recently converted to the Euro - so recently that both currencies are still in circulation and the locals have a tough time with conversions. Bratislava is a beautiful, if small, capital with many medieval nuances ...

... 10am--3:00pm!!! It was beautiful to watch but rather ugly to be out in. After the snow stopped we took a long walk and got some pizza, and again went shopping!!! Tomorrow we plan to see the museums (if they are open) and do a bit more sight seeing...the weather is supposed to get progressively better so we will have no more excuses to shop!! Take care everyone!!! Heart, Josh and Jamie

... due to the business practices we experienced from them. While we enjoyed our time at Schloss Shonebrunnen, and several other free and open-to-the-public Viennese attractions, we fell into one or two overpriced tourist traps and also paid more money than we should have due to unhelpful and tricky advice. It is our own fault for letting our guard down in matters of money, and trusting the Viennese to be less money-grubbing than Parisians or Londoners, but ...

... and surrounded in gorgeous green countryside. However, Vienna feels very American. The city itself is very small and the shopping district is made up of all the same fashions we have at home with McDonald´s every few hundred meters and even a KFC. The museum quarter has some old, ornate buildings and there are some beautiful cathedrals, but overall I can see why ski season holds the most appeal here. Tomorrow we´re off to Prague where we ...

... So just before the press conference he was given the notes from the meeting but didn't have time to look over them before going to the conference. So he proceeded with his press conference which was apparently the most boring press conference ever. Then at the very end he read the notes he had been giving without thinking and non-chalantly said oh and all travel restrictions will be lifted. This of course led to an uproar of questions like when would ...

... place settings. No. I want to be a Habsburg because of the library. This library, an utter masterpiece of baroque architecture, features two levels of floor-to-ceiling bookcases filled with precious tomes. This library has priceless manuscripts and incunabula and books bound in the finest materials available to an empire. This library has globes of both the heavens and the earth, based on the finest observations of the 18th ...

... and scorched buildings, and we had a very nice (though expensive) time there. Prague: We got off the train from Dresden at Prague Holsovice station and into a place I`d like to call "Hobotown". A magical land where grubby men with no pants flung insults and Molotovs at each other while bent and soggy cigarettes danged from their bottom lips. It was gorgeous. The smattering of `Policie` we saw at the station - men who were armed with so many weapons that their ...

... better and in a much, much less complicated way than our former professor. What took Dr. Thomas an entire class period to teach us, literally took Dr. Kraft 5 to 10 minutes. He is very to-the-point, shaky English and all. Lalaine gave me a cell phone that Kirstin Schmitt had given her to use on the trip. Since Lalaine's host mom provided her with a phone, Lalain gave it to me to use (since I was now the only one without a phone). Lalaine and I walked ...