You can thank Mary Jo for that title. I didn’t even realize that rhymed until she mentioned it…
Anyway!
We got an email from our college friend Jenna that she was going to be in Vienna for a few days. Despite the busy schedule for that week, we planned time. We left Linz right after Mary Jo got done with class on Friday and headed over to Vienna. The plan was to meet Jenna at the hostel we were staying at. Well, as luck would have it… or decision would have it I guess, Jenna decided to stay in the same hostel as us for the night! We even ended up in the same 6 bed room… with no one else! So that was cool. We were all pretty happy/surprised with the whole thing!
The first order of business was to get some food! We walked down to a little pedestrian area and promptly ran into a nice looking place. Mary Jo and Jenna had pork, sauerkraut, and a dumpling. I had a “cordon bleu” that was basically Wieneschnitzel. It was still good though. We just talked about stuff during dinner. Jenna did try to run away, but there were limited hiding spots and we quickly found her.
Once dinner was complete, we decided to catch the subway into the center of town to see what was rocking down there. We were actually planning on finding some dessert. It was quite necessary too. Jenna could barely wait.
Well, maybe that’s not what was happening there. It can be hard to tell sometimes.
We got to the main part of town without incident. It was actually pretty neat. We came out of the subway right next to the big church… or the old church… it was some important church. The streets radiated out from that point, but each had a little curve to it, so in any direction, you just saw the street curve off and turn into buildings. It was a neat effect.
I really liked the way they buildings were lit in that part of town. They had multiple light sources on each floor lighting up. It really made the details on the buildings pop out at you.
The big goal of this part of the evening was to secure dessert. Jenna had been down to that part of the town the other night and knew of a famous place to go. We arrived at the Sacher Cafe to have some famous Sacher Torte (cake). Weird thing though was that they made you check your coat… for a 1 Euro fee. Made me extra glad I had opted to leave mine at the hostel! Anyway, we sat down and had some cake.
It was a chocolate cake (obviously), but there was some sort of tart glaze on it. It was OK, but in my opinion it’s nothing to be considered “famous”. I’ve had better no-name cake.
Once the dessert was finished, we decided to wander the streets a bit. We saw a fountain and some statues, but the funniest thing was this super up scale Billa. Billa is the grocery store we normally go to. It’s not very big and it’s not very fancy. In Vienna, however, we found a Billa that had chandeliers,
statues, and fancy looking clocks.
Oh, they also had Bling water. Bling water is, apparently, bottled water that’s super expensive. Like 44 Euro for 3/4 of a liter expensive!
We wandered some more, then returned to the hostel for a good night’s sleep.
The next morning we awoke ready to face the day!
Well, some of us were more ready than others.
Jenna was actually flying back to England that day, so we didn’t have a ton of time. We did start the day off right with a little breakfast at the hostel.
Once fed, we ventured back to the main part of town and caught a tram up to the Belvedere Palace. We walked through the garden quick, then worked back toward the main part of the city. We stopped at a monument for a little stalking.
Well, maybe that wasn’t the main reason for stopping, but I sure took the opportunity! Random fountain picture!
We continued navigating our way back to the city center.
We stopped off at another little place and had a piece of cake. By that time Jenna had to leave to catch her flight, so we said goodbye and parted ways.
Mary Jo and I didn’t have to get back to Linz, so we took a little time and looked through some of the shops. We stopped at a book store. Mary Jo bought a book. I just gawked at the books.
We kept walking and eventually decided to check out the big church in Vienna. It’s a neat looking place, but it was 6 Euro to get in, so we decided to just wait until Joni’s parents visit in a few weeks.
That was the last place we visited. We started walking back to the subway, but took a quick detour for Joni to play on the cat tails.
We hopped a train and zipped back to Linz, ending our adventure. Today we’re just laying around not doing much… well, Mary Jo’s not doing much. I always find a way to stay busy, like by blogging! 😀
How fortunate that you ended up staying in the same hostel. That looks like a pretty cool church. Lot’s of neat architecture. I do so enjoy your posts, so thank you Will for keeping busy in this way. lol ONLY 2 WEEKS (not even) hooray
We’re going to take you everywhere and make you walk. You’ll be lucky if you can stand by the time we’re done with you! MWUAHAHAHAHAHA!
OH NO! can’t wait! lol seriously we both bought a new pair of shoes a few weeks ago. should be OK 😮 I hope 🙂