Vi-enna a different country!

Ho-kay. Here goes.

We [Rima, Terry, Gennie, and I] headed for Vienna early, EARLY Friday morning to get there by noon. It wasn't a bad bus trip...the countryside that we past was lovely. It is super easy to tell when we crossed the border into Osterreich [aka Austria, just learned that today] because all of the advertisements change from Czech to German. We got into the bus terminal and got on the the U, the Viennese subway system.

Our first hostel was nice, clean and really big. That day, we wandered around the shopping area of Vienna [or Wien, as they say in German] and poked our heads into a quaint church. But by that afternoon, we were exhausted and frustrated by the culture and language change. Plus, it started to rain. And then it started to sleet. Fun times! We headed back to the hostel and zonked out.

The next day, we headed out early to the Imperial Treasury and Palace. We couldn't find the building we were looking for, so we walked around the entire compound. The Habsburgs knew what they were doing when it came to architecture. The compound is incredible, very grand and imposing. Many of the palaces have been transformed into other uses, like the National Library and various museums, but others are in use as government buildings. We went to the Silver Collection and Sisi Museum inside the compound. Mom, you would have died over this silver collection. The collection included several sets of solid gold place settings for 250 each. Because really, who doesn't need over a thousand gold place settings?

The Sisi Museum is in the royal apartments of Emperor Franz Josef and his wife Elisabeth. For some context [and to show what I learned] Franz Josef's heir and successor was Archduke Franz Ferdinand, whose assassination essentially catalyzed WWI. Anyway, their apartments are well preserved to show the lavishness of their lives. Redonkulous.

Yesterday, changed hostels in the morning. We wanted to stay in this hostel one night because of the views of the city [in fact, if you wikipedia Vienna, the panoramic picture on the page was taken from this hostel!]. We took the metro to the end of the line, then hopped on a bus up the hill. We finally got off at this beautiful building on top of the hill. Seriously, this place looks like what I imagine Pemberly to look like. There is a hotel sign and we don't see any other buildings. Clearly, this must be our hotel! We go in to check in, and quickly the charm wears off. There is NO one here. It is like the Shining. I half-expected Jack Nicholson to come wandering into the lobby. We finally find the receptionist. She sees our backpacks, laughs, and points down the hill. We walk some more and then find our hostel. Slightly less grand, but we still have that great view.

We unpacked and went back into town to the National Art Gallery and the Natural History Museum which face each other near the Palace. The National Art Museum has a large collection of Egyptian art, which I LOVE so I wandered around for a good bit. They also had lots of Roman sculpture and Italian paintings, so I had a great time.

Later, we went to the Natural History Museum. Lots of dinosaurs, lions, and bugs. I particularly enjoyed the gem collections. To each her own.

Today [my 21st birthday!], we switched hostels once again. This time, we're in the center of town. We met up with some other people from the Institute and went to Karelskirche. This is a beautiful church and monastery, very Baroque and ornate. They are in the middle of renovations, but instead of closing down for the renovations, they are making the best of it. Amid the scaffolding, theyhave a glass elevator that goes all the way to a platform at the base of the dome. This platform is a metal mesh, so you can see all the way to the bottom. The platform is 35 meters high, but that wasn't high enough for the evil people who designed this platform. Oh, have I not mentioned that I am deathly afraid of heights? Yeeeaaah. Anyway, there are stairs that go all the way to the top of the dome, six stories worth. Is that enough? Oh no. There is a spiral staircase that went into the steeple of the church. I have attached a picture of the church [not mine...I haven't seen blue sky in a while]. I went all the way to the top of the dome to the skinny windows.  It was quite cold up there but the whole vertigo thing has me sweating profusely. Lovely.  I'm sure that in all of the pictures of me up there, I'll be pale and terrified. Oh well.

After that, we went to celebrate my birthday at a restaurant called Delicious Monster. I got some soup and pasta and a glass of wine to celebrate. We went to St. Stephen's Cathedral after lunch. It is the Gothic church in the very center of Vienna. There is an elevator to the top and apparently my first trip up to the top of a church gave me confidence to do it again. Unfortunately, this elevator dumps you out outside on one of the spires of the church onto a platform made of mesh metal. Awesome. I quickly went back down.

We wandered around Stephenplatz for a while and then went to Billa for some groceries. We are cooking dinner at the hostel. The hostel is super cute and everyone is really nice.

We are leaving Vienna on Wednesday and then I fly to London on Thursday to meet Katherine. Still have a week of spring break! Of course, when I go back to school, I'll be in Prague. Life is not bad.