Vienna

FINALLY! I get to tell you about Vienna. 

Well, I wish there was more to say, other than the fact that I LOVED seeing Sophie again.  Once again it was just about my favorite trip, and I got to see so much of Vienna this time.  Sophie showed me around and went into some

So here’s a quick run down of how my time went with Sophie.  I spent 4 wonderful days with her and I saw so much of Vienna this time!   Sophie and I set out to do some adventuring of our own.  We ended up at the Sissy Museum and got to see all the old china from the royals all those years ago and see some of the rooms.  Sissy was one of the most famous princesses of the royal family in Austria, but she tragically died and now a lot of people are really interested in her history and everything about her.  So the Sissy museum was really interesting.  Then she went off to study and I took time to wander around the city and see the churches I wanted to see the first day.

She went off to study and I went off sight seeing, and wandering around.  This is what

At this church I caught a phenomenal free organ concert.  Where I also feel asleep for a bit of time….(I was tired and it was prime siesta time!) and where I later went in the hopes of finding confession in English….but alas, I ended up doing it in Spanish….in Austria. haha. But the church was gorgeous and well worth my time

 

THIS is the national library.  Where the public can go in and check out books any time.  It’s MASSIVE.  Basically, I was jealous and want my library to look like that.

THIS is the inside of the national library mueseum.  Inside the museum they had cool old globes, and lots of old books and old games and pictures.  It was really cool to see and to look at all old globes of stars and such.

Another pretty church, as always.

After the first day of sight seeing we spent the night in with her family and watched a super cute kids movie in English that she’s never watched in English before.  Then we got ready to head into the city to visit some museums, grab lunch and overall meander around town.  That night she kindly brought me with her to hang out with some friends for the night at a couple bars where I discovered two things:

1.) It’s totally okay to smoke inside a bar in Austria, even in the non-smoking section…..  They were required by law to make a “smoke-free” zone in all bars and restaurants, but a small glass wall with no door is sufficient enough.  Or no walls at all….and just some posts that make it seem like an area that’s separated.  Also, they still have an ash-tray on the table and clear the ash-tray off for you when bringing your drinks…..Hmmmmm.  I don’t think the law is working very well.

2.) I’m still awesome at darts! All those years playing at Kristen’s house actually paid off.  We played with an electric dart board machine, but it still was awesome and I almost won, but Sophie bested me!  I was supposed to get exactly the number of points I had left and every time I got more points than necessary it added points on my score! Stupid machine!  Either way, I was wonderfully surprised to find that I could still play.  It made me really want to play again when I get home.  To Kristen’s basement I go!

The third day we decided on going to look for the graves of all those famous musicians that hark from Austria and Vienna.  So we made our long trip to the outskirts of town in the gloomy rain to find the cemeteries where those famous musicians are buried.  After walking around and getting a bit lost we finally stumbled upon the suspiciously conveniently placed tombstones of Mozart, Beethoven, Strauss and a couple others.  I saw suspiciously conveniently placed because they were all in the same place….and me and Sophie joked about how we find it hard to believe they knew these people would be famous and be visited by everyone in the future.  So maybe the gravestones were moved, or maybe happenstance was really on point when they buried these composers.  We were also confused because Mozart was supposed to be in a different cemetery…but he was at this one *suspicious eyes*…..

I was clearly excited about “seeing” Beethoven! 

Mozart’s (first?) grave

Schubert’s grave

They were all meticulously cared for with bright flowers even in the winter time, which makes me think they take especially good care of them in the winter because they know visitors come to see the graves.  It was stilly really cool to see.  Then we we found our way to the second cemetery where Mozart’s second(?) grave was located.  This one both Sophie and I liked better.  It was simpler and very nice.

 

Then when we were finished we headed off to Klosterneuburg (I think I spelled that right!) to my favorite part of the trip.  Sophie’s family has the coolest friends.  Their friends were having a party for no good reason and of course I was invited to tag along and spend time with good people, good beer and good food.  The only thing I’m sorely dissapointed about is that I didn’t get a picture of the food they served.  Can you guess what it was?  PAELLA!  Really, really good seafood paella.  Seriously, it was some of the best I’ve ever had.  They cooked it on one of those gigantic pans and had soooooo much food.  I could only eat one serving, but it was the best serving ever.  I can’t escape Spain. :D Imagine one big pan that looks like that!  It was really big and really good.  haha.

But that wasn’t the best part of the night….if you can believe it.  Sophie’s family is a family full of musicians.  So it only makes sense that they have awesome musician friends who throw parties and naturally set up all the equipment for a band in their living room so people can just start playing whenever they want.  So yup, that happened.  Throughout the night people just walked over to the equipment, teenagers and parents alike.  They played everything from modern music that’s on the radio to classic rock, and even a couple German or Austrian songs (those of which I didn’t know).  I met some very interesting and very nice people.  Everyone was very welcoming, and given that I didn’t speak German, they spoke in English to me and had some great things to say.  The whole night was passed with good people and good music.  I took an incredibly amount of videos and such, but I haven’t had any luck uploading them while in my apartment with the weak internet we have here.  Maybe one day I will get them up.

Oh yea!  Sophie’s mom finally used some liquid confidence worked up the nerve to sing some beautiful blues music.  She was so good!  We stayed at the party until about 1AM and then headed back to Vienna with Sophie’s car so I could go to church on Sunday in English!  We worked very hard to find a church in Vienna that had mass in English, since I was missing it so much, and finally found it.  So we spent the night in her families apartment in the city.

 

Sunday was a very uneventful day, and since it was my last full day in Austria with her we woke up at a decent hour, and Sophie lead me to the church with the intentions of dropping me off to go study for a bit, but she just ended up joining me.  Then we met up with some of her friends and wandered around and went into a free army museum.  Wow it was really boring!  But the guys we were with wanted to go it.  So we sucked it up and hey, who am I to complain about a free museum.  So Sophie and I walked through it quickly, pausing at the most interesting things (AKA: WWII Hitler propaganda) and looked at the gorgeous ceiling.  I decided that I wanted to buy this building as well and was going to host a wonderful ball. 

      

 

After finally ditching the boring museum for lunch we packed up our stuff and headed back to her little town outside of the city and on our way back home I pointed out a really pretty building on the hill top and Sophie realized she forgot to show me the COOLEST PART of where she lives.  It’s a really, really old monastery.  I’m talking like almost 1,500 years old! Unfortunately when we showed up it was pretty much closing, but it was gorgeous inside and Sophie said she got confirmed inside.  It’s apparently really famous because it’s one of the oldest ever.

It’s called the Stift Klosterneuburg.  You should read about it here because the history is really interesting and there’s a saint buried in there. 

But that pretty much sums up my entire stay in Austria.  It was amazing.  I saw great people, spent time with one of my favorite Austrians’ and my favorite Austrian family. I hope one day I can host Sophie in the amazing way she hosted me.  And I won’t forget my incredibly Christmas vacation.  While I might not have been able to be home with my family in the US this was certainly a great way to wrap up my time traveling alone.  I’m actually glad that none of my friends stayed, because if they had I would not have had the incredible experiences I had traveling by myself.  I encourage everyone to go on a vacation alone, because it is an amazing experience.  You never know who you’re going to meet or what’s going to happen to you.  But one thing is for sure…you’ll have an amazing experience.

Much love and thanks to all my wonderful hosts! <3