The beauty of Vienna and Prague

So, as expected, I’ve promised a blog and spent weeks ignoring that promise. I could give you a litany of excuses as to why this happened, but it’s probably better if I just get on with it. Anyway, I never said I would provide timely entries.

After attending our friend Lesley’s wedding, I traveled with my friend Kate for about a week and half. Our first stop was Vienna. While it seems like so much has already changed since that day (which I’ll talk about in other entries), this is what I can recall of that time.

I remember Vienna being beautiful. Everything seemed ordered and clean. Everyone was well-dressed. The stately buildings glowed in the early summer light. That feeling was probably enhanced by the fact that Kate was able to snag us a big discount at a five star hotel because her friend worked for Marriott.

My pictures do not reflect this because my camera is sort of broken. But use your imagination.

While our time in Vienna was pretty easeful, there were plenty of hiccups and mistakes. We booked this free tour of Vienna with this program called Vienna Greeters, where people volunteer to show you around their city. Our tour guide was this older gentleman who took us on a much longer tour than we expected and spoke of many things of which we had no interest. For me, there is nothing worse than being trapped talking to someone and feeling obligated to be nice and pleasant out of sheer politeness. Of course, it wasn’t the guide’s fault, but just one of those unfortunate things that happen. Another blunder was planned hike through a bunch of wineries only to realize most were not open on weekdays. But that is a part of travel. There would be no good stories or things to laugh about later without the problems and mistakes.

Amusement park we went to just outside of Vienna

Prague was just as beautiful, but had a different quality to Vienna. It seemed older in a way. It was a smaller city so the presence of throngs of tourists was more apparent. However, a tour through the Prague Castle was one of the highlights of the trip. And I liked that they didn’t use the Euro (they use the Czech koruna) so I could do shitty math in my head and pretend like everything was cheaper than it actually was.

View from Prague Castle

We stayed in this cute B&B that had a delicious free breakfast every morning. We would chat with some of the people staying in there each morning, which if you know me and Kate, was extremely surprising. I have not mastered the art of starting conversations with strangers, but I usually like it when they start one with me (as long as I have a way to escape if needed).

Me on top of this tower we climbed in Prague