Vienna

Following the Welcome Week four of us decide to head to Vienna for 3 days. Vienna is a beautiful city, many beautiful buildings and gardens. The train takes about 3 hours, and we arrive in Vienna on Friday afternoon.


Friday night we go to the Opera with super cheap standing room tickets - tonight's show is 'The Flying Dutchman'. This was an interesting experience - unfortunately we didn't find the English subtitles until it was almost finished!!

Saturday we go to the beautiful Schloss Schönbrunn, where we take a crash course in Viennese history...and have some fun in the maze!

The Vienna Four - Me, Cherry, Yao Yao and Joo Young.

Saturday evening we explore the city - gorgeous all lit up at night! After dark we head over the famous Ferris Wheel, with a ride on the roller coaster too. The views are beautiful from the top of the wheel, although by this stage my camera is dead - so I have no good pictures!

Sunday is a beautiful, blue sky-ed day - so we head to the park in the morning, and relax while doing some people watching. After a relaxed Brunch we check out the Austrian art in Belvedere, and although art is not at all my thing, I am pleasantly surprised by what we find inside.

After some more exploring of the old buildings and many statues across Vienna we see some huge tents set up around the Parliament - today is election day in Austria, but we cannot gather any info on what is happening. Talking to some Austrian students on the train that night there was some unease at the high number of votes the far right wing parties had received - as an aside, exactly three weeks later the infamous right wing politician Jörg Haider was killed in a car crash.

So far the weather in Austria had been terrible, but today was definitely an exception. Following the past two days of endless walking we are pretty much exhausted, and spend a fair bit of the afternoon relaxing under the sun :D

Vienna has some very classy statues, along with some more unusually placed ones - like this random elephant.

But on a more serious note....

Linz

My second weekend here in Salzburg I head to Linz, to see Kat and her home - Katsdorf! It is about 2 hours on the train, and when I arrive in Linz the weather is crap - Austria is not being very welcoming in terms of weather or temperature!

Although the weather is not so inviting, from what I see Linz is a beautiful city - many old buildings, much like Salzburg, but without all the tourists! Kat and her friend Kristina meet me at the fancy Linz Hauptbahnhof - the newest train station in Austria ;)

We go for coffee atop a mountain with some nice views over the city - here I am told about some strange customs they have in Austrian weddings!


Over the weekend I meet Kat's parents and sister, see her lovely home and surroundings. The weekend is pretty laid back - although a bike ride was planned on Sunday, we opt for a drive around Kat's place. When we attempt to go for a walk it starts to pour - so after getting drenched we head back for a coffee instead :D

My Room

After recovering from a good nights sleep on Friday...I was surprised to wake to a horrible day! Rainy, cold and miserable....I was a little worried what I had gotten myself into with the weather in this place. There seemed to be no one around campus...and a trip to IKEA was the logical way to spend the day -- still a popular way to spend a rainy day! (due to a lack of other options).

The beautiful thing about IKEA is that they have the same stuff in Salzburg as they do in Rhodes! And I am used to not understanding the names of things here anyway...! This was a crash course in the value of the Euro/Aussie dollar....but I came home with some essentials (towels, a knife...), along with some cacti, a small rug, a sheet (well, some material in the size of a sheet....they only have fitted sheets in Europe...crikey!) and in the process successfully navigated the trains :D

Although outside was crap, inside my bright-yellow room was all you could want a Uni dorm room to be -- modern and clean, with sheets provided, and although towelless the kitchen was also reasonably equipped.

Number 045..on the lowest floor - this means I have a door to the grass and volleyball courts outisde :D


The kitchen part of the room...



The rest of the room, including the IKEA rug..

Arrival at my Destination

My journey begins around 12noon on Thursday 12th September, when we finally leave home (about an hour after it was planned) heading down to Sydney Airport. My flight leaves at 3.50pm (Salzburg time 2.50am?). All the usual airport stuff - queueing, getting a dodgy middle seat, tears, saying goodbye, tears, another round of hugs, tears, immigration, security...and then taking off over Sydney.

With a brief stop over in Singapore, I arrive at Frankfurt (about 6am Friday, Salzburg time) with no idea what I need to do to get the train leg of my Qantas journey...but with the help of a steward, who even waits for me in the baggage claim and takes me to the right place...we get it sorted!

The next step is a train change at Munich...which should be pretty simple, and I have 20 minutes to move down about 5 platforms. Somehow...and it is still a mystery...I get the wrong train, heading the opposite direction -- along with 6 other locals -- so I didn't feel quite so silly. We ended up taking the scenic route - twice as long on slow local trians.

Eventually I arrive in Salzburg, about 2pm Friday (I think) to be met by my 'buddy' Johannes - hallejulah! - who takes me to my room and gives me a quick tour around campus, but it is obivous I am pretty dead and looking forward to my bed!

All up 36 hours travelling...from 2am Thursday to 2pm Friday (Salzburg time) - and worth it!