Vienna, Day 1

Unfortunately, the actual end to our Budapest stay probably soured by view of the city for good. We arrived a little early to the train station and the platform for our train wasn't posted yet. However, as we were standing there, a nice man who looked like a conductor came over and asked us if we were heading to Vienna. A little surprised at how he knew, I nevertheless readily agreed and proceeded follow him to a nearby train. He asked what kind of seats we'd gotten, etc etc and just seemed like a friendly, smiley, nice man. It wasn't until he started hefting our luggage up onto the train, putting onto the overhead racks in a private compartment that it dawned on me that we'd probably have to tip him and was this really the conductor?? As it turns out, no. He wasn't a conductor. And yes, he definitely wanted a tip. And a big tip at that. But we'd done our best to use up all our hungarian florints and we hadn't exchanged for any Euros yet. So we really couldn't give him much! He left in a bit of a huff and I was left feeling REALLY gullible & like a total newbie (cuz as it turns out, R & C weren't as ready to follow the guy as i was, but i'd already gone...so all they could do was follow me). *sigh*

We were looking forward to getting some more rest on the train ride, but it soon became apparent that that would not be happening because of a little korean boy (i thought he was japanese, ah well, all asians look alike!)...who kept running up and down the corridor, opening & closing the sliding doors and screaming the whole time. Arg! "Who's that obnoxious kid? Why aren't his parents keeping a tighter rein on him?? If I had a kid...." were the general thoughts going thru our heads. But the the boy came in front of our compartment, looked thru the window at us and smiled and we all melted. We're such pushovers! Anyhow, we made friends with Poum Su, his mom and his big sister and chatted the rest of the ride away. :) who wouldn't fall for that face?

We arrived in Vienna, left our luggage at the hotel (of COURSE we couldn't check in yet....never can...), had lunch at a yummy restaurant and then headed out to explore the city. The first day we didn't have much time, so we took it easy with a walking tour. C planned out our entire itinerary in vienna (her fav city by far), so it was really relaxing for me. :) hee hee It got really cold in the afternoon though, and I (still getting over a cold) started coughing like crazy. So that was a little sucky. But whenever I got cold, I just used it as an excuse to drop into a store or cafe. hee hee We had Sacher Torte (a famous viennesse cake, really sweet and covered in choc) with viennesse coffee in the smoke-filled Cafe Tivolerhof (omg! they smoke so much here).

We spent most of the day in the pedestrian shopping area near Stephenplatz doing the touristy thing. Ducking in and out of stores and trying to avoid the crazy number of little kids running around (why aren't they in school??).

With feet that had already fallen off from all the walking/standing/shopping, we returned to our hotel and discovered we were staying in a virtual mansion of hotel rooms!! Mini bar area, living room with sofas & stuff, master bedroom, a tub AND shower....and separate room for the WC. Wow. We really wanted to luxuriate in our hotel room as long as possible. so we went down, grabbed dinner from a street vendor (gyros & falafels) and went back to our room. i was soo pooped after all that walking and shopping i sorta fell asleep in the middle of our after dinner convo. =P

Total walking distance: ~4 miles