Roadtrip part 2 : My Viennese Waltz

I shall resume roughly where we last left off : hurtling at dangerous speeds through the darkened Alps. We made it safely to Vienna, only to be lost in the twisting city streets; we pulled over at a gas station where a very kind Austrian man let us use his GPS to find our hostel. The hostel was, by the way, on top of a small mountain (what the Austrians call "a hill") and far, far away from the city. We chose it because of its parking for our precious Audi. We missed the hostel twice driving on the street, because it is hidden behind a palace (also known as a very expensive hotel) -- at first I was frightened that I had completely messed up the booking and put us in some overpriced gala. ("I swear it said only 20 euros a night!") It turned out our hostel is pretty much the servants' quarters of the place.

Anyway, we relaxed that night with beer and chips (not fries, Eleanor, in case the Brits have gotten to you with their lingo) before nodding off to sleep. We started off our day in Vienna by buying tickets to a concert from someone dressed in a Mozart-period costume -- the Viennese have a distinct talent for exploiting Mozart, and I love it. We then meandered around and ended up watching the Jugendstil Ankeruhr (a glockenspiel) at noon as twelve figures paraded past. Being as we were in Vienna, a café was absolutely necessary, so we decided to go all-out and splurge at Café Central, a café that boasts of patrons such as Beethoven, Freud and Trotsky. There I ordered a 6 euro Café Amadeus and an apple strudel, and planned a revolution.

Afterwards, we wondered about to famous places, like an old jousting square (of course I reenacted a jousting game with the help of a friend), and several churches, one of which had a very disturbing monument to the plague near it. We also spent a pleasant fifteen minutes watching Austrian street performers break dance and shout in English ("Show time!").

We also visited the Hapsburg's winter palace, but it required an entrance fee so we just stood there. We went across town to our concert, which was lovely -- it is said that even mediocre concerts in Vienna are above average, and I would not consider this mediocre at all. Then, since it was Halloween, we spent our time in an area known as Bermuda Triangle, where there are a large amount of bars within twenty paces.

That night, because we are poor students surviving via car in Central Europe, we forewent any hostel fees by sleeping in the car. Yes, that's right. We returned to the hostel parking lot, got out our sleeping bags, and piled into the Audi for the night; the woods were our bathroom. I'm sure we must have looked quite a sight to people the next morning, with the windows completely fogged up, leaving only a jumble of heads and limbs in odd positions all over the place. Anyway, we then sneaked back into the hostel and stole breakfast (as well as lunch) from them -- I think it perfectly justified as the breakfast was terrible for a 20-euro fee. It tasted wonderful when it was free, however. We also stole their washrooms to try and make ourselves look like we hadn't spent the evening drinking and then sleeping in a car.

 We then trekked through the city to find the Hapsburg's summer palace, which again required money. We instead rambled through the gardens. We finished our time in Vienna at Zentralfriedhof where we found the graves of Beethoven, Brahms, Schubert and Strauss. (Right = church at Karlsplatz)

We then regained the car and navigated our way through the city back to the autobahn. (By the way, while we were still in Vienna, stopped at a red light, I saw some strange guy on the corner of the sidewalk opposite. I watched, horrified, as he stood there, stuck his hands in his pants and unzipped, pulled out a clear plastic bottle, and peed into it. He then rezipped, readjusted, and continued standing there, not even having attempted to hide himself from any cars or pedestrians.) Next stop : Budapest.

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Alison