vienne 1

the beginning of our spring break adventure! oh vienna, it was probably the "nicest" place we went to over spring break. i say that hesitantly because all the places were nice, but not all of them had EVERYTHING. vienna, was unbelievably beautiful, clean, the people we very kind and had great senses of humor, big, lively... on and on. will and i got there in the afternoon. as we walked off the plane, we realized almost immediately that we have no german under our belt, and that getting into the city would prove somewhat difficult, but make for a great story. we eventually find a tourist desk. without the address of our hotel, not even a general indication of its direction (drew had all that information because he had booked it; he didn't arrive until much later in the evening), i remember something about the schonbrunn palace, and ask the guy how to get there. we assumed that the marriot schonbrunn would be next to the palace with the same name. right? wrong.

the very friendly austrian at the desk pulls out a metro map and a city map. he points us in the right direction, giving us information on where and how to transfer in the train stations. about 45 mins later, we get to the schonbrunn metro stop, walk outside with bags in hand, and realize that we have no freaking clue where to go. it's not like we could have asked somebody where it was either... we don't speak the language (later, however, we found out that everyone speaks english in vienna). so we did as any lost pair of 21 year olds would do... walk to the right for over an hour in the complete opposite direction, along the entirety of this palace, which in my opinion is more beautiful and probably bigger than versailles, (probably because it was built later and thus it's more modern?) until we hit a 4 star hotel. we decide to go in and try our luck. mind you, will and i are dressed like bums, we're noticeably sweating, and are clearly not austrian. the two girls at the front desk looked at us, scaled us with their piercing eyes, and then turned around as if we weren't even standing there! eventually we forcefully got their attention and their demeanor changed completely when we told them we were lost. they pointed us in the right direction. after another hour hike back towards where we came, we finally find the hotel... had we turned left out of the metro stop, we would have seen the hotel as if it were the moon in a night sky... what a fantastic start to an even more fantastic vacation.

more about vienna in a little.

cheers, jhabra