Wien Weekend Pt. 1...

So on February 29th we headed to Vienna for the weekend on a bus with all the other students. We knew that it was going to be raining most of the weekend so that was kind of pretty disappointing.

When we arrived, we put all our stuff in the hotel and then met downstairs right after that to go on a bus/walking tour of the city. Like I said, it was raining and obviously cloudy the whole time so the pictures weren't really that great. I'll post some, but I really wish that I had gotten to see it for all it was worth.

Here are Caitlin and Emily trying to make it a good time through the bad weather

A cool statue and building we saw on our walking part of the tour

One of the most famous sites in Vienna: Stephansdom. It's a cathedral right in the middle of the city and is 800 years old.

It was really awesome to see from the outside (especially the designs on the roof). The only bad thing is that there is construction on almost every main site, so sometimes it takes away from it a bit as well - you can see it on the spire.

Here is another view of the other side.

Inside the church

Details on one of the columns inside - pretty awesome

Of course, we then got hungry and found...MAMA's Kitchen hahaha. We got some good Austrian food. Caitlin and I shared to save some money and got turkey gulasch (mit kartoffeln - with potatoes - well it was actually like a potato dumpling thing) und frittatensuppe. It was a great meal!

The infamous Mama's Kitchen. haha.

After that we needed some dessert, so we went to Hotel Sacher the place where the original sachertorte was created! The whole experience there was actually rather annoying because they have 3 different cafes in a row and none of them would seat us and kept telling us to go back to the other ones - when there were CLEARLY seats open. How rude! So we finally got a place at the bar and ordered our sachertorte - and after all that it was just ok! But here is a pic of the place anyways.

Sachertorte

After that we just walked around a bit and made our way back to the hotel. That night, we went to go see an opera!! Vienna is an extremely artsy and high class place with tons of shows, art, and museums....so we had to experience that. The best part is....the standing room in the opera was only ZWEI EUROS (2 euros!).

Caitlin, Emily, Natalie, and Michael who is obviously not looking - all standing in line.

Inside the Vienna Opera House

Emily, me and Natalie inside ready to hear some opera!

Caitlin and I in the opera house

The Opera was actually in Italian and there were little screens that translated most of it into German or English. It was packed and the singing/orchestra was amazing! I was kind of confused though and couldn't see the whole stage...but come on...2 euros and a Viennese Opera experience...so worth it! We then left after intermission (an hour and a half in - and it was 2.5 hours long). Outside there was a pizza and kebap stand - I got spinach, garlic, and feta pizza for 2.5 euros - it was HUGE AND so goooood. :) We wanted to check out some of the nightlife so took the underground around the city and found some clubs/bars. They were really crowded and we were really tired, so we decided to go back to the hotel (and the underground stopped running at like 12:30).

The next morning we woke up and ate the free breakfast downstairs which was SO good! We then had a scheduled tour at the Art History Museum.

Outside of the Kunsthistorisches Museum

The ceiling of part of the museum

Me posing in front of the entrance stairway

One of the many painting galleries

One of the most awesome/popular painting there

My favorite was actually the temporary exhibit where the artist Giuseppe Arcimboldo used pieces of fruit, vegetables, food to make people's faces. It was great!

Another shot of the museum's interior

A mummified crocodile!!

Me in front of the Egyptian part of the museum

So after we finished at the museum we were trying to decide where to go next and the big door to the museum opened and slammed shut - let's just say that the winds were like 35 mph and it was pouring. greatttt. haha. We decided that we wanted to do this apfelstrudel making seminar thing and you get the recipe and get to eat it etc,....we took the underground for like 45 minutes to get there (by the time we transfered and everything) and walked there.....we asked and they said they only do it in the summer. WTF! The booklet failed to say that piece of info.

Sad faces because we couldn't make apfelstrudel :(

Cool picture of the rathaus of Vienna (city hall)

So then we decided to have an adventure where we looked in all the travel books and brochures we had and decided to go to as many places as we could the rest of the day. We planned it out and found the route there too. We decided to go to Bagel Station (bagels were apparently invented in Vienna...), Centimeter (sandwiches for 10 cents per cm), and Cafe Central (to get our apfulstrudel and have some coffee which Vienna is very popular for!).

Caitlin and me (acting like a dummy) in front of the 2 spire church - which I had really wanted to see and we randomly came across it! yay!

Stop #1Stop #2Stop #3Our apfelstrudel - which was the best in the whole world

AND the best drink - Wiener Eiskaffee

Group (minus Clayton - taking the pic) at Cafe Central

After we hit those three stops, we went back to the hotel to change. We then took the underground back to the clubs/bars we had seen before. We wanted to go back to this place called the Bermuda Triangle and it was packed, but we squeezed in and just started dancing for like an hour and a half. It was hilarious that everyone loved the song "Mambo #5" and then they were singing all these Austrian/German songs too and we just mouthed it. I don't know....but it was really funny. We were exhausted and had to get up at 6 the next morning, so we had to leave. Of course the underground wasn't running anymore so we had to walk like 35 minutes back home through the sprinkling rain....all to save like 2 euros from not getting a taxi. haha.

I have to do Sunday on a different post, because this one is getting way too long....