Vacation Report: Vienna

What we saw from our super great hotel. :) Our new thing is to get two rooms that are connected... instead of a "family room". But when they connect rooms here , they put a door at the end of the hall and you get part of the hall, then you just leave your doors open :) Cute huh?

We watched HOP. In English! ...and yes, those tiny little children ate ALL that popcorn. It was real movie theater popcorn - Salty and Buttery, not sweet which is what the insist on serving here in Germany. Sweet popcorn is fine, just not at a movie theater. :)

Sometimes Scotty is the sweetest boy on earth.... sometimes.

We got on this train because it was pouring rain, and it took us here....

:) Good deal huh?


Easter Market - Really cute!

Top: Poppyseed and sugar syrup over the top of.... POTATOES... then topped with applesauce. Weird, but surprisingly NOT gross.
Bottom: Apple slices dipped in batter and fried? powdered sugar on top. Kids ate happily.


Painted eggs. Real eggs. :)

This is Poozie in the most expensive restaurant our family has ever eaten at all together. Mozart and all those other famous composers have signed the wall. :)


(Another pink bunny picture since Nana loved them.)

I forgot I wrote all this a while back... so I'll stick it in... it's a bit long... sorry.

Since we were in Vienna a day early Paul wasn't supposed to be at work yet, but I should have known better. :) While he worked at the hotel I took the kids to an obligatory tourist sight, Schonbrunn Palace.

It ended up being really cool only because there was an Easter market out front and a little tour train that went around it. Turns out Andrea Loves Trains!

The Easter market was just like the Christmas markets except you replace Santa with a Bunny. :) We bought some "interesting" food items there, just to try them... Unique. I'd never buy them again, but it was in the name of experiencing culture ...or so I told the kids. :)

Next thing we know it starts to pour rain and hail so we run like crazy people to a nearby tour train and hop in not knowing where it would go. Poozie Loves Trains and it was enclosed, we were warm and happy... It ended up taking us to the top of the Palace grounds where you could see everything. It was neat, the kids liked it, and it even stopped raining so we could get out and run around taking pictures before the train left again.

We went back to the hotel, picked up Happy and went to a yummy/way too expensive restaurant down the street from the hotel. The kids all behaved so it was a nice dinner and everyone was happy.

Day two in Vienna I took the kids to check out the town on what I thought was a tram that would take us in a big circle. We hopped on a tram. It went for ten minutes, it stopped, and the kids noticed... "gee, we are the only ones on here... cool!". Turns out it's not so cool. The bus driver came back, speaking some sort of a language, but we quickly figured out we needed to get off. Fine.

We got off and we are in the middle of a grassy area. No streets, people, cars, signs in sight. For the kids sake I confidently say, "we'll just walk across the street and catch a tram going back." We cross the tracks and see a tram stop and after reading the sign we determine that the next tram will be in two hours.

HA.

Then it starts to rain.

HA again.

Too bad I didn't have a map at all huh?

We decided to start off walking in a random direction and thankfully the same tram we had just gotten off, pulls around and is now heading to us. I'm not sure if it was supposed to stop, but I think the driver knew we were confused and lost... he stopped and let us on. 387 points for Vienna.

Anyways, that was a long detour from my real story... so I was still sure this was the tram that would take us in a circle of the city, and I figured I just got on it the wrong way... so we rode it for a while the opposite way. It was going really slow and the kids were getting antsy so we got off when we saw a trusty S-bahn station (subway)... We took the S-bahn a few stops and got off at the main square.

It was still raining but I thought there should be a tourist information booth somewhere so I made the kids circle the enormous church in the middle of the square. Nothing... but now we were slightly soggy and Poozie's shoes were soaking wet from happily jumping from puddle to puddle. I see a big ice cream store that we had been to the day before. I knew there was only two in Vienna and I was impressed I managed to find both!

We walked towards it and Michaela told me it looked familiar... yah, yah, yah... big old buildings, cobblestone, it's all the same kid. Then we see the Pizza Bizi place we ate lunch at the day before... Turns out we took two hours, rode two trams and a subway train and ended up on the other side of our hotel. We got some bagels from a bagel man and went to the hotel and watched cartoons for a while while Andrea's shoes dried out. UGH.

After I got my confidence back we ventured out once again. We went to find a big ferris wheel. Luckily it was big so we found it easily. :) We were the only ones there. No lines, no crowds, the entire thing was to ourselves... :) We took another train ride through the deserted amusement park because... Poozie Loves Trains. :)

I was feeling better about our day as we started to head back to find the movie theater that shows movies in English. Long story short... We roamed the streets for an hour, asking dozens of store owners for directions... Finally we found the theater down an unnamed side street/alley... and around the corner. It was worth it though. We watched HOP in English and ate two HUGE buckets of good popcorn. We had the theater to ourselves which was good for when Andrea woke up from her nap and was angry at the world... until she noticed the cute little Bunny on the screen. :)

Day Three of Vienna. Paul flew back to Germany for an unexpected meeting so the kids and I decided to leave Austria too. We went to Slovakia... as you do.

...to be continued.