Wien!

No, not half of the word wiener.....dirty minds..... Vienna! We left early on Friday morning. Ok, well it was like 8:30 when we left our apartment. And of course we left a little later than we should have so we literally just missed the free train to the airport. Its ok though because there is also a bus from the same metro station that goes to the airport, it just costs 4 euros. So we hopped on the bus but just barely because it was so freaking full. Literally not one more person would have been able to fit on the bus. It got really hot and I got really car sick. I thought we were never going to make it without me puking all over the lady standing next to me. So when we got to the airport (free of puke I might add) we noticed that our flight was a little delayed so we all just kinda hung out and got some coffee... then all of a sudden we realized that our flight was changed back to the normal time and was on the final boarding call! They didn't even announce it over the loud speaker! So we take off sprinting to the gate, because oh yea, they changed the gate on us too. We made it luckily. The flight was good but when we landed in Vienna it was a nasty rainy day. We took the bus to our hostel, which was really nice - The Wombat, and got settled in the room. Three of the girls were hungry for lunch but I wasn't so Zoe and I stayed back and took a nap... well the other girls were supposed to wake us up when they were done with lunch but they didn't so Zoe and I ended up sleeping until 7. It was a wonderful four hour nap but I wasted a whole day in Vienna! So then Zoe and I were hungry for dinner so we went to get some food. We found this restaurant that looked pretty authentic and it was pretty good! I got like a chef salad and a pretzel. Oh and of course can't forget the Austrian Beer called Stigle. It was still raining so after dinner we just headed back. I was being lazy so I laid down and ended up falling asleep for the night. So lame I know.

Then on Saturday, we didn't wake up until 10:30. We suck. We only had one full day and we slept in really late. Oops. But we got up and going and headed to the Hapsburg palace. We didn't go in or anything and I don't even think its really a palace anymore, its more just a bunch of nice buildings in on area with gardens and stuff... I don't really know but the buildings were pretty! And the city is so clean! We were walking around this area and we stumbled upon a St. Patrick's Day festival - with GREEN beer! So of course we had to join in! It made me so happy. I always say that Ireland was one of the best trips I've ever been on and I want to go back so drinking green beer and listening to Irish music made my day! It was so fun! We then headed to St. Stephen's Cathedral. I am absolutely sick of seeing Cathedrals and was not enthralled what-so-ever by this cathedral, in fact I thought it was ugly and dirty if I can be honest. haha While we were sitting by the Cathedral, this cute little lady started talking to us because she heard us speaking English. She is originally from Vienna but has lived in D.C. for a long time. We finally had to say "well, we should get going, we still have a lot to see today" or we would still be sitting in Vienna on that bench in front of the dirty Cathedral talking to that little old lady. So when we ditched her we went towards Mozart's house. I was actually pretty excited about seeing this because when I was in middle school I had to watch a movie on him and the whole time I was in Vienna I kept thinking of that movie and picturing Mozart just walking and hanging out in the streets that I was walking around in. The tour of his house was actually pretty lame and I didn't listen to most of the guided audio tour, but I can say that I walked around Mozart's house! So after Mozart's house we headed towards the Ferris wheel- its the oldest standing Ferris wheel in the world! We rode it when the sun was setting so we had beautiful views! After that we headed back towards the hostel and ate dinner. I ate old Vienna Soup. It was good but it was basically just noodles, vegetables, and beef in beef broth. We then went to the bar that was located right in our hostel - the WomBar. We were making fun of it all day but actually ended up having a good time there! The bartender was amazingly good looking! I didn't know Austrians looked like that! Vienna was really nice and I had a decent time I just wish we would have had more time there. I feel like we aren't spending enough time in these cities but I guess at least I get a taste of them all....

This morning was bad. We needed to catch a train to Budapest but we didn't exactly know how to do it so everyone was screaming at each other and it was just bad. The only good thing was that our hostel had a pretty decent all you can eat buffet for breakfast for only 3 euros. So of course we had to do that first. We finally got the train situation figured out and left at around noon. It was a two and a half hour ride and I slept most of the way but every now and then I would wake up and have the most gorgeous views out the window - rolling hills with small farm houses and windmills. It was so quaint and cute. We didn't see anything today in Budapest because when we arrived we decided to take care of our train stuff for tomorrow to go to Prague - a 10 hour over night train.... that should be tons of fun! (I forgot to bring my sleeping pills... wonderful.....) And then we headed to the hostel. One thing I've already noticed about Budapest is that it is not technologically advanced at all. For instance, when we bought our train tickets the lady had to write out all the tickets and then we went to take the metro and their one electronic ticket machine was out of order and so you had to go to the one window they had to by tickets from and that lady had to write out everything too. Come on Budapest! Get with the 21 century!

At first I thought Budapest seemed dirty and not safe but that's just because of the are that the train station was in. Our hostel is in a really clean, nice part of town and what I did see on our way to the hostel and to dinner tonight looked very pretty. We went and ate dinner at a Lugar's, a restaurant that the hostel recommended to us. It was delicious! And the nice thing about Budapest is that its pretty cheap! We had so much food and in euros it was under 50 for five people, which in Spain would never happen for the amount of food we got. I had chicken with cheese and spinach. Delicious. That brings up another subject though, Budapest is not on the Euro. They have their own money which is called the Forint. Its so weird and driving us all nuts! Literally tonight at dinner it took us about 20 minutes just to figure out how to pay for our meals because they use numbers in the thousands and hundreds. Like for instance, I exchanged 50 euros when I got here and I received a 10,000 forint bill, I felt rich! Or at least the money looked like I was rich. And my glass of wine at dinner was 390 forints. Expensive wine, not. So cheap.

Anyways, tomorrow we have a busy day planned so we are all just hanging out in our hostel and going to bed early so we can get up and see everything. Then we have to get on our over night train so I won't be able to write for another day or two. Don't miss me too much! But just know I am having fun trekking across Eastern Europe!