Day 4: Vienna

The day started in Katowice, Poland with a 7AM wake up call. We packed our backpacks and headed to the train station. We bought two tickets to Vienna and hopped on a train departing at 9:22AM. In retrospect, it seems so simple. Go to the train station,  buy tickets, get on the train and go. But up until that point the only train we've ever really been on was from Newark, NJ into New York City. So there was lots of trying to communicate with grumpy ticket agents (who only speak in Polish), lots of staring at the departure board to figure out which platform our train will arrive at and the anxiety that comes with doing something you're not 100% sure of.







Needless to say, we were relieved to finally be on the train. I enjoyed our ride through the country side. We had a comfortable cabin to ourselves almost the entire duration of the ride. I took advantage of the time to sip on a cappuccino & nibble on a pastry I picked up at the station in Katowice, "write my memoirs" and read Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential (a book that will make you feel like a total pansy for being a vegetarian, especially while traveling. Maybe not the best reading selection for this trip).

When we arrived in Vienna we had about a mile walk to our hotel. It's important to note here that the area surrounding a train station isn't always the prettiest. So as we trekked, in the hot sun, to our hotel I was optimistic but had no idea what to expect from Vienna. We made our way to our hotel, checked in and relaxed a bit before we hit the town. So we study a map, buy some train tickets and make our way to the city center. Again, it sounds so easy, but even the simple task of figuring out how to get from point A to point B can be a little exhausting. Once we made it to the city center we were beyond pleasantly surprised.

Everything was beautiful. The people. The architecture. Gorgeous. All of it.


I love traveling with Jeremy because he always knows where we are and which way is North. Also, he's cute.

















As we were looking for a vegetarian restaurant TripAdvisor recommended we heard music coming from a park - so we decided to head that way instead (secretly hoping David Bowie was playing in the park - it's a long shot, I know). We stumbled upon a Jazz & Film Festival (not David Bowie, unfortunately) and decided to order a couple of beers and hang out there for a bit. At this point we were completely smitten by Vienna and the fact that our beers were served in real glass, at a festival, made us downright giddy. We decided to go ahead and grab dinner from an Indian booth (ah, our ultimate comfort food) at the festival, grabbed a couple more beers and enjoyed people watching. Everyone was beautiful and stylish. Every child seemed happy and well-behaved. Ah, Vienna... we like you. As the sun set and the film began, a feature on the Prague Philharmonic, we were feeling pretty tired and decided to head back to our hotel. After seeing how bike friendly the city seemed Jeremy started to look into bike rentals on his phone and found a wine-tasting bike tour through the Wachau Valley for the next morning. Sign me up! But first, a good night's sleep.