25 May 2007

Sightseeing in Vienna (the first of 2 days off the bikes)
We woke rather early for a day off because Leni wanted to show us how to get into the city and show us around a bit. When we entered the house she had a breakfast spread fit for a king laid out for us. After breakfast we were driven to the underground station by Ernst, Elisabeth's boyfriend, and Leni showed us the ropes to get into the city on this subway train system. Once in town she escorted us to some of the sites and then over to St. Stephen's cathedral. We toured the inside and then decided to take the guided tour of the catacombs beneath the church where all the bishops are buried. Leni sat at a cafe and waited. The tour was interesting even though the guide had a heavy accent and spoke very quickly. The coolest part was at the very end when we looked into a room that had skulls and bones stacked like wood from floor to ceiling. Creepy!
Leni took us to the visitor center where we got some information on bus tours and then showed us the opera house. She headed home and left us on our own to wander around. We ate the sandwiches she packed for us (amazing, hey!) and then took a 1 1\2 hour bus tour that was o.k. but not great. After the tour we walked back to the Hofburg Palace where we were going to take a guided tour, but we were too late as it closed in one hour. So we walked down the road taking some photos of some of the cool buildings we had seen from the bus. We grabbed a kabob for a late afternoon snack and then headed back to the house on the underground. We were feeling confident as we sat on what we thought was our last train after successfully making the required transfer. Suddenly we were the only ones on the train as it pulled away from a station and stopped about 100 meters down the tracks. We panicked a bit when we saw the conductor get out of the train and we were still locked in it. J!
ohn pounded on the window and asked him what was going on. He was going down to the other end of the train to drive it back in the opposite direction. This was apparently some kind of express train that didn't go all the way to our stop which was the end of the line. So we got off at the first stop and then waited for the next train that went all the way in our direction. That's called learning the hard way.
We successfully navigated our way back to the house from the underground station, a 25 minute walk that we had quickly drawn a map of this morning as we were being driven there. After a quick shower, Elisabeth came over and the 4 of us drove to an old town close to an hour away where we enjoyed a buffet style Austrian dinner accompanied by a roaming musical pair playing waltzes and polkas on an accordian and a violin.
After dinner we were driven up a big hill (saw a cute little fox cross the road in front of us) to an overlook by an old church. As we were walking to the overlook from the parking lot there was a small fireworks display right there at the hotel by the church. The view of the city with the lights at night was nice. We were all very tired when we finally arrived back at the house. It was a very exhausting day of sightseeing, but it sure was nice to have so much help from our new friends.