At any rate, Vienna was cool. Unfortunately all my photos from Vienna were accidentally deleted. I don’t know how it happened, and there weren’t many, but it sucks. Anyways, there wasn’t an overabundance of things to see and do, but I made do with my short time. I was exhausted when I got in, but I met Gloria, Bianca, and Sarah, three Austrian girls, right away. We all hung out, and a guitar was being passed around while we had some coffee. Gloria ended up being like my guide for the city for my time there (thank you!). She showed me around to all the major sites and was an excellent host. We checked out the MuseumQuartier where they have some pretty awesome yellow chairs and several museums and wandered around the city. We saw the Naschmarkt, which is a huge outdoor market that has everything in it. I saw plenty of churches and cool buildings as well, and wandered my way past university buildings and through the Heldenplatz and botanical gardens and pedestrian areas. One of the days I was there was a holiday, apparently (I don’t know which one), so a lot of things were closed. But I saw quite a bit. And I went to the KunstHaus Museum, which had a pretty cool Picasso exhibit going on. The building itself was pretty cool – lots of colors and the floors were all wavy. We followed that up with a walk by the Danube to see the graffiti on the walls (where it’s legal to do it!). There were some pretty cool things there. Overall I had a good time in Wien, but because of the people I met there. Oh! And Gloria gave me two dread ties, so now I have some color in my hair too. Woo!
Also, it’s tough to be super excited about Vienna when I was looking forward to my extended stay in Scotland. I had another late night for my last night in Wien, but luckily my flight wasn’t until the afternoon. My second flight, from London to Edinburgh, was delayed by 40 minutes, but no big deal; it still beats the 14 hour bus ride I was originally going to take. Hannah met me at the airport all decked out in neon which was amazing. I was super happy to have finally arrived! We dropped my stuff off at hers and then went up the hill by her house to get a view of the city at night before going off to meet some of her friends. The next day we headed off for Midge Fest, which was a lot of fun. Think camping and lots of music in the idyllic Scottish countryside. And Caroline came up for it as well, so it was like a little reunion for the Three ‘Kateers. ☺ . I met some more people, but it downpoured for a good amount of the weekend. I was sleeping in the car and the rain was strong enough to wake me up.
Apart from that Hannah showed me around Edinburgh, showing me the sites and taking me around to her friends’ places and introducing me to people and all that good jazz. I can see now why she talks so fondly of Scotland (and in particular Edinburgh) – it’s so nice! Even when it was rainy it was still nice, but maybe that’s because I think it’s always raining in Scotland. We went to the Dean Gallery and on a ghost tour of Greyfrair’s Kirkyard and the Covenanter’s prison. We walked up several hills, went to a quarry, and one night made our way up Arthur’s Seat. Such an awesome view from up there! Speaking of awesome views, we also went up The Scott Monument and had a view of the city during the day, which was also pretty cool. Oh yeah, and I did a lot of catching up on sleep!
We also went to Glasgow for a night and stayed with Hannah’s friend Nikki, who I met in Amsterdam in October. We hung out at hers the night we got there and then the next day I was introduced to a British TV series about a crime solving magician’s helper called Jonathan Creek before we headed out for lunch at an awesome vegan restaurant called “The 78.” We all got chickpea burgers. They were amazing! After that we kicked around the Kelvingrove Museum before heading back to Edinburgh.
Basically I had an AMAZING time and I’m so happy that I could go. I can’t believe that my 10 days there have already flown by…
… which brings me to where I currently am now – Praha! (Prague!) I’m exhausted. I didn’t sleep last night and after having to say goodbye to Hannah knowing that I won’t see her for a year I wasn’t much in the mood to do anything when I arrived. I checked into my hostel, which is pretty dismal. I wasn’t sure if it was actually open or not until I walked right up into it. But hey, for less than $9 and free wifi, I can’t complain. Besides, it seems pretty secure and not dirty, just a bit run down and overgrown from the outside. I dropped off my stuff then went out exploring for a few hours before the rain started. I haven’t even looked at my map that I picked up today, but I wandered around by some museums near the train station and in the city center. I don’t know if I’m going to actually do anything tonight or if I’m just going to wait until tomorrow. But so far Prague looks great. It’s a pretty city with quite a few supermarkets (crazy what you notice right way, eh?) and I did manage to stumble upon an outdoor market that had plenty of puppets. Tomorrow will be a better day though! I’m going to go exploring and maybe the Kafka museum. (Well, I’m going to the Kafka museum one of the days that I’m here at any rate).
So, that’s all for now. I hope that was a good overview of what I’ve been up to. I’m going to go make some dinner and have an easy/early night. Until next time…
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