The end of our 2006 trip

If there's anyone left reading this blog, we would like to thankyou for travelling with us. We hope it was interesting for you. We had a fantastic time, although perhaps we would not try to fit some much in - we came back absolutely exhausted! Hopefully you understand why we were always behind with uploading our entries.

Everywhere we travelled was absolutely facinating. The two pleasant suprises of the trip were Avignon and Budapest: Avignon was a pleasant break after busy Paris, and the warm Provencal weather was a treat. Budapest was a beautiful city with so much to explore and experience.

We'll have to visit both Paris and Budapest again before two long, but there are also many other parts of Europe, and the rest of the world, that are also beckoning...

We had so much good food while we were away, but one thing we couldn't find was decent Asian foods. It was so nice to treat ourselves with a very good Thai meal back in Australia: We're so lucky to have such a wealth of good restaurants. It's a shame that such fantastic pastries and cakes are so difficult to get here... or perhaps it's good for our waistlines that it is.

The cities compared

Here's a light-hearted take on some of the best and worst things about the cities we visited. Do you think we got it wrong? Comment at let us know!

Paris

Advantages:

• Amazing patisseries on every corner.
• Fantastic shops: Les Salons du Palais Royal, La Maison du Chocolat, Laderée...
• Great metro system with lots of character.
• The Musée d'Orsay.
• The stunning Sainte Chappelle.

Disadvantages:

• Lots of long lines to get into any tourist attraction.
• Indifferent shop assistants.
• Châtelet - Les Halles RER station at night.
• As historic and grand as it is, the palace at Versailles was a little disappointing: Huge crowds and grand but mostly empty rooms.

Avignon

Advantages:

• Relaxed Provençal atmosphere.
• Everything is in walking distance.
• Narrow winding alleyways in the shadow of the Palais des Papes.
• The pretty streets of Villeneurve-les-Avignon.

Disadvantages:

• Vegetarian food is hard to find.
• Everything is closed for a couple of hours at lunch.

Venice

Advantages:

• Amazing history.
• Beautiful canals.
• No cars.
• Some fantastic masks and Murano glass, if you look.

Disadvantages:

• Huge crowds between the main tourist spots: San Marco, Rialto and Ferrovia.
• The smell of the canals.
• Everything is overpriced.
• The service in most shops, restaurants and cafes is appauling.

Vienna

Advantages:

• Very efficient public transport, especially the U-Bahn.
• Locals are friendly.
• Schönbrunn Palace is beautiful and very well presented.
• Very clean: The only city in Europe we visited where there weren't awful drain smells!
• The Hundertwasserhaus and Kunsthaus.
• Lots of vegetarian restaurants.

Disadvantages:

• Shops have restrictive opening hours.
• Most of the architecture is dull.

Bratislava

Advantages:

• Nice examples of art nouveau architecture around the city.
• Locals who are thrilled that you take an interest in the history of their city.
• The historic city center is easy to get around by foot.

Disadvantages:

• Most cafes and restaurants are aiming at the 'beer and chips brigade' (i.e., British backpackers).
• Bratislava Castle is virtually a shell.
• Soviet-style archtecture that looks completely out of place.
• Huge communist-era housing estates.

Budapest

Advantages:

• Fantastic fin de siècle architecture everywhere.
• History everywhere - fantastic National Museum.
• Good public transport: Fun contrast between the histroic M1 and the communist-era M2 and M3.
• The thermal baths.
• Everyone we met was amazingly polite and helpful.
• The State Opera.
• Azerbaijani food at Maquis des Salade.
• Less expensive than the rest of Europe.

Disadvantages:

• Problem with air pollution.
• Trying to change the 20000 Forint notes the ATMS give you.

Top Fives

Here, for a bit of fun, are our lists of top five experiences from our trip in Europe.

Top five best restaurants

1. Marquis de Salade, Budapest.
2. Le Petit Chatelet, Paris.
3. Antica Besseta, Venice.
4. Tempus Fugit, Bratislava.
5. La Victoire Suprême du Coeur, Paris.

Top five most frightening moments

1. Climbing Tour Magne, Nîmes.
2. Riding in a taxi with an insane Parisian driver.
3. Using a pedestrian crossing across the Boulevard de l'Oulle, Avignon.
4. Walking around the arena, Nîmes.
5. The speeding 'escalators-of-death' on the Budapest Metro.

Top five best art galleries

1. Musée d'Orsay, Paris.
2. Kunsthaus, Vienna.
3. The Louvre, Paris.
4. Ca' Pesaro, Venice.
5. Secession Building, Vienna.

Top five strangest museums

1. Esperanto Museum, Vienna.
2. Statue Park, Budapest.
3. Clock Museum, Vienna.
4. Old Town Hall, Bratislava.
5. Lace Museum, Burano, Venice.

Top five churches

1. Sainte Chappelle, Paris.
2. Santa Maria dei Miracoli, Venice.
3. La Madeleine, Paris.
4. Basilica San Marco, Venice.
5. Stephansdom, Vienna.

Top five Art Nouveau spots.

1. Exhibition at the Musée d'Orsay, Paris.
2. Gustav Klimt's Beethoven Frieze, Secession Building, Vienna.
3. The thermal baths at the Gellért Hotel, Budapest.
4. Kaiser Pavillion, Vienna.
5. Andrássy út, Budapest.

Top five best shops

1. La Maison du Chocolat, Paris (chocolate).
2. Les Salons du Palais Royal, Paris (perfume).
3. Ca' Macana, Venice (papier-mâché masks).
4. Shakespeare & Co., Paris (bookshop).
5. Barovier e Toso, Murano (modern glass).

Day 28 - Flying home

We got up before dawn this morning for our taxi ride to the airport. The taxi driver decided the best thing to do in the thin traffic was to drive at 120 km/h in 60 km/h zones, swerve wildly around the one or two cars we encountered, and race the traffic lights. We'd given him no indication we were in a hurry. After checking in at the airport, we wandered around looking at the few duty free shops (but didn't buy anything) and then tried to calculate a perfect combination of bottled waters and snacks we could buy to get rid of our remaining forints. Evan nearly succeeded, coming away with only 200 (about 50c).

The first leg of the trip took us back to Vienna, then came the long haul to Kuala Lumpur. David wasn't doing too well, still suffering from fever and unable to sleep at all. At Kuala Lumpur, we were given the usual 20 minutes to get off the plane and then get back on, so our visit to the duty free shops was brief and purposeful. David, half asleep, decided on an impulse to get a huge 1 kg box of Guylian chocolates, only discovering later what a pain it was to carry around.

We arrived in Sydney early in the morning. When we arrived at the baggage collection area, they started to make announcements listing the names of passengers whose baggage had been left in Vienna. Every few minutes more names would be added and we expected that ours would be among them - not that we would have minded too much: There was nothing in our bags we needed immediately. But no, we got our baggage and made our way through customs - alot more painful than any border control in Europe - to the domestic terminal. After the short hop to Canberra we were met by David's grandma and John, but were too exhausted from the flight to talk a lot about the trip. We were glad to be home, and looking forward to a couple of days' rest to readjust to Australian time.

Day 27 - Hungarian Parliament Building

David was unfortunately still sick this morning. Evan arranged for a doctor to come and pay a house call and afterwards walked to the local pharmacy (luckily very close by an Andrassy Utca) to get some supplies. Buying brandname medicines was not difficult but explaining to the pharmacist that I wanted carbon was a little more difficult. After trying a range of descriptions, Evan simply wrote a large 'C' on a piece of paper handed to him by the pharmacist who then understood immediately. Thank heavens for the universal language of science (and those chemistry classes Evan never thought he'd use)!

After setting David up for the day, Evan headed towards the Parliament Building down by the Danube. On the way there, he discovered a bookshop selling an Hungarian cookbook, in English, that could not be had for love or money in Australia. Our previous attempts to get it had ended up with finding people who were prepared to sell it for about USD 300. It was, however, yet another book to take home in an already heavy suitcase.

Evan arrived at the Parliament about an hour before the next English tour--tours were available in a range of languages including Hebrew. They were free for EU citizens but not for the rest, so Evan bought his ticket and had a look around the surrounding streets. Out the front of the Parliament there was a memorial to those massacred in the 1956 uprising, including a Hungarian flag with a hole in the centre (symbolising liberation from the 'foreign' communist regime by removing its coat of arms). Across the road from the Parliament one of the grand old buildings had smallish iron balls arranged in an interesting pattern all over romanesque architecture. They were clearly former bullet holes from the massacre of those who challenged the regime in 1956.

A memorial to those who died in the 1956 uprising, with the Parliament in the background.

The Parliament Building itself was very Victorian and was based on the Houses of Parliament in London. It had the standard gaudy grandness--acres of gold leaf, gothic revival vaulted ceilings etc, and some interesting porcelain statues all over the place symbolising an idealised view of the typical Hungarians at the time. There were the standard two chambers. Near the entrance the tour group was shown a model of the Parliament Building made by a family during the communist times out what appeared to be match sticks. It was so big that the to get it out of their apartment, the authorities had to pull a wall down. The family was rewarded for their patriotism with a new apartment.

The Upper House.

The matchstick parliament.

In the lobby of the Upper House, we were shown the apparently famous numbered brass cigar holders. Members would put their cigars down in a numbered slot to go and hear speeches being made. If the speaker was good, the cigar would burn down and his oratory would be said to be 'worth a Cuban cigar'.

In the central dome, the group was shown St Stephen's crown and other crown jewels in a solid glass case. This is the famous crown with the cross bent at an angle. Why it is bent is a mystery--it may just have been broken at one point but has now become iconic. While we allowed to use flash photography anywhere else in the building, we were asked not to use it on the crown jewels, but of course a handful of people completely ignored this. Tourists!

The Crown of St Stephen, with its distinctive bent cross.

After the Parliament, even did some shopping at Lush, taking advantage of the exchange rate to get some good deals and bath ballistics to cheer David up. It was then back to the hotel for an early night.

The Lush store on Szt. István Krt.

Day 26 - Gellért Baths

We started the morning by trying out the thermal baths. Budapest has many, and we decided to try the famous Gellért Baths because of its very grand Art Nouveau architecture (our guide book says it is like "taking a bath in a cathedral"). We took a plunge in the thermal baths and had a swim in the swimming pools, which perhaps better suited the very hot weather.

The Gellért Baths.

Taking the tram back into Pest, David wasn't feeling very well and had to get off. We stopped into the nearest store to have a drink to rehydrate and to rest for a moment. We made our way back to the hotel so David could lie down. This was made especially difficult by the traffic chaos that George Bush was still causing.

David spent most of the afternoon in bed, doing his best to recover. Evan went out and did a little shopping. Later that evening, feeling a little better, we had dinner at a cheap vegetarian restaurant, Govinda's.

Day 25 - Buda Hills and Statue Park

We ventured across the other side of the Danube for the first time today. We took a tram over Margaret Bridge to Moszkva tér, and another tram a few stops to the lowest station of the cogwheel railway. This is a train line that goes up the steep slope up into the Buda Hills. This unusual train line counts as public transport, and so was covered by our Budapest Cards.

Getting off at the highest station, Széchenyi Mountain, we walked over to the nearby Children's Railway. This railway is run by the Young Pioneers, originally a Communist Party affiliated youth organisation. Today the Young Pioneers are apolitical and similar in many ways to the Scouts.

Everyone running the railway (except the train driver) is aged between 10 and 14: The ticket seller, signalman, ticket inspector... It's quite remarkable.

Evan in front of the Children's Railway station at Széchenyi Mountain.

A train on the Children's Railway.

We took the train up to the highest point in the mountains, János-hegy. From this station, we walked up to the lookout and then took the chair-lift back down the mountains, which was relaxing and had a good view of the city. We caught a bus back to Moszkva tér, where we had lunch in Mammut (a large shopping centre).

The lookout at János-hegy.

The view from the chair-lift.

Next, we needed to take a tram and then a bus out to Szoborpark, or Statue Park. This park, far out in the suburbs of Budapest is a remarkable place. At the fall of communism in Hungary, communist statues were rounded up and relocated here. The park, situated under tall electricity pylons, is hardly glamourous, and it's a bit neglected. No doubt the exisitance of this park is controversial for many people.

The statues and plaques here are interesting. Many are Hungarian-Soviet 'friendship memorials'. Others are statues of figures such as Lenin, and Marx and Engels. A few, perhaps the most controversial, are memorials to those who died fighting against the revoluntionaries in 1956.

Szorborpark.

This statue is interesting. It was created in 1951 as a memorial to Ilja Afonoszejevis Ostapenko, a captain in the Soviet Red Army. It was placed on the highway leading out from Budapest to Vienna, and greeted people as they arrived. After the fall of communism, locals didn't want to get rid of their friendly, waving statue!

Back in the city, the tram we caught didn't cross back into Pest as we expected it to (there were lots of announcements, but they were in Hungarian, so we didn't understand). We had to catch a tram at the next bridge. Then, at the main metro station, Deák Ferenc tér, the platforms for the M1 were closed. Leaving the station to walk down to the next station, we noticed that many of the roads in the centre of the city were closed off. The source of all this inconvience, it turned out, was that George Bush was in town. That explained the US flags we'd seem around.

Now that our hotel has a kitchen - and after all the expensive restaurants we've been eating at - we went to a supermarket to buy some things to make ourselves dinner. While there we bought ourselves a bottle Tokaji (Tokay) 6 puttonyos (ie. very sweet) wine and a bottle of Unicum.

Day 24 - National Museum and Hungarian State Opera

Our first stop was the National Museum at Kálvin tér. To get there we had to change from the historic M1 metro line to the communist-era M3 line. This line is very different, it's much deeper for a start; The 'escalators-of-death' as we called them go very fast, much faster than any other escalators we've been on. Strangely, the handrail moves even faster, so your hand creeps up faster than you do.

The collection in the National Museum is very well presented. It is arranged in roughly chronological order from the stone age through to the 20th Century. Many facinating and varied items are on display. We found the last century particularly interesting, especially the treatment of the two World Wars and the 1956 Revolution. Throughout the communist-era, the propaganda machine denounced the revolution as a counter-revoluntionary revolt, so it is interesting to see it come full circle and be portrayed now as a popular uprising.

The Hungarian National Museum.

We had planned to visit the Electrotechnical Museum (with the world's largest collection of electrical meters) but it was closed. We stopped at at Cafe Károlyi and had a traditional Hungarian lunch.

Fantastic buildings like this are all over Budapest.

We were walking over to the House of Terror museum in the old secret police building when we found ourselves outside the Opera House. We thought we should go in and have a look and we ended up buying tickets to the performance that night. Suddenly, we didn't have much time left, so we rushed back to the hotel to get changed.

The opera tonight was Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro. The Opera House is very grand and very ornate and we had great seats. It was a talented performance and very enjoyable, even though the story was silly. It was a fantastic experience.

Getting out fairly late, we had dinner at a restaurant near our hotel, the Premier Étterem. It was very nice in the hot weather to have dinner outside at this Art Nouveau restaurant. The food was very good and the service was very, very polite: Something we noticed as a trend in Budapest, almost everyone is very polite.

Day 23 - Down the Danube to Budapest

After breakfast we quickly checked out of our hotel and rushed down to to International Passanger Terminal on the river. We needed to get there early because we had being having trouble booking with the company running the hydrofoil service between Bratislava and Budapest.

Another hydrofoil in a lock on the Danube.

The Basilica in Esztergom, the largest church in Hungary. Hungary's first king, St Stephen, was born in this town on the Danube bend. It was the capital from the 10th to the 13th Centuries.

Fortunately, we managed to check in ok, and we chatted to a very pleasant American woman also waiting for the hydrofoil - which arrived late. Once onboard the craft the journey was comfortable enough. There were some interesting sights along the way in both Slovakia and Hungary.

The hydrofoil dropped us off at the passanger terminal on the Pest side of the river, in the middle of the city. We walked along Váci utca, probably the most touristy street in Budapest, to the metro station at Vörösmarty tér. Unfortunately one of the wheels on David's bag had decided to give up, making it very painful to drag along.

The ticket officer at the metro station didn't understand any English, but with a few Hungarian words and lots of pointing we were able to buy two Budapest cards, which gives discounts to museums and other attractions, and also free travel on public transport.

The M1 line, also known as the Milleniumi Földalatti (Millennium Underground) is interesting. Dating from 1896, it's the second oldest underground train in the world, after the London Underground. Most of the stations have been restored to their appearance at the turn of the century. One of the most remarkable things about it is that it runs just under the surface. We got off at Bajza utca (you can hear the poker-machine-sounding announcement) and our hotel, the Radio Inn, was just around the corner.

A train pulls into a historic station on the metro.

It was a pleasant surprise after all the other European hotels we'd stayed in to have not just a bar fridge but a small kitchen! Finally, we could make our own breakfast and even a cup of tea. In fact the room, really an apartment, was quite spacious. Unfortunately the beds were uncomfortable, but the location was great. Just off leafy Andrássy út and in the diplomatic district.

After resting, we went to dinner at the irresistibly named Marquis de Salade. The restaurant specialises in Azerbaijani dishes and the food was delicious, fresh and suited the warm weather perfectly (the cool cellar the restaurant was in also helped). The waiter was exceptionally polite.

Afterwards took the metro back up to Hősök tere (Heroes' Square) and wandered down Andrássy út to the apartment building where David's family once lived.

The Millennium Monument (to mark Hungary's thousandth anniversary in 1896), in Heroes' Square at the end of Andrássy út.

Day 22 - Bratislava's Old Town Hall and Castle

We visited the Old Town Hall this morning. The building now houses a museum with an unusual collection of exhibits: A room with artwork by local school children is next to items from early tribes in the area. Some collections and rooms were better displayed than others, some pieces were no doubt significant but didn't have English descriptions.

Undoubtably the eeriest part of the museum was the old jail/dungeons. The pictures and descriptions were too good: We would have been happy not to know what most of the torture instruments were intended for! It was also unpleasantly cold and damp. It was an awful place.

From the town hall's tower there is a good view of the old town.

The tower of the Old Town Hall.

Next we visited Bratislavský hrad (Bratislava Castle) up on the hill. The castle has a long and complicated history, so we were disappointed when we arrived to find that seemingly nothing on the inside had been preserved - it felt like an office space from the 50s. Perhaps we shouldn't have been so surprised.

Bratislava Castle.

The castle also now houses a museum. There was a temporary exhibition about Leonardo da Vinci which seemed to be popular with the locals. Every second display in this exhibition seemed to be advertising for one of the sponsors. Other parts of the museum were quieter, but also less well financed. Again, some interesting pieces including some local Art Nouveau furniture. In the Crown Tower is a replica of St Stephen's Crown of Hungary (Bratislava was at one stage the capital of Hungary) and again good views of the city, especially the river.

A view of the old town from the Castle. On the left is St. Martin's Cathedral, where many Hungarian kings were crowned. At the very top of the spire there is a gilt sculpture of St Stephen's crown.

The Danube and Nový Most from the Crown Tower.

After looking unsucessfully for a laundromat (they seem to be very rare in this part of Europe) we headed back to the hotel to rest.

The food at most places looked unappetising; It looks like most places aim to please the British backpackers that are everywhere here. We bit the bullet and had dinner at an interesting, but expensive restaurant, Tempus Fugit. The food was good with an a mix of international flavours.

Day 21 - Bratislava

After breakfast we checked out of our hotel and headed for the train station to catch a train to Bratislava.

Bratislava is only about 50km from Vienna, so while the train wasn't very fast, it was a short ride. Arriving in Slovakia we had our first (quick) passport check since arriving at Vienna airport three weeks ago. The woman at the information desk didn't speak much English (and we couldn't speak any Slovak) but we were able to understand her instructions to get to the bus stop and which bus to catch. A few stops later we were dropped off under Nový Most ('New Bridge' formerly the 'Bridge of the Slovak National Uprising'). It was a short walk to our hotel.

Looking back at Nový Most (with its strange UFO-shaped restaurant and nightclub up top) as we drag our bags over to the hotel.

After checking in we had salad for lunch at Café Mayer in Hlavne Namestie, the main square in the old town. We wandered over to the supermarket to buy some bottled water and also two locally produced soft-drinks: Vinea (a grape-based drink which tasted nice) and Kofola (a cola drink which didn't taste so good).

Trying Kofola down by the Danube.

That evening we ventured out of the old town, past the presidential palace to a cheap vegetarian restaurant ('Elixir 14') offering good homestyle Slovakian food.

The main square of the old town, Hlavne Namestie, at night.

Day 20 - The Esperanto Museum, Hundertwasserhaus, Kunsthaus, Seccesion Building

We started the morning by visiting perhaps the most unusual museum we have visited so far: the Esperanto Museum. This small and well presented museum has interesting items including books and memorabilia, and interactive exhibits.

We wandered down the popular shopping street of Mariahilferstrasse, and stopped into a boardgame store, Spielerei. We bought a small game called Hick Hack in Gackelwack (also known as Pick Picknic).

We caught the U-bahn out to an unusual building. The Hundertwasserhaus is a municipal apartment block in one of the most architectually uninteresting parts of Vienna. The artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser designed this building with several principles in mind: For example, tenants should be able to tell their apartment from the street so all the windows are different, and each apartment is painted a different colour. He also believed that a building shouldn't take land away from nature, hence the plants growing from the roof and out the sides of the building. He also put large golden onion domes on the roof because they are traditionally the perogative of the rich and powerful and he believed the tenants here deserved them, too.

We couldn't get into the building; it is a functional residential building, afterall. We still were able to marvel at surely one of the most unusual blocks of council flats.

One side of the Hundertwasserhaus.

A couple of blocks down the road is another building by the same artist, the Kunsthaus Wien, an art gallery. As it happens it was currently showing an exhibition of Hunderwasser's art, as well as an exhibition of HR Giger. Both exhibitions were very good. The Kunsthaus is obviously a natural and very fitting place to display Hunderwasser's work with its deliberately wonky floors, jarring colours and plants everywhere. Giger's work looked particularly dark in comparison.

A particularly suprising display was an Australian flag that Hundertwasser had designed to replace the current one (he had also designed a flag for New Zealand which is quite popular). We bought a small version of this Australian flag in the gift shop as an unusual souvenir.

The Kunsthaus, with Hunderwasser's New Zeland flag flying.

Our last stop for the afternoon was another art gallery, the Secession Building. The purpose of the building is to give avant garde artists a space to display their work. The facade of the building, and Gustav Klimt's Beethoven Frieze in the basement are in Secession (Art Nouveau) style, but everything else was contempory art.

The Secession Building. The motto over the door translates as "To every Age its Art, to Art its Freedom."

Part of one of the installation works in the Secession Building, ELEVATOR by artist Dave Hullfish Bailey.

For dinner we headed a bit further out to a vegetarian restaurant called Hollerei which had very nice food outside under the trees. We also got the test the limits of of German-speaking abilities with the waitress.

Day 19 - Schönbrunn Palace

We visited Schönbrunn Palace today. This palace is in some ways similar to Versailles, which we visited a couple of weeks ago (read our blog entry, if you missed it). It's a large palace (perhaps not quite as big as the Chateau de Versailles) with large manicured gardens.

David in front of the Palace.

Evan in the palace grounds, with the Gloriette on the hill behind him.

We went in to pay our admission fee, and chose to get a 'Classic Pass' which gave us access to the 'Grand Tour' of the palace, the Privy Garden, the Maze and an apple-strudel making demonstration.

Our ticket gave us a time and a gate to see the palace, presumably to stop everyone going in at once (Versailles certainly wasn't this organised!). We had a quick look around the grounds before heading on in when our time came.

The palace was in a very good state compared to Versailles. Most rooms were in well restored and in good condition, and - shock! horror! - actually had furniture and other pieces. The personal rooms of Franz Joseph, in particular, were well displayed.

An interesting feature of the palace is that there are narrow corridors running between rooms. All the fireplaces faced into these corridors so that the servants did not have to go into the rooms and interrupt the imperial family to check on the fires and add wood. It was also nice to see many of the servants uniforms, and the various places where the imperial family ate meals - the tables were all set and decorated.

One of the many rooms on the tour is a memorial room to the son of Napoleon and Maria Louisa. The product of a political marriage, he became a 'political hot potato' (in the words of our audioguide) when Napoleon's empire collapsed. He spent most of his life (he died at 21) virtually imprisioned in this palace. In this room is an interesting painting of the boy, and a small stuffed crested larch - the boy claimed this bird was his only friend he ever had in the palace.

After our tour of the palace we headed up to the Gloriette. In the heat and burning sun it seemed a long way to walk, and a surprisingly steep hill - but we made it! We used our pass to get on top, which has good views of the gardens and surrounding city. We had lunch in the Gloriette itself, which was ok for a place targetted at tourists.

The Gloriette, built during the reign of Maria Theresa.

Back at the foot of the hill, we wandered through the maze, and eventually got out. We also visited the pretty Privy Garden adjacent to the palace.

The palace from the Privy Garden.

By this stage we were getting a little tired and were not really in the mood for the apple strudel show, so we gave it a miss.

We walked over to the Kaiser Pavilion which is a Secessionist-style (Viennese Art Nouveau) train station that was designed for the imperial family while at Schönbrunn. Unfortunately, it was closed today.

The Kaiser Pavilion.

Later that evening we had Japanese at a place called Yugetsu not far from the Opera. There appears to be many Japanese restaurants in Vienna, and this was recommended as the best. We can't comment on that, but it was a pleasant meal.

Day 18 - Exploring Vienna

Early in the morning we checked into our new hotel, the Wilhelmshof. The hotel wasn't as flash, and a little further out, but the staff were friendly and the room spacious. While at the hotel, we picked up a Vienna Card which is great value with discounts to many attractions and free use of public transport.

The first place we got to use our Vienna Card was at the Clock Museum. This small museum has some interesting pieces. One of the minders spoke very little English, but was very enthusiastic about some of the items and did here best to share that with us.

The clock museum.

After wandering around the Hofburg and the Volksgarten, we visited the Café Central (which our guidebook describes as the "most splendid of coffee houses in Vienna") for lunch. The food was very nice. For dessert David has the hazelnut mousse and Evan tried a Sachertorte.

Afterwards we headed back to the famous Neue Burg which houses the Sammlung Alter Musikinstrumente - the musical instruments museum - among other things. The collection of instruments here is huge with many historic or unusual pieces. We also had a quick look at the Hofjagd und Rüstkammer, the weaponry museum, in the same building.

Neue Burg.

A display in the musical instruments museum.

A joustling display in the weaponry museum.

To see a little bit more of the inner city, we hopped on the number two tram and did a few laps of the Ringstraße.

For dinner we went to a mostly-vegetarian restaurant called Wrenkh. This restaurant had three menus to choose from ("energy", "balance" and "beauty"). The food here was all very fresh and kept simple - a very nice change. Some interesting combinations of flavours here.

Day 17 - Travel to Vienna

Venice has been interesting, and we're glad we decided to visit. There are also things we still want to see, but we have had enough of Venice for the time being. The crowds, at least at this time of year, are too much. It's also exhausting to walk everywhere in this heat, and benches to sit down are scarce (let alone one in the shade). We have also gotten tired of the poor or even rude service at many of the cafes and stores here. Obviously you don't need to give good service or even good food to do good business in Venice. It's also too expensive to stay here too long - everything costs much more than anywhere else we've been.

After doing some errands in the morning, we went to the train station to catch our train. It was lucky we had arrived early, because when we arrived we noticed that the person at the ticket booth had given us a reservation for the wrong day! After typically unhelpful service from the ticket office, we managed to get a new reservation (at extra cost to us).

Deciding to have a drink at the cafe at the train station was a mistake. Receiving rude service from the waiter, we decided to leave without ordering anything. Venice had gotten too much for us.

On the train we had seats in different rows. We're convinced the ticketing staff at Santa Lucia station are hopeless - buy your tickets from another station, or online. The train was half-empty and we had unoccupied seats next to us, so we sat next to each other anyway.

Apart from that less-than-ideal start to the journey, the rest of the trip was pleasant enough. Having dinner in the dining car was a nice way to spend some of the time. Although we wouldn't rave about the food, it was made to order and tasted fresh - and was better than half the stuff we ate in Venice. We weren't sure what to expect from the dining car so it was nice to see tablecloths, full sized plates and real cutlery. The best thing was the stunning scenery.

A castle from the train window.

Arriving in Vienna we easily made our way from the train station to our hotel by catching the S-Bahn (city train syatem) a couple of stops and switching to the U-Bahn (metro). We were at our hotel in minutes.

A station of the very efficient S-Bahn.

For some reason almost every hotel in Vienna (ones that advertise online, anyway) seemed to be booked out for this night, a Tuesday, when we checked a few days ago. What we had to do in the end was stay in a more expensive hotel tonight, and switch to a cheaper one tomorrow. We're not trying to be martyrs, and we're sure you're not feeling sorry for us right now, but that's why we stayed in a more expensive hotel tonight. Our hotel for the night the Radisson SAS Style Hotel which is nice, even though it does have a bit of a generic international hotel feel.

For the first time since we arrived in Europe, our room had a bar fridge (although we didn't have tea and coffee making facilities). I don't think they understand the concept of the mini-bar over here - it was all complimentary. In Australia, at least, the mini-bar is used to squeeze as much money from the guest as possible. Needless to say, we ate and drank everything - we were paying enough for the room.

Our hotel room.

One thing we noticed is how quiet everything is around here, such a nice change from Venice. There's almost no-one about on the streets. Vienna seems to shut down at night.

Day 16 - Murano and Burano

Today we headed out to the island of Murano by Vaporetto (water bus). Murano almost a smaller version of Venice, famous for it's glass. Lots of glass can be bought in Venice and Murano - most of it made in China.

Murano is alot like Venice, only smaller and a little less crowded.

We started by visiting the glass museum on the island. It was interesting to get an insight into the history of glass making here. We ventured through the rest of the island looking for a couple of stores we had been recommended, and trying to avoid all the stores selling rubbish.

This display was in the glass museum. Apparently these sorts of 'gardens' were once very popular.

Some of the stores allowed you to see glass being blown. Want a glass penguin, for some reason? You've come to the right place.

Some of the stores we visited had some nice things but hefty prices - up to around 30,000€. The shop assistants encouraged us to touch and pick up the pieces. Not at these prices, thankyou!

We caught a vaporetto again, out to more distant island of Burano. Burano is famous for its lace, although very little is made here anymore. Disappointingly, we weren't the only people to think of coming out to this little town - the place was packed with tourists. Strangely, though, no-one was in the lace museum, execpt for three old ladies still stiching lace the old-fashioned way. The museum was in the old lace school (apparently quite famous in itself) and had some amazing pieces.

Burano is bright and colourful. It's poor campanile, like many around here, has an unfortunate lean.

Houses in Burano are smaller than in Venice, but packed closer together. There are no courtyards, either, which is why everyone hangs their clothes out in the street.

We had a simple pizza lunch, but got more than we bargained for (we're sure European serving sizes are larger). We decided to walk it off by crossing the bridge to the nearby island of Mazzorbo.

Mazzorbo is nothing at like Venice. There's only a couple of shops, a few houses, and lots of open space. It was a refreshing change! I don't think we bumped into another group of tourists while we were wandering.

A green pathway on Mazzorbo.

Back in Venice, we wandered past the Arsenale, the historic sight where the great ships of the Venetian Republic were built. It's still in use by the military, so you can't see that much inside.

David in front of the entrance to the Arsenale.

On the way back to our hotel we stopped into a tiny little electrical store where we saw a chandelier flower for sale in the window. The flower looked exactly like the candelier flowers we had seen in the historic palaces we had visited. We thought this small, inexpensive glass flower is a better souvenir and reminder of Venice than anything we had seen on Murano.

That evening we were still too full for dinner, so went out for Ice Cream on the Zattere. Our guidebook recommended three gelaterie (ice cream shops) while we were in Venice: Paolin, Il Doge and Nico. Over the last few days we had tried all three. Our verdict? Definately try the 'Crema del Doge' at Il Doge in Campo Santa Margherita.