Mandyland

Today, we meandered over to the lovely Old City again. There is never a shortage of things to see there. I love walking around the pedestrian shopping streets and the Hofburg Palace. We did that, and sat down in an outdoor cafe for some coffee. I ordered an ice coffee, and was delightfully surprised that it came with with ice cream in it. Who knew? After this, we went to the Capuchin Church to see the Imperial Crypts. This is where 145 royal family members are buried in beautifully ornate pewter tombs. This place was fascinating. The church doesn't look very big from the outside, but the basement is so expansive, it seems to go on forever. Each casket was unique, and I recognized many of the names on the corresponding placards: Franz Josef, Maria Theresa, ... read more

On Sunday morning, Mom and I went to mass at St Augustine Chapel. It was perfectly pleasant the first forty five minutes, then it just got old. I was bored out of my skull. An hour and a half long mass is too much for me! I entertained myself by giving all my pew neighbors names and fabulous backstories. Little did I know I'd keep running into these new 'friends' throughout the day...haha!! After this, it was on to the beautiful Palmenhaus, which houses a butterfly garden. We figured seeing butterflies in such a remarkable setting would be worth the entry fee, and we were right. We wandered around the small garden's paths, trying to photograph the glamorous bugs. I learned that the prettiest butterflies were the most elusive, and the less attractive ones were a ... read more

Now that we are settled into our home and have gotten over jet lag, we figured it was time to start being tourists. In the morning, we had some breakfast in our apartment and set off to learn the metro. We had a handy little Rick Steves pocket guide with a map of the subway/tram lines, and we would use it often. This was a good reminder of me to not completely rely on my phone and internet; sometimes it's nice to have paper! The metro in Vienna is easy to learn, clean, and not too expensive. It was only a two minute walk to the station, and a quick ride to the city center. We ended up on Kartner street.. a lovely pedestrian street full of high-end fancy stores and outdoor cafes. This was our ... read more

Ah, we finally arrived! Vienna's airport seemed way smaller than O'Hare, and wasn't at all busy. We made our way to baggage claim, and easily found the taxi stands. We took a pretty expensive taxi ride to our hotel. That's the thing when travelling with Mom; she is almost 79 and is over the skimping in life. I probably would've taken the 16 dollar train, but the taxi was quite nice after such a long, sleepless flight. Our driver was nice enough, but we did hit some traffic and it took us about an hour. I didn't have much of an impression of Vienna yet. My mind was so tired, it could barely form thoughts. We finally made it to Holiday Inn Vienna City, and checked our bags. We weren't able to check in for three ... read more

The day finally came! I was off the whole day, had the house to myself and not much planned. Since I'd be gone for two weeks, I wanted to make sure I had all my bases covered. Bills were paid, the fridge was cleaned, I even stocked up on some freezer stuff so I don/'t have to shop right away upon returning. I took my time finalizing all my packing, and finally left the house at noon. I had a reservation at Comfort Suites Cicero/Syracuse North, but could not check in until three. I stopped in Clay for some last minute shopping. I lucked out and finally found a good spring coat for my trip, and a smaller wallet. When three rolled around, I finally checked into the hotel. I only paid 125 USD for one ... read more