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Published: August 30th 2008
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Vienna
View from the ferris wheel Drove back to St Poltein to find our friendly hardware store to buy an adaptor for our power cord, and by the time we found our way out again we had decided to only drive to the outskirts of Vienna today as we would not have enough time to see anything. So we hunted around for a camping ground or info centre without any success until about 7pm when we came across a bit of a forest which we could drive into quite easily so we tucked ourselves away from the road and parked. We still had plenty of light left to make dinner and have a little stroll through the forest before bed.
After an undisturbed sleep(apart from a little rain and wind in the trees) we had breakfast and headed for the capital. We had a street map donated by a fellow camper at Melk so we had some idea where we were heading although we were not sure what we were going to see. It was more by good luck than good management that we arrived on a Sunday because the driving and parking was a lot easier and we managed to park right in the centre
Vienna
Rathaus building of the city. It was around 10 O’clock and was cool and fairly quiet when we started wandering around the old streets and buildings. Like previous old cities there was restoration work being carried out on some of the buildings and we have come to the conclusion that old cities must always be under restoration to one degree or another. Vienna was very clean and the architecture quite amazing but we only visited a fairly small part of the city, we could have spent a few days here. We walked through Rathaus Park past the Rathaus, Votive Church, through Sigmund Freud Garden, back down to the Parliament Building, through the Volksgarten and through Heldenplatz (Heroes Square), very pretty area but by now it was getting pretty hot so we were hugging the shade where we could. There was a outdoor film festival on in Rathaus Park as well as an outdoor food court so we stopped under an umbrella and had a coffee before driving over to the ‘Volksprater’ which is like an amusement park where they have a 64m high ferris wheel built in 1897. I managed to convince Jac to take a ride on it with me to
Vienna
Votive Church see the city vista which was quite cool. We bought a city guide book at the souvenir shop and sat down at a café for a late lunch before walking back to the bus and heading south to Burgenland. There was a big lake on the map in Burgenland called Neusiedler See that looked interesting and it had a camping ground so we headed there to check it out. When we got there we found that it was nothing like the lakes in the mountains as there were no mountains here. The camping ground was huge and crowded and it was not really what we were looking for so we kept on heading south until we found another camping ground at a little place called Markt St Martin. The little camping ground was about half a kilometer out of town next to a small river which was flowing quite fast and showed signs that it had been higher recently. There was also a swimming pool complex next door with sandy beaches which looked quite new. I recalled seeing on the news about a week ago at Ferd’s place that there was a lot of flooding and guessed it must have
Vienna
Parliament Building been around here - that would explain the mosquitoes! We had dinner, showered and shut ourselves in the van with the mosquito net over the door which seemed to work pretty well but the cunning little buggers hide and wait until you’re asleep before attacking! Next day I went in search of some flyspray and insect repellant and had to drive to the supermarket down the road. There was lightening and thunder in the hills around us most of the day but it was not until about 7pm that a man came and told us we should be prepared to move back across to the other side of the river if the water gets too much higher. Apparently it had been raining heavily in the catchment areas of our little river and could quite possibly flood. We moved out just before dark and watched as the water got higher and higher until it burst it’s bank about 20m upstream and washed through the campsite and surrounding field of hay. The local volunteer fire department were quickly on the job in force due to their recent experience and managed to save the swimming pools this time but all the hay was
washed down in the torrent. We spent the night at the local Gasthof and enjoyed a few free beers to boot making for an eventful evening.
Next morning after a mosquito free night in soft beds we headed for Graz. After an uneventful drive down the A2 we arrived mid-morning to a busy city but managed to find a park in the park. We went for a walk with the computer hoping to find a random unsecured wireless site but were unsuccessful - it was a nice walk though. We then made the mistake of trying to drive to some points of interest in the city but ended up getting frustrated with traffic, roadworks, one-way streets and a sometimes difficult gearbox and ended up heading out again at around 2pm. We stopped at a supermarket for supplies and headed southwest to Karnten. It might pay to mention here that there are 10 states in Austria; Voralberg and Tirol in the west; Carinthia (Karnten) in the south; Styria, East Tirol and Salzberg near the middle; Burgenland in the east; and Vienna, Upper Austria and Lower Austria in the north (go figure). Karnten had a big lake district we were going to
check out and the first one we came across was Worthersee and a place called Velden which consisted of fashionable shops, cafes and restaurants and well dressed people. Obviously a very fashionable place to go on holiday and very busy. We drove on through to another lake called Ossiacher See where we found a small campsite and decided to rest up for a couple of nights after our long drive. It appears that a lot of the lakes around here may be really nice but access to them is limited due to private land and our campsite was not on the waterfront, consequently I couldn’t go for a swim - bugger. We then headed into Villach determined to find internet and found an internet café with wireless so we sat outside with a beer (it was around 12ish) and checked our mail. Five hours later we had had enough so headed off to another campsite near another lake called Faakersee. This was the biggest camping ground we had stayed at (and the most expensive) but wasn’t too crowded. It was nice there with the nearby high mountains and the lake even when the thunder and lightning was happening. We left
Faakersee on Friday the 9th heading for the hotel where Ferd works, he had the Sunday off and was going to show us around. Before we left we took a detour up to Castle Finkenstein on the hill as it looked pretty cool, and it was, with great views of the lakes and a small amphitheatre where they have concerts - nothing that night though. We had a day to kill on our way north so we stopped at a small campsite almost in the middle of nowhere on a minor road, it was very peaceful and had a small lake nearby (Goggausee) but once again unfortunately access was limited.
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