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Venice, Italy to Austrian BorderAfter a very restful night sleep I was able to get up and do some more packing. In this hotel bathroom they had a bidet next to the toilet. The bidet uses a stream of water in a low washbasin that to clean your genitals and anal area after using the toilet. I tried it. It's not unpleasant just different. After playing around with the bidet, I went down for breakfast and then we were off to Vienna.
As we travel through Italy toward the Austrian border we passed many fields of sunflowers. Also, Ann and I started noticing that some of the grove of trees were perfectly lined up as if they were planted. Some of the tree crops had old trees next to middle-age trees next to young trees, all perfectly aligned in rows and columns. We asked Scott about it but he didn't notice it before. Then as we took an exit and started heading north we passed a giant Lumbermill. So these tall trees are being used for some type of furniture or building materials. As we got into the Alps near the town of Tolmezzo, Italy we were informed by Scott that we
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Venice, Italy to Austrian Border had just barely gotten pass a freeway closure by 10 minutes. Apparently they're going to be closing the freeway at 10 am due to finding a bomb left over from WWII. The military are going to remove it.
We passed many small towns nestled in the bottom of the Alps. We also went through about six tunnels just to get to the border. We passed a few towns that are nestled against the bottom of the Alps. they have these man-made sluices to funnel the water as it comes down from the Alps. At 10:45 we stopped at the Marche Movenpick Restaurant rest stop on the outskirts of Tibitsch overlooking the Worther See (Lake). It was a beautiful rest stop. Although they had a Burger King, right next to it was a fresh market restaurant. All the items were freshly cooked or baked or you could put up fresh fruit and vegetables to take with you. I got the tomato soup, zucchini, and a cinnamon roll along with a bottle of water. It cost me almost €13. All of it tasted good but the zucchini was heavily salted so I only had a couple pieces. They had
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Venice, Italy to Austrian Border an outdoor patio that looked over the Worther See. It's a beautiful little place. They even have an Ibis hotel joined to it.
As we travel down the road once again trees and trucks are enemies in trying to get picture of the scenery and the castles. Austria is just like Germany, they want you to come see the country but not from the main highway. Some of the overpass bridges were very high off the ground. We made another pitstop at another restaurant that had a cute little building that remind me of a hobbit house. And once again you had to pay €.70 to get into the restroom. You then take the receipt upstairs to buy something and you get €.50 off anything.
Vienna, Austria’s capital, lies in the country’s east on the Danube River. Its artistic and intellectual legacy was shaped by residents including Mozart, Beethoven and Sigmund Freud. The city is also known for its Imperial palaces, including Schönbrunn, the Habsburgs’ summer residence. In the MuseumsQuartier district, historic and contemporary buildings display works by Egon Schiele, Gustav Klimt and other artists.
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Venice, Italy to Austrian Border We arrived into Vienna about 4 o'clock. As we entered the city it looked very modern and didn't see anything of historical significance. We pulled into the hotel about 4:15 pm. Originally were were to stay at the Hilton next to the Danube but they changed us to the Downtown Hilton. SOOOO upset about that. My room is on the seventh floor with a nice view of an old building in the distance. We had about an hour and a half to settle in and rest up before our night out. As I settled in the people in the connecting room next-door to me obviously had children who did not have much discipline in their lives. Between the running in the hallway and them trying to get into my room from the connecting door, I finally called down to the front desk to complain. They offered to move me to a room without a connecting door but couldn't guarantee me a room with no children next-door. So I told him I would wait and see until tonight to see what would happen.
We left and headed out through the city of Vienna. We did pass
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Venice, Italy to Austrian Border over the Danube River twice since it is branched off in the city. Tonight's dinner at an authentic Austrian restaurant is in a suburb of Vienna called Aderklaa. The name of the restaurant was Marchfelderfof. Each tour bus that appears is greeted with 5 to 7 members of the restaurant staff waving Austrian flags and playing songs. One member of our group got to cut the red ribbon to let us in. It's a very large restaurant with very very eclectic type of decorations. It was full of a jumble of different things from music instruments, ballet shoes, birdcages, and just a wide variety of odds and ends. The funnest part was going to the restrooms. Inside each of the different styles for the ladies room there were pictures of semi nude to full nude men in various poses throughout the centuries including today's man. From all the squealing of the women older and younger you would think that they have never seen naked men before. Lol! We were served a meal comprising of authentic Austrian dishes. We were given a shot of schnapps in a test tube bottle stuck in a block of wood as an aperitif. This was
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Venice, Italy to Austrian Border followed by a salad but had a tunafish dressing. I did not think I was gonna like it but it was very mild flavored. As I was eating my salad I have to look around at the people at my table who are mostly non-Americans. All of them had their fork turned over and was using their knife to push the lettuce on to the fork. Then keep in the fork still turned upside down they wouldn't eat the salad off the fork. Our use my fork like a spoon to scoop up and to stab my food. I wonder if this is an American thing or just the way I was taught. Then we had to choose a main course and I chose the tender and juicy flaker beef goulash with dumplings. The beef goulash is not what I expected from America. There are no noodles. It's chunks of roast beef and a nice sauce and the dumplings is not bread. Apparently a dumpling is flour, fat and water mixed into a loaf and then cut. And that's exactly what it tasted like. The desert of current cream and nougat moose with marinated Woodberry roaster was too tart and
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Venice, Italy to Austrian Border sweet for my taste. We were then given a two minute demonstration of the Vienna waltz. The dancers then selected a few gas to dance with. By that time the room was overly hot and I decided to go outside and wait until everyone else was done with their coffee.
After everyone board the bus we headed back to the hotel. Luigi, the bus driver from Italy, was playing disco music as we boarded. And he continued playing it all the way back to the hotel. Each time we went through a tunnel he would start flashing the internal lights to make it look like a disco room. We had a very good time heading back.
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