Day 31

Monday August 27

8:15amish - woke up, went to breakfast, etc. etc.

9:30amish - went to Karntnerstrasse and Graben to look for something specific to buy. Found it. Won't say what it is here because the person it's for will be reading this :p but hopefully they will like it.

10:00am - of all the Swarovski stores on the Karntnerstrasse (by my count, at least 3), the biggest one of all opened at 10 so I went in and I go up to the lady and I ask sheepishly, "Is there anything I can buy here in Austria that I can't buy in the US?" She kind of looks at me funny and I try to explain that I collect them and have millions of them but wanted something special that I can't get at home in a Swarovski store. So she shows me these Austria and Vienna-specific keychains and paperweights. That's it. So I can't leave Austria without my favorite Austrian crystal so I bought a paperweight that has a famous image at the bottom of Vienna's amusement park's ferris wheel that says "Wien" (the way they spell Vienna here). It was 30 euros, whatever, I had to have it LOL!!!!!!!!

11:00am - Made my way to the Synagogue, which his not particularly far away. On the way I got a pretzel and sat down in a little square and ate it. Got to the synagogue, which looks like a normal building except for the chains and concrete blocks at each end of the street it's on and the little bit of Hebrew on the outside. Not exactly like the major churches. I was early (tour at 11:30) so I went and sat down under the shade close by.

11:20am - went to the synagogue and there was a line! Wow. Whole family from Israel with a "so-ugly-it-was-cute" baby with them. This british lady came up and wanted to know how to get into the Synagogue. We told her and she starts telling me how her grandmother was from Vienna and probably went to this temple and blahblah and she was upset that she couldn’t get in. She was all emotional and asking me to say a prayer for her inside because she didn't have time as she and her friends were going home that day or whatever. I didn't have the heart to tell her I didn't particularly pray, so I was just like "sure sure"

Anyway, the security to get inside this temple was more than anything I had encountered on my trip so far!! Had to show a picture ID and the security guard asked questions. He asked me why I was in Vienna, where I was from, where I had been before that, blahblah. Then he asked if I liked it and I said I loved it it was beautiful and he asked me if everything I was carrying was mine and if anything could be used as a weapon. I was like, DUH LOL. I figured it probably wouldn't have been smart to say "if I did, don't you think I wouldn't tell you anyway"

Then through a metal detector where you put your bags on a table for another guard to look through. I should mention these guys were in black suits and looked like FBI agents in Washington DC. Anyway he looks through my bags and sees the Swarovski box, so I'm like, you can look in it if you want to. He goes "I don't want to but I have to." so he starts to open it and he's doing it upside down so that if he opened it up that way the round paperweight would just fall right out. I was like please, let me do that. And so I open it and he sees it's a crystal thing and he looks at a THIRD guy behind a window, and they just laugh. Then he looks through my purse and I'm like, that's just a water bottle, you can throw it away if you need to. And he laughs at me and says "no maybe I'll just make you drink it" and I said "hey if you want me to I will." It was funny but.. Well… didn't have to do any of that to go into any church that is for sure.

12:00 noon - finally everyone is inside - maybe close to 75 or so people - and we get to go into the sanctuary which is actually a lot smaller than I expected. It's an Orthodox temple so the lower part is for men and the upper part is for women so the men can't see the women during the service. The girl explained the history of the temple (it's the only one that survived a 1938 Nazi raid and it did that because it was "hidden" within a building pretty unnoticeable from the outside, it's only one of 12 today in the whole city, etc.), answered some questions and then we got to look around. It was built in 1826 and has been renovated. It looks kind of like a round theater and that's because it was designed by an architect who did theaters at the time.

Anyway it was very interesting.

12:30pmish - saw a little restaurant around the corner from the temple that looked pretty busy, called Bermuda Brau. So I was hungry and went. They had a chicken wing dish for 7.20. Sounded good, so I got it. Asked for a glass of water and got a bottle of mineral water, ah well. Then the bees came. One of the dipping sauces they brought with the wings (which was, btw, just a huge plate of about 50 (ok maybe not 50 but you get the point) pieces of wings and nothing else. They should probably have it on the appetizer menu but anyway it was tasty nonetheless). So the bee comes. And doesn't leave. I got up and went to the bathroom, and when I got back, it had gone away but shortly came back. Finally I got so tired of sitting there I wasn't even hungry anymore. Paid and left.

Conveniently on my way back, once again, I passed by Zanoni and since I knew I wouldn't be by there later, I had my daily Blumentute! I was a good girl again, and I had 3 sorbets - raspberry, blueberry, and LEMON! Omg, the lemon tasted like eating a lemon :D It was sooooo sour and tasty!! Of course, since it was during the day, it was hotter and sunnier, so I was like, please please just don't make a mess on yourself. So what do I do, I look down and see pink spots going down the front of my pants. Of course LOL.

1:45pm - so I went back to the hotel, sprayed some OxiClean on it and put the pants in the sink, changed, and went back out a while later.

2:30pmish - went back out, walked to the Kaisergruft - aka the place where ALL of the Hapsburgs are buried. Ok, can we say CREEPY. I got the map for 50 cents and like, omg, there are like hundreds of them. It's so creepy. I don't know what more I can say but to see all of the tombs of ALL of these powerful people all in one place. Yikes. Took a picture of the map so you can see how big and how many there are, since my pictures don't show the sheer size of it I don't think.

3:15pmish - walked a few blocks to the Burggarten - an old greenspace of the Hapspurgs at the Hofburg Palace complex. Walked through, took some pictures, sat on a bench and watched all the Austrian families in the park for a while, which was nice. Found the Mozart statue and went a couple blocks to the Heldenplatz, yet ANOTHER Square in the Hofburg complex. There are a couple more museums there that I have no interest in and it's a across the street from the Museumsquartier where there are a bunch MORE museums… yikes. Anyway there was some kind of festival going on in the Heldenplatz - everyone was drinking beer lol. But I didn't feel like walking around too much in the sun to actually figure out what it was so I checked it out and found the closest tram stop

4:15pm - following the helpful directions of someone on the travel boards, I took the Tram D out to Gunoldstrasse, then the bus 39A to the end at Sievering, then a 10minute or so walk through the gorgeous hilly wooded vineyards to the Heuringer (aka wine tavern) called Weinhof Zimmermann. Took just over an hour all told.

5:20pmish - Very beautiful setting right in the vineyard. The waitress spoke enough english to tell me what to do - order the food at a buffet and pay for it, then take it outside on a tray to a picnic table where she would take my drink order. OK cool. Got a bunch of stuff (well, mostly the same as what my picnic lunch the other day was), paid the 12 something euros, and went outside where I ordered the same type of wine I got last night. Everyone around me was locals, so that was nice, but a little intimidating at the same time. They had all kinds of interesting drinks that I wish I had known what they were lol. I bet some of them were nonalcoholic and tastier than wine. I think it's clear, I just don't like wine, no matter how "good" other people tell me it is. :p Sat for a while enjoying the local peaceful atmosphere and gorgeous scenery, avoiding the FUCKING BEES, and just chilling.

6:30pm - I paid for my wine (2.20 - cheap!), couldn't stand the bees anymore, so I left. I had been hoping to stay long enough to see the sun setting over the vineyards, as I'm sure it would've been beyond stunning. but I couldn't take it anymore. So I walked back to the bus station where one was just about to leave, hopped on, got off at Gunoldstrasse, got the D tram and took it all the way to right around the corner from my hotel, hurrah! Arrived around 7:30pm. I was so thirsty, before going to the hotel I went to McD's and sucked it up and got a 1 euro soda. The cold icy fizziness hit the spot.

7:45pm - Eurosport is showing tennis, yay! Looks like the sorbet came out of my pants, double yay! I'm very tired today but not sure why. At least my feet aren't killing me too badly today, triple yay! Gonna take it easy tomorrow too, I'm VOWING To finally go to a real Viennese coffeehouse and just do a bit of shopping and one last "back streets" walking tour and that is about it.