Europe on a Shoestring: Ahhh Vienna

We arrived in Vienna in the rain and on a public holiday. Not a good start! I was not well so I stayed in and went to sleep. After a good night's sleep, I woke feeling much better so headed down to a breakfast of juice, coffee, pork sausages wrapped in cheese and bacon, and scrambled eggs. Not a good idea at all. Obviously, my tummy bug hadn't died overnight and I was straight back to my room. Elizabeth and Keeley headed off to the Schonbrunn Palace while I slept some more. The maid woke me so I headed off to the Palace too. Keeley and Elizabeth had been through the Palace as well as the Zoo by the time I arrived so I took my time walking through and listening to the history with an audio guide. I still don't know much about the Habsburgs but I know a lot more than I did before my visit! The Palace has 1441 rooms but I only wandered through 40 of the most important ones. http://www.guide-to-castles-of-europe.com/schonbrunn-palace.html Very pleased I made the effort to visit while I was in Vienna. I planned to walk up to the Gloriette, but the temperature was dropping quickly so I abandoned that idea in favour of catching the tram back to the hotel.

I ran to catch the tram ( the driver waited for me!) and had an uneventful journey back to the station. Our hotel is maybe 200 metres from the station but do you think I could find it? Of course not! I ended up walking for a half hour before I stopped to ask where I was. Naturally, I had walked in the opposite direction and was told to just go back to the station and go the other way. But somehow, I became hopelessly, completely, utterly lost! I could not even find the railway station and it's bloody huge! I walked down streets and didn't see a soul. God only knows where I was. I ended up seeing a tram line in the distance and headed for that. I hopped on a tram that said it was going to Mariahilfer (I recognised this as the street our hotel was in). I could not believe I was 4 tram stops away from the station. I jumped out at the station and still couldn't find my way! I have completely lost my innate sense of direction! Completely! I blame the anaesthetic I had in July. (He was a Russian anaesthetist!) I think I have been lost in every place we've been so far. I have given up finding my way from the station to our lodgings even when it's 200 metres away, because I have been lost every single time. I can barely believe it myself. I have never been lost anywhere in my whole life before that op!

Relief washed over me as I entered our hotel through the revolving doors, and I have stayed put ever since, only venturing to the cafe downstairs for a bowl of soup. Hopefully I have lost some weight! :-)

Off to Prague tomorrow!