Vienna, Austria

Since our arrival in Vienna wasn't until about eight that night our adventures didn't begin until the following day. We took a city tour. On the tour we were able to see:

-St. Stephen's Cathedral (there seems to be a few of these around the world)
-The Hofburg Palace
-The State Opera House
-Heroes' Square
-Parliament (which looks very Grecian)
-Succession Building
-Schonbaunn Palace

That was day one. After the tour we seemed to have worn ourselves out and headed back to the hotel for a rest before we headed over to Prata Park to take a ride on the Big Wheel which is mentioned in the film "The Third Man". A relaxing and enjoyable ride. Very similar to the London Eye in London.

One our second day in Vienna we trekked off to see the Terra-Cotta Warriors, which were on display for the first time in Austria. An interesting experience especially since one of my friends had gone to China and saw them there as well so we basically saw them at the same time. Crazy huh?

Before we went off to see the Terra-Cotta Warriors we set off to the Danu Tower. Our biggest problem seemed to be finding it. We ended up in the local park walking around looking for the entrance to the tower only to find that we had to exit the park and walk further down to reach the tower. We finally managed, after being within a stone's throw of it numerous time, to make it to our destination. An interesting aspect of the Danu Tower is that you can bungee jump off of it. None of the family members, however, were feeling terribly adventuresome and so we keep that off our list of things to do before we left Vienna.

After our excursion to the Danu Tower we went back to St. Stephen's Plaza to wrap up the last minute souvenir shopping. As we were there a protest rally marched through the plaza. Apparently they were protesting the closing of a home for the homeless that the government was trying to close down. Shall we say that it was a interesting close to our time in Vienna before we hopped a train to Prague that evening.