Quick Vienna update from Colin

Yesterday, I took a train from Berlin to Vienna, where I'm going to meet Naomi (who's been in Italy). It was about 10 hours, but first-class was only about ten Euros extra, so I ended up without neighbors (my seat was alone on its side of the aisle) and a huge picture window. The views were beautiful, especially the stretch between Dresden and Prague - the train followed the Elbe river ('Labe' in Czech) through a fairly steep valley.

I got to Vienna around 10:30pm, and walked to my hostel. I got a bed in a 6-person room. It was 'fine,' as my brother would say. A little too hot, but pretty quiet. I had an over-priced hostel breakfast in the morning. Actually, it wouldn't have been overpriced if I had taken it up on its offer of "all you can eat," but I learned in Frankfurt that starting off the day by eating all the hostel Musli you can eat makes the rest of the day feel like you're a clump of soggy oats.

I walked then over to the hostel with I'm supposed to meet Naomi - about an hour walking. Some first impressions: people seem to eat schnitzel here the way the Germans eat dönner kebab (though they also eat dönner here). The city looks more like Paris than Berlin, at least, from what I remember of my 3 hours in Paris last year. It's older, both in population and in buildings, and so there's a lot more of "so-and-so lived here" stuff.

My main plan for our time here is to eat cake and ice-cream. Naomi can make the call on the rest.