“Does this hostel exist?” I could not believe that this was running through my mind again after a long train ride from Prague. I mean after staying at a place with a door that said Shopping Centre No. 10, I was hoping this would not be of similar nature. Well, my direct thought after this one? It sure as hell better b/c it was a pricey hostel, the only one we could find for the period that we were there. Turns out it was a hotel with full service. We had a gimongous room, 3 beds…one of which was a queen size and an enormous bathroom. Not to mention that they cleaned every morning…woot! This turned out to be the best hostel on our entire trip!

After dropping off our bags, we were off and running to explore…we only had a short time in Vienna and there was much to see. First off, the Hundertwasserhaus Wien, which are these bizarre, Dr Seuss-ish buildings in Europe designed by Friedensreich Hundertwasser. This was a touch strange…I’m not sure if it was the cold, cloudy day that was drawing quickly to a close, but this didn’t pique my interest terribly. There was also the KunstHaus Wien, with a permanent exhibition dedicated to Hundertwasser. Instead, I was thinking ahead to the Museumsquartier to hunt down the Lomography store. So I left Michelle and Irene to explore the museum and off I went to track down a fisheye camera and also a Freitag bag.

Along the way, I also ended up passing a lot of camera stores…and of course pressed my nose longingly against the glass - but didn’t dare go in for fear of just handing over the credit card: ( But I did end up at Be A Good Girl (www.beagoodgirl.com) which was a great store…could easily have spent my life savings in there too;P Instead, just settled on spending part of my life savings on my lovely, lovely Freitag bag. Then I bolted out of there in case I spotted something else I wanted!

Then it was a pretty brisk jaunt over to Museumsquartier…it was cold in Vienna: ( For the life of me, I could not find the Lomo store (I did find it the next day), seems like I found everything but. I really loved this area of Vienna b/c it contains Baroque buildings (this area used be court stables) as well as very modern galleries right in the thick of things. With the number of galleries, it certainly called for a repeat visit the next day. It would also be a nice way of getting out of the cold!

Then it was off to meet Michelle and Irene for dindin and back to snooze as it would be an early morning for all of us. Irene was on a mission to go on an architectural tour of the city with a map she had found. Michelle was going to have a lazy day to explore some of her favourite sites. And me…I was off to the Nachtmarkt at 7 in the morning…I love flea markets, but put the flea market next to a food, fruit and snack market and I’m sold! But we would all be meeting for brunch and dinner to catch up on the days events…So off to catch some zzz’s…

Coming up…getting stuck on a train going nowhere fast…

Great set! Pimpi · 2008-03-19: 01:38

love the opera toilet Dragana · 2008-03-19: 08:36

Tagged: vienna hundertwasserhaus kunsthaus museumsquartier wienerstaatsoper operatoilet