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| Glenn's Journal for 9-28-02 - Vienna It's Saturday morning and our first full day in Vienna. We slept in a little this morning as one roommate woke us all up as he came in around 5:15 am from partying all night. We got dressed and prepared to head out for the day. Well it did not take me long to realize that I needed some warmer clothes on so I returned to our room for a long sleeve shirt. Upon my return I dropped the key at the front desk where the receptionist told me about the street markets on Saturday's only and highly recommeded them. Our first stop this morning was the grocery store for breakfast where we had yogurt and chocolate chip muffins. We also bought some juice, water, and candy for later. After the grocery store we returned to our hostel to drop off our extra food items before heading on to the street markets. We made our way up Mariahilfer Strasse where we ran into the 1st market on Neubau Gasse. The market extended 5 or 6 blocks running down both sides of the street and the place was packed with people. The vendors are selling everything from their junk to food and clothes to personally made arts and crafts. The few things we priced were overpriced in my mind but that may be the tourist price expecting you to bargain them down. Oh well, we did not buy anything at this market, at least not today. By now we were getting hungry so we looked for food while heading towards the Naschmarkt. We stopped into a pizza joint where we both had slices of pizza for lunch (We could have had spaghetti or something else!!). After lunch we found our way to the Naschmarkt. Here is where you can find many of the fesh fruit and vegetable stands. You can also find shops selling clothes and tourist items along with a flea market mostly of "junk" that people had to sell. We also passed on buying anything from this market as well. We also hurried through this market a little more so since it was rainy and cold. Another miserable day for the weather. We decided to head back to the hostel to get out of the rain and cold for a while. Upon our return to the hostel we read our books for a while and tried to take naps. Of course our roommates each showed up while we were trying to take naps so we didn't get much of one. Downstairs in the breakroom of the hostel they play "Bad" movies each night at 7:00 pm. Tonight "Volcano" was playing and we had decided to stay in and thought we would see it. It included Tommy Lee Jones and Anne Heche and was about a volcano that develops and erupts in the middle of Los Angeles. It was definitely a movie I would not have paid for but fun all the same. We then went out to dinner at a Chinese restaurant just around the corner from the hostel (the hostel had flyers on the counter for it). After dinner we returned to the hostel, read for a while before turning in for the night. We plan on attending the Vienna Boy's Choir in the morning and you have to be there by 8:30 am for the standing room only seats or you will not get one. Our roommates were not home at midnight when we finally went to sleep. They were checking out tomorrow to catch the bus that was leaving from the hostel at 7:45 am. |
| The Parliament building in Vienna. |