Tuesday June 5th

Tuesday morning began with the best breakfast since London. Eggs, ham, and fresh bread were a welcomed sight after a few weeks of subpar breakfasts. However, the downpour of rain outside as I was eating my breakfast was far from what I wanted to see. The group was scheduled to take a bike tour of Prague Tuesday morning and I was not looking forward to getting soaked in 50 degree weather. Apparently everyone else, including our professors, held this same feeling and the executive decision was made to cancel the bike trip. Somewhat relieved, although disappointed we wouldn’t be biking the city, I spent the rest of my day working on my thesis in the hotel lobby. At this point I am mainly transcribing interviews and formulating my approach to the topic of public-private partnerships. Once I return to Auburn I will begin to actually write my thesis, so until then I am doing all that I can to gather and compile as much information as possible.

Old Town Square

After making some headway on my thesis, I was ready to get out of the hotel and have some fun. The group met up at 6 and walked to U Medvidku Beer Hall and Restaurant, a famous Prague destination. The U Medvidku Beer Hall and Restaurant is a 550 year-old brewery that is renowned for its beer. While it wasn’t the best beer I have ever had, it was pretty cool to have a few beers and eat dinner in such an old establishment. For dinner I order a half meter, or about a foot and a half, long sausage. The spicy sausage was pretty tasty and cheap, so I had no complaints.

Although Tuesday was a bit slow and we were unfortunately not able to see much of Prague, I’m glad I was able to put some work into my thesis and stay out of the nasty weather. As I have said before, this trip has been an incredible experience but it’s nice to have a day to yourself every now and again.

Monday June 4th

Prague from Charles Bridge

After a short stay in Vienna, Monday brought a train ride to the next stop of our European tour; Prague. We rose early to pack our bags and make our way to the train station for our 9:30 train. We actually arrived about 45 minutes early so I took advantage of the extra time to buy a cinnamon roll with raisins that was approximately the size of my face. I guess at this point my trip to Vienna had come full circle breakfast-wise, starting with Pringles and ending with a delicious cinnamon roll. After scarfing down the breakfast treat I made my way to the train which arrived exactly on-time and left five minutes later exactly on-time. The aviation industry needs to take notes on how Austrian trains stick to a given schedule. However, Austrian trains are not without their own faults. For the second train ride in a row, our six person car was lacking proper air conditioning. I’m beginning to wonder if, when our professor booked our trains, he forgot to check the box requesting an air-conditioned car. Luckily this time we were just sitting in the car rather than sleeping, but the trip was nonetheless very warm. After five hours of riding in Satan’s kitchen we arrived in Prague.

 

We reached our hotel in Prague mid-afternoon to check-in and grab a late lunch. I was actually impressed with all the different food offerings in close proximity to our hotel. Before I found somewhere to eat lunch I had to stop by an ATM to withdraw some Czech currency. Unlike the vast majority of our stops in Europe, the Czech Republic does not use the Euro but rather the Czech Crown. It was slightly confusing pulling money out of the ATM because $1 equates to about 20 Czech Crowns. After withdrawing a thousand Crowns out of the ATM, I snagged a quick lunch and headed back to the hotel to unpack and lay down for a few minutes.

Gehry's crazy building

The group met up at 6:30 to walk around the city for a while and see the sites. One of the most interesting was a building designed by world-renowned architect Frank Gehry, as seen in the picture below. We later walked to such sites as the Charles Bridge, Jewish quarter, and Old Town Square. Even though we have been traveling for a while now, seeing all these new and interesting places does not get old. After finishing our walk in the Old Town Square, the group was released for the evening. I was starving since it was about 9 PM, so a few of us went to a stand that was roasting hams and sausages. I ended up ordering a sausage, potatoes with cabbage and bacon, and a cold beer to wash it down. Similar to Vienna, the food was not the most flavorful in the world but it was tasty and filling. After a long day, I was ready to call it a night and prepare myself for the rest of our short trip in Prague.   

Sunday June 3rd

Sunday began a little later than normal as the group didn’t meet until 10:30. After a great night’s sleep, I was ready to check out more of Vienna. The group met in the hotel lobby and proceeded to take the subway a few stops over to Prater Park. Prater Park, known to Austrians as Wiener Prater, is very reminiscent of New York’s Central Park with tons of grass and lots of shade provided by the many Chestnut trees. Our walk through the park actually began at Wurstelprater, an amusement park that marks the entrance to Prater Park. This was actually a trick by our professors as we all thought we would be spending the day at the amusement park rather than walking around the actual park. However, we would eventually return to Wurstelprater.

Slightly larger than most swings

Even with our incessant demands to stop at Wurstelprater, our professor chose for us to keep on with our walk through Prater Park. Our professor planned for our group to take a leisurely walk through the park, but once we began traversing the massive area we realized it would be anything but a quiet Sunday afternoon. There must have been some sort of race that weaved its way through the park, with runners and people cheering them on at every turn. In addition to the runners, there was also a couple of bands setup along the way cranking out Austrian and American music. We eventually were able to keep walking and break away from the race and enjoy the quieter side of the park. While we all enjoyed the serenity and beauty of Prater Park during our walk, none of us could shake the memory of the amusement park from earlier in the day. 

Trying to hide the nervousness as we strapped-in

Beginning to gain height

After a few hours in Prater Park, our professor finally gave in to our wishes and let us loose to explore Wurstelprater. The first ride that caught our eye was a massive elevated swing. As the pictures show, we were buckled in like an ordinary swing but were then lifted almost 400 feet into the air and swung around. While I will be the first to admit I am not a huge fan of heights, the view from the top was well worth the slight anxiety I had as we ascended. We literally had a panorama view of all of Vienna as we were swung around the massive tower. Once I had two feet on the ground again, we all decided to walk around the park for a while and look for any rides that interested us. I put my East Tennessee roots to work and rode go-carts a few times, doing my best Dale Earnhardt impression as I traded paint with my fellow group members. Fully satisfying our inner-child after a full afternoon in the park, we headed back to the hotel to grab a quick dinner and relax for the night in preparation for our early-Monday morning train ride to Prague. 

Saturday June 2nd

Belvedere Palace

After some much-needed rest Friday night, I woke up early Saturday morning ready to see more of Vienna. Because our bike tour of Barcelona was so well-received by the group, our professor scheduled a bike tour of Vienna for Saturday morning. Luckily I really enjoy the bike tours regardless of weather because it rained off and on for about the first two hours of our riding around the city. Even with the rain pounding down at times, I had a blast biking around and seeing such sites as the Museumsquartier, St. Stephen’s Cathedral, Belvedere Palace, and many other significant buildings. Having traveled and visited many cities in Europe in the past four weeks, I think the best and quickest way of seeing as much of a city as possible is taking a bike tour. While the visits to the different sites aren’t quite as in-depth, you see a ton of places and you’re not wasting time walking to and from the different destinations. Even with Saturday morning’s rain, I had a great time pedaling around the city.

St. Stephen's Cathedral

Following a couple hours of biking, we were all starving so the group broke up for the day to grab late lunches. A few of us saw a little village of shops and pop-up restaurants close to St. Stephen’s in downtown on our bike tour which piqued our interest, so we decided to hop on the subway and head back to grab some lunch. The area reminded me of Market Square in Knoxville, only more crowded and with more food vendors. Once we arrived I checked out a few of the different food stands before I ordered a bratwurst hot dog and a massive pretzel. The hot dog was actually very interesting because rather than a bratwurst on a bun, the hot dog was instead a bratwurst placed inside a hollowed-out piece of bread.  After a tasty lunch, a couple of us walked around and shopped in the downtown area for a while before heading back to the hotel.  

After showering and relaxing around the hotel for a while, three other guys and I decided to head back downtown for dinner and a few beers since the group wasn’t meeting until 10:30 Sunday morning. I was actually fairly surprised that there really weren’t a ton of options when it came to bars in downtown Vienna. In most of our previous stops you couldn’t throw a stone without hitting some type of watering hole. The four of us ended up going to an Australian bar, where they thankfully spoke English, and drank a few beers before calling it a night. 

 

As I said in a previous blog entry, I have been very impressed with Vienna. The subway system is incredibly easy to use even with the language barrier, the food is extremely affordable, and the overall city feels clean and nice. After the hustle and bustle of very touristy stops prior, I have thoroughly enjoyed my time in Vienna.

Friday June 1st

After an eventful night of travel from Italy to Austria, we arrived early in the morning to cooler weather and very pretty scenery. We ended up finding our hotel, a Marriott, around 9:30 and searched around the neighborhood for something to eat for breakfast. If there’s one thing I have learned this trip, it’s that most cultures do not place the same importance on breakfast as Americans. True to form, I wandered the streets of Vienna and was unable to find any shops or restaurants serving breakfast so I settled with a can of Pringles, a Snickers, and a Coke to wash it all down. While I’ve actually been impressed with how healthy I have been able to eat while traveling, this breakfast was not one of my finer meals of the trip.

Schonbrunn Palace

Following my breakfast of champions, the group met up to begin our sightseeing in Vienna. Our hotel is conveniently located a few hundred yards away from the Schonbrunn Palace, so we began our day visiting the Palace’s gardens. The Schonbrunn Palace is a former Habsburg summer residence and is filled with beautiful gardens. I couldn’t help but think of how many of my family members would enjoy visiting the Palace’s gardens as I weaved my way through. What stood out most to me about the gardens was the massive amount of maintenance that must be involved with the upkeep of the acres of gardens. I cannot imagine how many workers it must take to trim all the bushes, weed the flowerbeds, and cut the grass. The Schonbrunn Palace’s gardens were a sight to see.

A small taste of the many gardens

After walking around the well-manicured grounds, the group separated for the afternoon to eat lunch, shower, and rest after our long night. We met back up at 7 to head to downtown Vienna to walk around for a while and a find somewhere to eat an authentic Vientiane meal. One thing I noticed on our walk around Vienna’s most urban area was the cleanliness of their downtown. Unlike a few of our previous stops, there was hardly any graffiti on walls or gypsies begging for loose change. Another difference from pretty much all of our previous stops was the lack of tourists. While Vienna might not be the most well-known city in Europe, our walk downtown alone made me a big fan of the Austrian city. We followed our stroll around downtown with a great meal at Weinerwald, a restaurant highly recommended to us by one of our professors. I ordered skillet full of roasted chicken, potatoes, bacon, and onions. While it was not the most flavorful meal I’ve eaten on my trip, it was definitely one of the most hearty and filling. After our late dinner, I headed home for the evening to call it a night after a long day.

Thursday May 31st

After touring around most of Venice Tuesday and Wednesday, on Thursday the group left the main island and traveled to the Venetian suburb of Lido. We boarded Venice’s public boat transportation to travel to the small island, and then boarded a public bus to make our way to the beach to relax and catch some sun. While we traveled no more than probably 10 miles total, our trip from the hotel to the secluded beach took almost two and a half hours. Although public transportation is cheap, sometimes you get what you pay for when it comes to travel time.

View from my spot on the beach

Once we made it to the beach we all grabbed a quick lunch and headed down to the sand. It was almost eerie as we walked down to the beach and realized that there were probably only about six other people within sight of the spot we chose for the day. Even though it was an early Thursday afternoon, I expected to see a lot more people on such a warm and sunny day. However, I definitely didn’t complain about the lack of noise and people on the beach. We spent the next few hours relaxing and discussing our journey so far through Europe. Since we had to catch a train to Vienna later Thursday night, we left the beach about 3:30 to head back to the hotel to grab quick showers and pack up our bags.

Photos from our boat ride to the train station

After rinsing off the sand and saltwater, we made our way to the train station for our overnight train to Vienna. While I knew this journey would not be the most fun time of our trip, I had no idea what was in store for us as we prepared to board the train. We boarded the train a little before 9 PM and made our way to our sleeping cabins. Since we have a large group, we reserved our spots ahead of time and I shared a sleeping cabin with five of my fellow classmates. The sleeping cabin wasn’t completely terrible, roughly measuring six feet wide by eight feet long by nine feet high, but we were certainly packed in there like sardines. As we were getting settled into the cabin and preparing to depart the station, everyone in the group began to notice the lack of air conditioning in the entire train car. For some reason that nobody could comprehend, the air conditioning would not function on only our train car. As you can imagine, multiple sleeping cabins of six people in extremely close quarters with no air conditioning, or ventilation of any kind for that matter, was a recipe for disaster. To make matters worse, the train car was also without Internet or plugs to recharge our computers. After complaining for a while, I decided that my complaints weren’t going to help anything and decided instead to just take my shirt off and try to relax. After about three of the hottest hours of my life, shirtless in a tiny sleeping cabin, the air conditioning magically came on and I was able to sleep a few hours before arriving in Vienna Friday morning at about 8:30. While the overnight train ride was terrible for a while, it certainly provided a funny story afterwards.    

After a couple of weeks in Italy, we will be spending the next few days in Vienna followed by Prague. While it seem like months ago that I first arrived in London, my trip across Europe has been all I could ask for and more.

Wednesday May 30

This blog entry is going up a little late due to an issue with our train from Venice, a topic to be addressed in a future blog entry.

Wednesday marked our first full day in Venice. We began the day by eating a meager breakfast in our hotel’s courtyard, although this task was a little harder than planned. As we ate our cereal and Danishes we simultaneously fought off hoards of pigeons intent on eating our breakfasts. Fortunately I never had to actually hit one of the pigeons, but I was fully prepared to if necessary. The group met up shortly after breakfast to walk to our meeting with Venice’s public works department. 

Venetian "Fire Truck"

Insula is Venice’s public works authority who is in charge of such tasks as canal upkeep, repaving streets, as well as coordinating various construction projects. Insula is obviously a very different public works authority due to Venice’s location and unusual problems associated with the water-bound city. Our group met with a few Insula representatives, each member explaining their roles and answering our questions regarding upkeep of the city. It was incredibly interesting to learn more about how Insula remedies the fluctuating tides as well as the effects of saltwater on the foundations of buildings. While it would be fun to work in construction in Venice, I don’t think I would enjoy it as much as in the States because there is very little heavy machinery used in the small city. There obviously isn’t too much dirt to be moved when the whole island is built-up on piers. Anyway, I came away very impressed by Insula and their construction methods. 

After our meeting, the group visited the first large grocery store we had seen on our trip. Until that point, we had only seen smaller shops with not a whole lot to offer food-wise. Capitalizing on the big selection in the store, I paired up with another group member to buy a rotisserie chicken, roasted potatoes, and two sticks of bread for about 5 Euros a person- a great deal in one of the most expensive cities we have visited thus far. One thing we forgot to buy with our meal was forks, so we ended up sitting in a park tearing at the chicken with our hands. We caught a few laughs from passersby, but it didn’t bother us as we enjoyed the delicious and cheap meal.

Rialto Bridge

To round out the afternoon we were released to tour the city on our own. Similar to the day before, a couple of us walked around somewhat aimlessly. We ended up walking all the way to the Rialto Bridge, one of the three bridges that cross the Grand Canal in Venice. Similar to the Ponte Vechio bridge in Florence, the Rialto Bridge had a bunch of shops on the actual bridge. After glancing in the different shops I was finally able to find a few non-touristy presents for family. Presents in hand, I headed back to the hotel after a fun day in Venice.