Vienna - Day Forty Six

So, Vienna again...

I was sitting in The Loft Hostel in Budapest the other day trying to decide on the next location, and after about 30 minutes of my mind wandering to other things I managed to whittle it down to two possible destinations; Bucharest or Zagreb.

This was quite an achievement, because (yet again) I was a little hungover. So, with two potential candidates to choose from, I did a little research. Here are two extracts from the Lonely Planet's Shoestring Guide to Europe,

"Stray dogs, rip off taxis, lack of tourist information and communist smears aren't great press agents for Bucharest..."

and,

"Bucharest's stray dogs number 100,000 and, on rare occasion, bite. If bitten, go to a hospital for anti-rabies injections within 36 hours"

I think it was probably the anti-rabies injections (plural, I hope you'll notice) that didn't sit so well with my delicate, alcohol-soaked frame of mind, but I had a strong feeling that the 16 hour train journey to a city full of red-eyed, foam-lipped, blood thirsty slathering hell hounds could safely be postponed for a month or two.

Zagreb actually sounded lovely, but a quick inspection of the Hungarian railway network's website showed that the only trains available got me into the city late at night, and to be honest I just wasn't in the mood for that. I've arrived late in strange cities on quite a few occaisions now and it's always a bit stressful, no matter how safe or beautiful the city.

That left me in a bit of a pickle; where to go? Where to go...?

Of course, Vienna is only three pleasant hours away by train...

And it's a major transport hub...

And it's now officially my favourite city in Europe...

So here I am. And a good decision it was too. The journey was beautiful; a deep red sunset lending a warm glow to wide green fields, with frequently snatched glimpses of solitary deer and long-legged hares. Loads of hares for some reason. Definitely hares - not rabbits. I'm from the countryside you see, we know about these things.

As if to confirm what a good choice it was, I bumped into Chad (my fellow zombie bather from Budapest) almost immediately after arriving, and we had a few beers.

The next day I saw a man in a big flashy 4x4 (a real Chelsea tractor) cut across the road and get hit by a tram. Amazing. I love this city.

Budapest - Day Forty Three

The baths were so good I had no choice but to go back there for the second day in a row, and I'm so glad I did, because it gave me one of my most memorable travelling experiences yet.

I traversed the metro system (the oldest in mainland Europe apparently fact fans) and headed back to Széchenyi Baths with the unerring accuracy of a homing pigeon, leading a procession of three English girls from the Loft who wanted to see what all the fuss was about. We spent about three hours soaking up all the goodness of the baths, whirlpools, jacuzzis, plunge pools, saunas and steam rooms (and gawping at fatties - a key part of the experience). I was more or less ready to call it a day, but decided to have one last dip in the hottest of the outdoor pools.

I had been wallowing happily for a couple of minutes, skin pruning up nicely, when the memorable thing happened: a thunderstorm suddenly broke out of a sky that had been blue and sunny a few minutes earlier. I was submerged in lovely warmth from the neck down, peeping over the water which now seemed to boil with the force of the icy rain drops pounding its surface, while deafening peals of thunder rang out across the sky. Then the sheet lightning kicked in.

It was a truly amazing few minutes. I felt a long way from home, in the best way possible. The baths are actually underneath the flight path of Budapest airport, so there was the added entertainment value of watching the occaisional plane fly past and wondering if it was suddenly going get frazzled by a stray lightning bolt.

That night a group of us went to a nearby student bar, which seemed quite quiet until a band struck up some traditional Hungarian tunes and a group of students started doing some folk dancing. I don't recall folk dancing being as popular with students back in the UK, but it looks like it's probably our loss because those guys really started going at it - whirling around in what was basically a souped up version of the hokey-cokey. I wish I'd given it a go actually.

Budapest - Day Forty Two

I'm glad I picked The Loft Hostel for my stay in Budapest. It's a spacious, chilled out place and its small scale (there are only 18 beds in total) keeps things feeling friendly and homey. I've passed the last few days in classic backpacker style - beery drinking games in the evenings and lots of pavement pounding when I walk the hangover off the next day, and this hostel has been a great base - somewhere to relax amidst the chaos.

I've been feasting on Hungarian classics; goulash, paprika chicken and mixed fruit strudels have given me the energy required to get from one place of interest to another (it's a bigger city than the maps make it seem), and I've been soaking up the palpable Eastern European feel to this region, which is quite striking after my previous destinations. It's a bit of a driftwood city - everything feels a little battered and frayed. There are some beautiful old buildings here, but most of them look as if they've had a few layers of polish worn off them over the years, and could now do with some serious TLC. After all the pomp and splendor of Vienna, Budapest feels a little grubby and tired - most places would though I suppose.

I had a fantastic day today - so good that the city will always have a special place in my heart. I woke up after a mere three hours of sleep (more drinking games at The Loft I'm afraid) and there was a very real possibility that I would have ended up wasting the day. Luckily Chad, a Londoner I'd been drinking with the previous night, managed to kick some life into me when he reminded me I'd agreed to visit the baths with him.

Budapest is renowned as a city of spas, and we headed to it's grandest old bath house in a park behind Heroes Square. I'm not entirely sure how we made it across town, as we were both shuffling about like extras in a zombie film, but somehow we bumbled our way in there, avoided the more horrific big fat hairy naked guys in the changing room (although not before I saw some things that will plague my nightmares for a few sleepless weeks) and made it out into the intermittent sunshine of the outdoor pools.

The next few hours proved to be the best hangover cure I've ever found. We wallowed in the hot pools (38C...) like drunken zombie hippos, we whirled around in a kind of giant spinning whirlpool that made me laugh like a giddy schoolgirl, and we sweated it up in the saunas and steam rooms. If there was one of these back home i would visit every day, without exception, eventually getting thrown out at closing time looking like a giant pink prune. A happy one.

After what could well have been several hours (I lost track of time pretty comprehensively), I was ready to leave, but Chad talked me into getting a thai massage...

I have never had a thai massage before. I've never had any type of professional massage before. Sweet beard of Odin it was good though . I floated out of the place! The woman who gave me the massage was about a third of my size, but she had the vicelike grip of Chuck Norris. The last five minutes or so were finished off with a head massage that left me burbling and just as zombielike as when I arrived at the baths a few hours before. Worth every bloody forint.

I'm probably going to stay here for an extra night now, in the hope that tomorrow will be another sunny day and I can go back to the baths one last time. If you only see one thing in Budapest, make it that place.

Budapest - Day Thirty Nine

The sun just won't stop shining in Vienna, and the place seems to get lovelier by the day. I spent Thursday wandering around the city just basking in the goodness of it all.

Until now I really didn't think I was going to find a city that I liked more than Barcelona, but after a fantastic week Vienna has just about stolen the title. In the same way that I was planning to move back to Barcelona for a month or two to pick up some work and get to know the place better, I'm now considering doing the same here, and I'll definitely find it hard to leave.

On Thursday evening (after yet another coffee in Phil), I met up with Bernadette and we went to the State Opera house, where we bumped into Matt and Paige, a really nice Australian couple I'd met at my hostel. There was no opera on that night, but we picked up standing tickets to see a ballet for a ridiculously reasonable three and a half euros. I've never been to the ballet before - and never much wanted to either to be honest - but I ended up quite enjoying it. I even managed to follow the storyline which was an unexpected bonus. I did feel like a bit of a bum watching it in baggy jeans and a t-shirt though.

When it was over the four of us went to Naschmarkt (the outdoor farmer's market). As it was about 10pm the stalls were obviously closed, but there are a string of cafes and restaurants alongside the market, and the whole place had a surprisingly buzzing atmosphere. We picked up a tasty and reasonably priced dinner over a nice conversation - a good end to another great day in Austria.

By Friday I had put off leaving town so many times that I felt it was finally time to move on. It feels like summertime already here, and the city has never looked so beautiful, but I think it's probably time to hit the road again.

I jumped on a train to Budapest and had a compartment to myself all the way there, the window open as far as it would go to ease the baking temperature in the unseasonable heat. I bumped into Cameron, an American guy from one of my dorms in Wombats in Vienna, on the train - I'm starting to encounter a few familiar faces the longer I travel now - so it was nice to have a brief conversation before returning to my solitary compartment.

First impressions of Budapest are that it seems... interesting. Caught a bus across town in surprisingly humid heat that left me a bit of a sweaty mess by the time I made it to my hostel, which is on the fourth floor of an old residential building. It was worth it though - The Loft where I'm staying seems friendly and well thought out, a real traveller's place. I had a beer and snack in town but kept it quiet tonight. Apparently there's a DJ night in one of the traditional Turkish bath houses tomorrow, with everyone getting hammered in the saunas and baths whilst wearing swimming costumes. Sounds worth a try...

Vienna - Day Thirty Eight

I am an idiot.

Last night I went out to Flex - the legendary nightclub with the legendary club night, London Calling. I had an amazing night, I danced like a fool and drank too much alcohol, but spoiled the whole thing a little by somehow managing to lose my digital camera in the back of a taxi on the way home.

This is even more spectacularly inept than it sounds. My expensive, all-singing all-dancing camera has been broken since Milan and apparently needs to be sent back to Nikon to be fixed, which will take a few weeks. With that in mind, and frustrated at being in beautiful cities and unable to take any pictures, I had just blown about 150 euros on a compact digital camera and then spent the last two days making up for lost time. This is the camera I managed to lose, a mere 48 hours or so after buying it.

I had about 100 photos on there already, and some of them were really nice. Yesterday, with time on my hands and the sun hot in a blue, blue sky, I visited the impressive palace and gardens at Schönbrunn, on the edge of the city. Completely on the spur of the moment I bought a ticket for the zoo that they have there - the oldest in Europe, founded sometime in the 1700s. I sometimes get depressed at zoos - there's nothing worse than seeing animals cooped up in bad enclosures - and I was a little worried that Europe's oldest zoo might be a bit basic, but it turned out to be fantastic. The enclosures are pretty imaginative, and they have some cool animals. I would have paid the entrance fee just to see the three jaguars they have there (especially when one of them snarled at a teenage girl who tried to poke it - she nearly passed out with fear), but they also have a baby panda, some energetic sea lions, sleepy hippos and a really well designed rainforest house. I had more fun than a solitary zoo visitor should probably expect to have, and enjoyed walking round the palace gardens and getting lost in the deceptively tricky maze.

I know I only have myself to blame for losing the camera. It's another beautiful day in Vienna today though, and it's hard to get too depressed in this town. I'm off to sit in the park and maybe grab another coffee in the excellent Phil. I think I'll put off moving on for another day...

Vienna - Day Thirty Five

I was right about this town; it definitely deserves more than a few days of exploration. After a hectic month of dashing from city to city it has been really nice to slow things down a little and get the feel of Vienna at a more civilised pace.

I checked into my hostel on Thursday and almost immediately bumped into someone I knew. I had met Will - a British guy on a one man cycling odyssey - in Munich about a week before. In the time it had taken me to interRail between Munich, Amsterdam, Berlin and Vienna, he had cut a swathe through the Bavarian countryside on his bike and trailer, sweating it up and braving the elements as I reclined in sleeper carriages and quaffed beer in hostel bars - that sort of behaviour takes the wind out of your sails a bit when you imagine yourself to be roughing it around Europe.

About ten minutes later I also bumped into Jenna and Isaac, a couple from San Fransisco I had spent an evening in the laundry room with in Munich as I tried desperately to keep myself out of the bar for a night. They ended up drifting away after a brief chat, but I've spent most of the last few nights with Will, eating like kings in the excellent (and affordable) restaurants of Vienna, and hustling drunken Americans at pool. We´ve sampled traditional Austrian (two cannonball-sized dumplings of stodgy potato, encasing a cricket ball-sized mass of sausage meat, on a bed of sauerkraut... yummy), Italian, Vietnamese and Turkish. Admittedly though, the Turkish was a kebab.

I've passed the days lazily wandering the streets of this beautiful city. You can almost smell the history that wafts from every grand public building, elegant museum or extravagant statue that you pass, and when it all gets a bit too much you simply duck into the nearest kaffeehaus for a comfortable sitdown and an invigorating caffeine hit. My favourite of these by far is the excellent Phil on Gumpendorfer Straße. I'm not taking the credit for discovering it (it was recommended by the same girl who told me to check out Monsieur Vuongs in Berlin), but I've already spent several happy hours in there. It's a combination of cafe, furniture store, bookshop and music store. If you can find a seat (it always seems to be packed with all the cool kids of Vienna), you can kick back, sink a few excellent coffees and get chatting to friendly locals while a DJ plays the sort of background music that has you planning significant additions to your record collection. I had a great conversation with a Viennese guy called Matthias in there the other day - he's a graphic designer and proved to be extremely chatty whilst also wearing the coolest hoody I have ever laid eyes on. I felt significantly more fashionable just being in its presence, bathing in its reflected wonder. No one that cool is usually so friendly. Got a few more insider tips for the city which I'll hopefully check out over the next few days...

Today I was shown around Naschmarkt - a farmer´s market that´s been running since 1780 - by Bernadette, my informative local guide to the city. We assembled an extremely tasty (and uncharacteristically healthy) lunch from various market stalls which we ate with her flatmate Lizzy, then we walked to the top of a hill that overlooks the city. It´s only when you look down on Vienna like this that you realise how flat the surrounding landscape is for miles and miles around. This lack of geographical impediment also explains the fact that it gets really bloody windy. I wandered around at a 45° angle to the ground as frequent icy blasts painted my cheeks rosy red and threatened to carry me off into the distant Danube, but the view made up for the frostbite.

If all goes to plan tomorrow I might make a little day trip to Bratislava, which is only an hour away by train. I have decided to stay at least until Wednesday night so that I can take in a legendary club night at Flex - a place described in my hostel as "best club in civilisation". About five people now have told me to go on a Wednesday for a night called London Calling. With a name like that (my favourite album of all time) I´d turn up even if they played non-stop James Blunt, but apparently it´s the defining night out here. Time will tell.

Vienna - Day Thirty One

Ok, I yesterday I overslept again. This time it's because a couple of people were having sex in my dorm that night and it's hard to get your beauty sleep when your head's buried under the pillow and you're waiting for the fleshy panting noises to stop.

So, because of the bedroom athletics I missed the walking tour for the second day in a row. I'm not too gutted about that though, because the cold, rainy weather would probably have taken the edge off things. I caught the U-Bahn across the damp grey city to the Zoologischer Garten, which I would have checked out if the rain hadn't started coming in sideways at that point.

I ran through the downpour for a couple of blocks, nearly getting run over at an intersection where the green man turned red a bit quicker than I anticipated, and made it into the warm, dry sanctuary of Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtniskirche. This once grand cathedral was bombed to ruins by the RAF in WWII. Today it's broken tower and shattered body stand as a powerful anti-war memorial - the gilt-mosaic ceiling of the only remaining original section arcs gracefully above an interesting and moving museum exhibit that aims to convey the futility of war and the importance of understanding and dialogue between different nations and cultures.

Beside the ruins of the original church there is a new church. It's a simple tower from the outside, but as you enter through its heavy doors it is illuminated by thousands of blue glass windows - it was impressive even on the dark, rainy day that I visited. These two churches are well worth a visit if you are in the city. I found the ruined, bullet-strafed old cathedral profoundly moving, despite the thirty or so noisy English schoolkids who were bustling around when I was there.

Just before 9pm I borded a sleeper train for Vienna. This one was a lot more comfortable than the one from Barcelona to San Sebastian - I actually fitted in the couchette bed for a start. Like the previous train I had one of six beds in a private compartment, but there was only one other woman to share the cabin with this time (and she got off the train at about 5am) so I had a lot more privacy.

When she had left I opened the blind for a while as I tried to get back to sleep in the empty carriage, and the journey became surreal and cinematic. The train was quiet, except for the soothing background hum of the carriage sliding over the sleepers and cruising around long lazy corners, and my cabin was almost dark; illuminated only by the stars and the occaisional light from a farm in the sleeping countryside outside.

I was woken at about 8am this morning by the conductor as she brought me a cup of tea, some bread rolls and some tasty peach jam. As I had the cabin to myself I enjoyed a leisurely breakfast as the Austrian countryside rolled casually past my window. My interRail ticket is valid until the 5th of April, but I have a feeling this might be the last journey I make on it. I arrived this morning in a sunny, welcoming Vienna, and I have a strong suspicion that this city deserves more attention than a couple of short days.