Best Trip Ever--Day Five

Highlights: Got our rental car (in the morning); visited Schoennbrunn on the way out of town (beautiful! and near my old home as a student); cruised the Autobahn (Jon was in heaven); stopped in Melk for dinner; and arrived in old Salzburg (home of the one way street.)

I tried to limit the number of pictures I add to each post....but this was a bad one for that. I just couldnt choose!

The gardens have fun mazes with puzzles and water games.

Something to work towards: coming again for our 50th anniversary

Jon found his purpose on the autobahn...

Some beautiful views in Melk

Wood's Babies Born!

Congrats to Ginny and Dave Wood who had twins today! This makes #4 and 5 for the Wood family! Amazing. Here is the announcement from Ginny:

The boys arrived on Wednesday, October 11, 2006. Ryan Grant came at 2:57 pm weighing in at 6 lbs. 10 oz. and 19½ inches long. Tyson Kimball followed not long after at 3:11 pm, measuring 5 lbs. 15 oz. and 19½ inches long. Both boys are doing EXCEPTIONALLY well and mom is surviving too!! They are thus far quite mellow, often laying in the nursery or room with eyes wide open, just content to soak in their new surroundings. We recognize they may yet wake up a bit, but we are grateful for what we can get! The other kids are loving having their brothers finally here.

Also, Happy Belated Birthday to Ginny on October 5!

Best Trip Ever--Day Four

The highlights: watched a practice at the Spanish Riding school, toured Stephensdom (and climbed the tower to the top), had lunch at the SkyCafe, went shopping on Kartnerstrasse, and couldn't find a rental car so decided to stay one more night in Vienna. It was good we stayed because we were able to get tickets that night for Madame Butterfly at the Staatsoper .

St. Stephens Cathedral/Stephensdom

View from the top

View of Stephensdom from the SkyCafe

Us at the Staatsoper to see Madame Butterfly

The Short Version

When I was in high school and would come home from dates, I would always go check in with my parents to let them know I got home ok. Dad was always sound asleep. Mom was either awake worrying or sleeping light enough that she woke up when I opened the door (depending on who my date was.) I would sit and tell my mom all about the date--where we went, what we did, who was there, did I have fun, etc etc. At some point my dad would roll over and say, "Emily, is this the short version or the long version?" I am not sure if he was gently hinting for me to leave so he could go to sleep--or if he was debating whether or not it was worth it to stay awake for the end of the story. All you that know me well can probably guess—it was always the LONG version.

Since I am so behind on our posts--I am going to insert everything as "the short version." If you want more details, you will just have to give us a call or write an email :)

Best Trip Ever--Day Three

Around Town
We have a lot of pictures from this trip of Jon (posing because I am making him be in ANOTHER picture) and self portrait shots. This is the downside of traveling with only two people. (Especially when one of those two is obsessed with taking pictures.)
In the morning we started at the law school to finish up some business I had there. Then we walked passed the main Vienna University building, the Votiv Kirche and Rathaus again and then through the Volksgarten (people's garden.)

Museums
We visited the Natural History Museum (the art history museum was closed that day, so we had to miss it.) It was interesting and we had a good time goofing around with all the "stuffed animals." We also saw a Picasso exhibit at the Albertina museum and had picnic in the Burggarten.

Butterfly Reserve
Next to the Burggarten is a butterfly reserve. It was small, but beautiful and the butterflies loved Jon. It is basically an atrium with walkways, a waterfall and plants. The butterflies are free and flying all over.

Reisenrad
That night we took a ride on Vienna's famous Reisenrad. It was one of the earliest Ferris wheels to be built (1897) for Emperor Franz Josef. The wheel is about 200 feet in diameter. It originally had 30 gondolas, but it was damaged by fire in WWII and only 15 were replaced. It is a slow ride, but a great way to get a view of the city...

Best Trip Ever--Day Two

Today we moved to the Pension Shermin, near Karlskirche. It was nice to be in an area of town that I was more familiar with.
Karlskirche--St. Charles Church
This was one of my favorite spots when I lived here. It was a nice quiet place to sit and study or read. The church always stays cool, so with little AC in the summers, it was a nice break from the heat. When Jon and I went in, I was disappointed at first because they were restoring the inside of the church. It made it hard to really see the architecture and decor. However, because of the restoration we were able to ride an elevator (and then climb some stairs) to the top of the dom. It was really cool and gave a great view of the city. it was fun to see the ceiling of the church up close. The church is decorated in Baroque style, so it is very elaborate and dramatic. Many of the architectural features that I had thought stood out from the ceiling, I realized were just painted on once we could get close to them. It was amazing. With the restoration, they had a small museum exhibit. I really liked this unique painting of Mary's mother teaching her to read. It was a subject matter I had never seen before.
Outside the church in the courtyard, the United Buddy Bears were on display. This is an exhibit sponsored by the United nations. There are 125 bears that have been painted to represent countries in the United Nations. They are touring the world and are a project to promote tolerance, peace and international understanding. Jon and I took pictures with the Guatemalan Bear and the Qatari Bear.

Kartnerstrasse and Stephensdom

This is the pedestrian area of Vienna and the church at the center of the city--St. Stephen's Cathedral. It is a great place to shop or just to sit and people watch. I introduced Jon to wurst stands for the first time. It was love at first sight. He had to get a hot dog or sausage everywhere we went. Kartnerstrasse is also full of Italian gelato carts. I think Vienna has more gelato per capita than anywhere outside Italy. I was happy because I was able to get Almuddler again. (Almduddler is my favorite soda. It is hard to find outside Austria and tastes kind of like apple beer or gingerale.)

Amerika Institut and Staatsoper

After lunch we walked around and found my old school--The Austro-American Institute of Education (Operngasse 4). It was really bizarre being there. I felt like I had been reincarnated and was visiting a past life. It was really fun to see it though and to show Jon where I use to get a pastry in the morning or a wurst for lunch in between classes. My old school is right across the street from the state opera house. The Staatsoper is one of my favorite buildings in Vienna. I love the architecture.

Musikverein

You can't go to Vienna without going to some sort of classical music performance. We decided to see a piano and violin performance at the Musikverien. The Musikverein first opened in 1870 and is one of the three best concert halls in the world. The building has amazing acoustics. It is also the home to the Vienna Philharmonic. The concert we saw was really good. The violinist was the best. He was really entertaining to watch. We decided he thought he was a rock star--he could head-bang with the best of them. His hair kept getting caught in the bow. Jon leaned over to me during the concert and said, "Do you think he knows he isn't Bon Jovi?" The Musickverein is just across the street from Karlskirche, so we tried to take a night shot of the church. Not bad for not having a tripod.

Best Trip Ever--Day One

We started our trip in Vienna. This first night we were able to stay at the conference hotel--The Hotel Regina. Our room had a great view of the Votiv Kirche.

Jon arrived in the morning and my conference was done by lunch. We went to dinner with the Viennese hosts of the conference. After dinner we walked around to enjoy the city at night--but it started to rain so we only got so far. This picture is of the Rathaus--the City Hall. They often have events in the courtyard in front. When I lived here we use to come to see concerts here in the summer. The week Jon and I were there, they had a small circus.

If I were to die and come back as a country…

…It would definitely be Austria. Hands down. No contest. Vienna, Salzburg, Halstatt, Melk, the Salzkammergut—I will take it all. This is still my absolute favorite place on earth. I haven’t been everywhere, but I can’t imagine loving anyplace any more. If I didn’t have family or friends back home, this is where you would find me living out my life. I think this trip was my favorite ever because I had my two loves—Austria and Jon. On every other trip I have taken, one or the other was missing. Even though I got sick, I still had the greatest time. I think Jon got pretty sick of me starting the first day because I kept saying over and over “I love this place. I love this place. I LOVE THIS PLACE!” I took 2000 pictures in 10 days! I don’t know what I did before I went digital. Jon said he thinks that Chinese tourists take half the pictures in the world and that I take the other half. :) He is probably right.

Since I am catching up on my blog after the fact, I am just going to post the places we went with a few pictures. We can tell stories some other time.

Again… Best trip ever.

International Colloquium—Vienna

On October 6-7 I helped organize an international colloquium in Vienna, Austria. This was one of a series of conferences I have helped plan this year, but this is the first that I actually went to. The topic of the colloquium was “Developments in Marriage and Marital Law in Central and Eastern Europe: Reports, Prospects and Analysis.” It was held at the Law School at the University of Vienna. The conference involved about 35 scholars from 13 different countries.

Jon flew in for the last day of the conference so that we could tour Austria after it ended. I was really happy to be back. I lived in Vienna for 4 months during college on a German study abroad program. It has been seven years since I was there and it feels like a completely different lifetime. I loved being back and being able to share it with Jon.

This is a view of Vienna from the top floor of the Law School--where the conference was held.