Eastern Europe !!!

Well, big trip for me. It's been a long time since I travelled much.
But, I am back now.
I met Zoe in Paris before flying out to Vienna to start our big vacation.
Her host mother Michelline made dinner for us and some friends before we left. It was a great time.
I still don't believe Michelline's over 60. She is a very active and vibrant lady. Most of her friends are in their 40's, I think. Maybe due to her personality. Cool lady.

Being a veg-head, Zoe looked up veggie digs in most of the places we planned on seeing. In

Vienna, we hit the Bio-Bar and have good things to report. The food at this joint is very good. I was surprised. Also, they had some really good bio (organic) beers. My favorite was called Hilfer. But they had a Hemp beer that was very interesting. Made me hungry for some reason.

The Bio-Bar is located in the Stephanplatz area. It's right next to the Judenplatz museum. So look that up and you will find the Bio-Bar.












The architecture in Vienna (Wien) was clean and powerful. We both loved this city. There are some areas which are better than others. But, overall the city is very nice. The prices are about the same as Prague. However, the food and accomodations are light years better. The old town area and tourist areas are almost spotless. None of the graffiti we saw in other countries.






This is one of the museum areas. Around the corner was the treasury museum which was very nice. We saw a butterfly exhibit, like an atrium of sorts. I wanted to go in until I saw the price. I am such a cheap bastard. 5 Euro turuned me away.

We paid for the treasury museum though. I am glad we did. It was worth it. A lot more to see than I thought.



This is the smaller of the two Jewish museums in Vienna. It's right next to the Bio Bar restaraunt between the Stephanplats and Swedenplatz subway stations. The other Jewish museum is bigger. But, this one is located in a really cool area.

There is an interesting monument outside the Judenplatz museum to all the people who died in concentration camps.



The shopping and tourist areas like Marketplatz and such had many musicians playing for the crowd. There were some with accordians and some with guitars. Still others were four piece brass jazz groups and even the string quartet pictured to the left.




As I said, the architecture in Vienna is stunning.




This is the church at Stephanplatz. I shot this from many angles. But, this is the only one I have with the horsies in it... Yeah..

We got to Prague and started wandering around. We stopped for Gelato and looked up to see the building. It turned out to be the new Synagogue. We were in the Jewish area. It was a small Jewish area and some of the English speaking guides had a very whacked explaination of what Jews were like. Oh well. Anyway, it was a beautiful building.




This was the oldest of the buildings I saw. It was the original meeting hall and bordered the old Jewish cemetary.
I found the architecture quite nice.









Zoe (the boss) at the river bank in Prague.
Did I mention Prague was surprisingly expensive for the region?




The old town was a nice area to stay. Very touristy but less expensive than other areas. Still, we got soaked. Around US$70 for a double in a hostel with a single shared bathroom for the entire floor. It was not that clean, but we got some sleep. It was behind the church in the photo and to the left.



This celetial clock was quite the attraction. It kept track of time, months, daylight and even the constalations. Man, I thought is was made by Swatch. But, it did not have a stop watch or a gps.

Well, that's all for today.. I will add more pictures and comments from the trip later.