week two: vienna, prague again, and my birthday

we are back in the states, but we left our hearts in prague. we fell in love with that city and we enjoyed time with anders, and nith, and our nephew moss so much. we miss them! here's the recap of the second half of our trip: 

 on monday the 27th, the four of us took a high-speed train to from prague to vienna. the train left at 12:45 pm and was supposed to take 4.5 hours. we sat in a pod of six seats in one of the cars with two eastern europeans.

 shortly after leaving the station, it became very clear that there was an issue with the air conditioner....it was stifling in there! and it continued for the whole ride, which made it feel longer and more torturous than it should have. ;) the ride ended up being over 5 hours, but we survived. it set the tone for a hot hot few days in austria. it was in the 90s every day.

we took a bus to our airbnb, which was in an old convent in the middle of a bustling neighborhood. it had 2 bedrooms and 1 bathroom. we were tired and hot, so we ordered pizza from the place across the street for dinner and brought it back to our flat. i tried a beer that i had seen a couple times since arriving in vienna, but i was not a fan. :) oh well! the pizza was great, though.

 tuesday morning we set out for naschmarkt, which is a huge outdoor market with all sort of vendors. ashford wanted a peach, so we hooked him up with one of those. azalea found a magnet with her friend simone's name on it. 

 

i loved the rainbow crosswalks in vienna. it reminded me of capitol hill area of seattle. 

 

after a break at the airbnb for lunch and a cool down, we made our way to st. stephen's cathedral. 

we bought passes to go up in the towers and also did the catacombs tour. we explained to the kids what a catacomb was and asked if they would want to see it and they both gave a resounding "yes!" it was by far the coolest/craziest thing we did in vienna and something i will remember for the rest of the my life. they didn't allow photos in the catacombs, but there were caskets that held bishops from the 1700s, as well as roped off rooms full of human remains like skulls and other bones piled up. many of them were from victims of the plague. i have never seen anything like it! the kids thought it was creepy, but cool. they were the only kids on the tour, and they did great.

we grabbed our (daily) gelato after that. it was a really quirky ice cream shop. everything was black and white and looked like 3D drawings. 

i loved these buildings on our walk back. 

after another rest at the airbnb, we walked to a nearby thai restaurant for dinner. it was hot in there, but we sat by the windows and had some of the best thai food we've had in a long time. it was a really nice night. much like the inexpensive alcohol in prague, my 2 glasses of wine were about $3.60 us each. after dinner, we took a meandering walk back through the neighborhood. all of the outdoor cafes and parks were filled with people and it was such a nice vibe. another feeling i wish i could bottle up! 

wednesday morning we set out to go to prater, which is an amusement park that has a big ferris wheel from 1897. each car is enclosed and looks like a little red house. it was super cool. we got to ride it for 15 minutes and take in the views of the city and the amusement park below. 

once the kids saw all the other rides, we knew we wouldn't be getting out of there without going on at least one more. thatcher and i aren't big amusement park people, so we let them pick one thing to do before we left. there was no admission fee, you just pay for each ride. ashford ended up not wanting to do any of them and azalea picked the log chute, which i joined her on. it felt good to get a little wet because it was hot out!

after lunching/resting at our airbnb, we walked to get gelato. 

 

 

then we continued on to the treasury museum. we made sure to do inside, air-conditioned stuff in the afternoon each day. they had a crib that belonged to napolean II and a huge emerald. 

 on the way back, we stopped at this transit info center that thatcher had been patiently waiting to visit for a couple days :) it was huuuge and probably the highlight of his visit. ha! we took both the trams and the u-bahn (subway) while we were there. it was easy to get around, but not quite as quick/reliable as prague.

 

 

after some debate about what to do for dinner, the boys decided to stay back at the airbnb and eat some leftovers that we had and azalea and i headed out for a little pasta dinner date. we found a super cute place just 1.5 blocks away, overlooking a park with a fountain. they asked if we had a reservation because they were nearly booked (we didn't). they took pity on us and squeezed us in. the food was delicious and the company was even better ;)

 

thursday morning we had to check out of our airbnb, which meant 4 hours of dragging our luggage around the city before catching our train back to prague. we probably should have timed things better, but cest la vie. we walked around some areas we hadn't seen yet (which is most areas. vienna is too big to do in 3 days). we got some lunch at a cute little grocery store and ate it on a park bench. 

finally it was time to head to the train station. our train ended up leaving about 20 minutes late, but the ac worked this time, which made a world of difference.

we got back to anders and nith's around 9pm and ate some dinner they had for us, since we mostly just ate snacks all afternoon/evening. 

friday was back to prague life. we both agreed that while vienna was beautiful and fun, prague as definitely our favorite of the two. :) thatcher and i got to resume our morning coffee walks, which was so nice. it was so hot in vienna that we didn't feel like coffee in the mornings. 

once moss was done with his morning nap/feeding, we all headed out to prague castle. the grounds surrounding the castle were beautiful.

there was a little ceremony happening, so we stopped to listen to the music. 

 we left the grounds and made our way down this street that was one of my favorites in the city. it was a huge hill with a narrow road in the middle and tons of businesses. nith and anders said we should try a trdelnik, which is a czech dessert that is essentially an ice cream cone but the cone is a raised donut in a cone shape. oh my - it was so delicious! we got 2 of them and it was hard to finish. this was all before lunch time :)

we picked up kebabs/gyros on the way home. and snapped some pictures of this happiest little guy: 

 

in the late afternoon, we met up with an old friend who is from prague. jula was a high school exchange student in minnesota in 2012 and she lived with our friends liz, joe, jake, and max for a year. we got to know her well during that time, but haven't seen her since. the timing worked out great to see her as she had just returned from a 3 month occupational therapy program in india. it was so fun to catch up with her and anders, nith, and moss got to meet her. we got gelato and then hung out at the playground at petrin. it was a rare chilly afternoon!

 

 saturday morning was another coffee walk for thatcher and me :) i loved walking around the touristy areas in the morning, before the crowds. 

 

 

in the late morning, we took the tram to walk around a public garden. 

 

 

in the mid afternoon, nith and i went out for a couple hour shopping trip. i called it my birthday gift to myself :) it was so fun to spend that time with her and i ended up finding some new clothes. in the late afternoon, we all went to petrin again to hang out on a blanket. moss kept taking off every one's hats and he thought it was the funniest thing ever! endless baby giggles. 

around 9:30 pm, thatcher and i went for our only after dark walk in prague. we knew we wanted to see the city lights, but hadn't had the opportunity yet. it was beautiful! 

sunday was my 38th birthday! when we were looking at dates for our trip, i knew i wanted to spend it there and definitely not on an airplane :) a lot of the day was spent packing and running errands in prep for our return home, but i got one last coffee walk in as well as a trip to another marks and spencer department store. we picked up 2 kinds of cake for that evening.

i wore one of my new dresses and while we were waiting for the tram, a bird pooped on it. that was...memorable. at least i got to go home and change into my other new outfit i bought ;) we went to the mall by their house and got lunch at the fancy food court. i relaxed in the afternoon. i read my book and took a little nap. after moss's nap, we all went for one last walk through petrin together. 

 

nith and i went out for a traditional czech dinner together, which was really fun and delicious.

  

 thatcher, anders, and the kids stayed back and had pizza. then we all reunited for cake. i really wanted cheesecake because it's my favorite, so i got a slice for myself and everyone else split a small chocolate cake. and we had prosecco. yum!

monday morning it was time to head to the airport. it was hard to believe our 2-weeks in europe was coming to a close. our first flight of the day was 2 hours to get to helsinki. we took a small plane that was 2 and 2 across, which i think i've only done once before. then we had a 3 hour layover at the helsinki airport. it was packed. we got some food and hung out at our gate for a long time. finally every one was boarded and the plane headed out to the runway for take off. all of a sudden they informed us that they needed to "check something with the engine" before we could leave, so we went to a maintenance area. we weren't sure if we would be able to stay on the plane, or even leave any time soon, but thankfully we were able to do both and it took less than an hour. they fixed whatever it was, added even more fuel to the plane, so we could make up some of the time. so nice! we were also able to watch movies on board this time, which made for an easier journey. but 9 hours on a plane is long no matter what! by the time we touched down in seattle at 6:30 pm, it was 3:30 am in prague and we had been awake for wayyyyy too long. we took an uber home, unpacked our toothbrushes, and pretty much fell into bed. 

we'll be battling some jet lag for the next few days, but hopefully we'll feel more human again by thursday afternoon when we hit the road for minnesota. i laugh in disbelief every time i think about doing these trips so close together. wish us luck :)