I've caught the Travel Bug..

It's Thursday night here in Vienna and I finally have some down time to write, watch TV and just relax. For the past few weeks it feels like it's just been non-stop with everything. We packed up and went to Prague last Thursday which was simply amazing. The city, the people, the culture.. everything. I was a little nervous at first as this was going to be my first expirence staying in a hostel and we just booked the cheapest one with the best ratings. When we got there early Thursday morning we couldn't find it anywhere and were literally walking up and down the streets until this guy was like .. "Hey lost girls.. this way" .. He worked at the hostel and showed us where to go. This became our theme for the rest of the trip! As it turned out the hostel was run by two Canadian guys, who were so wonderful. The hostel was amazing, Lauren and I stayed in a room with 8 other people, all Americans! They were from the deep south so their accent was too funny.. they ended up being really cool and we partied with them on the weekend. I was completely shocked at the atmosphere and cleanliness of the hostel. You can cook, watch movies, go on the internet, do anything you want. It's better than a hotel as you get the chance to sit and talk to so many people. One of my absolute favorite things about being here is hearing stories from travellers all around the world. Or as my professor's would say I'm "networking"!

On Friday night the hostel put on a pubcrawl which was about 10 Euro's .. and it was free wine and beer. Needless to say.. this night turned into one big drunk fest. We had SO much fun, got to see the entire night life of the city while having a great tour guide walking us from bar to bar.. He too was also American! However as 6 of us were travelling together, the next morning it was a process to get all 6 very hungover people up and out of bed to do some touring! .. We went out that afternoon to go see the Prague Castle, for some reason we got lost and could not get to it, everyone was hungry and tired and now walking around in the rain.. as we stopped to look at a map my friend so loudly just said "Fuck the Castle"!! I don't think I've laughed so hard in a long time! It was so fitting for the moment. After about 2 hours we found it.. took a few pictures and made our way to the closest food establishment! .. After some food, the mood lightend and we spent the rest of day walking around the city.

Since Prague was the only other place besides Vienna that I have seen I was in awe. It was beautiful, the buildings, the water, I loved everything about it. What is very famous in Prauge is the Charles Bridge. From this bridge you can look over the city, I remember just standing there and thinking .. wow. I have never seen anything like that before, I didn't want to leave.

On the bus ride home back to Vienna all that was running through my head was what Stephen once said to me when he came home from Spain.. he said once you get a taste of travelling, you just want to see more and more. And right now, thats where I am. I want to see more. I find it so ironic how scared I was to come here and worried about so many things, and now all I want to do is see more cities, meet more people, and expirence more cultures. So like most people call it.. I have the travel bug. Our next little trip will be to Germany in about 10 days, this time it will just be Lauren and I which I think will be good. We'll be staying in Berlin for 3 nights and then back to Vienna. Travelling at night is my favorite thing to do.. I can just put my headphones in, look out the window and zone out. It gives you a lot of time to think.. Being in Vienna, and traveling has made me think a lot about my Grandmother Sturrock. I remember hearing all the stories of her travels and Im so happy that I will get to do the same thing now. I know she would be so proud of both Stephen and I.

As for everything else, it's going pretty good. My classes are very interesting, I love learning about PR and marketing from a different perspective, the change is so great. I have a class starting next week that focus's on Media and Culture which I'm really looking forward to. My German language class is kicking my ass. It's not like studying French or Spanish which is a pretty language, it's this yucky language! Lauren and I try and talk to each other at home sometimes in German! The good thing is that it has taught us a lot of the basic's for us to get around the city. We are constantly meeting new people and it's so great. We have become friends with these two guys who are from France. We spend a lot of time with them and have noticed so many different things between our cultures. They always get mad at us when we leave a bar without telling them, or don't talk to them for a few days. It's so weird. And Im talking like getting MAD! We of course just laugh it off.. but it's so very odd. But they are both cute :)

One last story and then I promise I'm going to stop writing! .. So this weekend in Prague we had a guy and girl from Finland come with us. The guy's name is Jussi. I absolutly adore him. He is so funny and such a nice guy. Anyways, we were sitting around the table having dinner one night, and the conversations are so different, we go around the table and tell everyone what our parents do, what our families are like and the difference between our cities. (it's really fun) Anyways, we got to talking about homeless people in Canada, and Lauren and I said because of the cold many of the hobo's live under the bridge. When I said this he looked at me very oddly and I wasn't sure if I said something politicaly incorrect or what.. as it turns out he thought I said "homo" and that we make the "homos" live under the bridges in Canada!! SO funny, I seriously was crying laughing. Anyways.. just another language barrier that is fun to get around!!

I'm posting some pictures from our weekend in Prague and a few from a night of ice skating in Vienna.

Lot's of love from Vienna.



This is me standing on the Charles Bridge in Prague, so beautiful.




This is the view from just one angle of the bridge; you could see so much of the city.




I took a lot of photos, I loved it.



This is a church that was across the street from out hostel.. I don't know the name of it, but it was really pretty!



This is in the middle of the City Centre.. we walked in the rain for hours that day. But well worth it :)


This is me a little scared of this guard! They were all around the Castle and tourists would just go up and get pictures, wave in their faces, it was so weird!! .. so of course I had to be that tourist as well!



This is the Prague Castle that took forever to get to, but it was very nice!



Another shot of the Castle..



And one more!



This is me with my Chec. money... it was like monopoly money!! It was so hard to understand what it was to the Euro.


Another shot of the six of us at a festival downtown.



This is the six of us at the Prague Castle that day.


Having dinner before a night on the town!


Lauren and Henni, night of the pub crawl!


Me... Loving the 1E for a glass of wine!


This is a night when we went skating down at City Hall.. the skating rink is huge with lots of people.



This is Oliver (my new French friend) and I.



Laruen and I skating..



And again!



This is a picture of City Hall at night time in the winter in Vienna. This photo can’t even do justice to how beautiful it really is. There are light everywhere and the skating rink is HUGE. We spent hours there one night. They have lots of music, food and drinks. Lots of fun.