32 hours in Vienna

Slept it briefly after too much walking the previous day. Left for Weltcafe behind the Votiv Church from a breakfast recommendation by the hostel staff. Students seem to form majority of the breakfast crowd and there was an overall relaxed atmosphere in the cafe. The cafe prides itself as fair trade and has detailed writeups about its philosophy in its menu. On offer were various types of breakfast such as Oriental (which I think is nothing close to been oriental), English, French, Continental, etc. Ended up going for a Mexican version as it seemed to be the odd one out from the menu. After 5min, I was presented with a plate of scrambled eggs with nachos and bread - pretty strange combi although I have to say the eggs were nicely done and went well with the nachos. Paid €6 + tips for the meal and coffee, seem to be the perfect fuel to start the day!

Popped onto the tourist tram 1 at the corner of the Ring road, which used to be Vienna's enormous city walls and bastions some 2 centuries back before they were replaced by wide and tree-lined roads and tram tracks. As I have bought the 24hr day pass, decided to try out the metro as well which turned out to be comfortable and efficient too. Switched back to tram 1 again heading towards the creations of eccentric Hundertwasserhaus, the architect who thinks that straight lines are wrong and everything revolves around spirals - "we always walk in circles but never end up at the same place...". His museum was dull but his other creation, a social housing project was really quite unique although I will loath to live in there with so many tourists coming round to 'visit' you everyday!

Headed back to the city centre before taking a peek into the majestic Stephans-dom, or commonly known as St. Stephen's Cathedral where it has been perpetually under construction since 1147, much like Sagrada Família in Barcelona. This is the main square for the Old Town and there are loads of horse drawn carriages parked beside the cathedral, awaiting for willing tourists. Heading southwards, I continued to the Wien Museum which was celebrating 50 years of its anniversary by having a New York Street Photography exhibition by a group of well known shooters in the 40s to the 80s. Entry - €7.

Made my way back to the hostel for internet access to check the train and bus tickets, as well as a brief rest of my tired feet. "See if there are any coffee houses in here that interests you, they are slightly more expensive but it is authentic Viennese experience", the hostel lady behind the counter kindly handed me a "Best of Vienna Konzert-Cafes" guide. One of the reason why I did a detour to Wien was to see and soak up the smoky coffee house experience that is so famous throughout the world. As the sky darkens, I hopped onto the U3 metro and headed to the northeastern end of the ring road.

Prukel sits directly out the exit of the station but moment I stepped in, the smoke was pure overwhelming and stepped right out immediately. Not good first experience, maybe I can try out the next one down the road - Ministerium, beside the nice looking art nouveau Post Office Savings Bank designed by Otto Wagner. The crowd was a lot smaller in this and I took up a seat right at the end of the cafe before ordering a coffee and chocolate cake, which ended up to be 2 slices of the cake when it arrived - it was probably the last piece and decided to give it to me anyway. I can see why it is so charming when you sit in one of them and watch businessmen go about their daily dealings and couples sharing a tender kiss under the cozy lighting. But unless smoking is banned indoors, I will probably not be one of them, and I still prefer cafes that are more unique in its atmosphere such as those in Brooklyn or the few I chanced upon while in Stockholm. Still it has been a good experience gained.

Made full use of my day pass and continued on to Spittelau, where U4 and U6 meets, to see the last work by Hundertwasserhaus. This time on a factory with oil like bunkers and a tower to match. The wind howled along as I spent the next 30min trying to capture a good shot before making my way back to hostel. Chatted with a Korean gal, Ashley, who was doing an exchange in Bonn in the room who thought I was a rude korean guy after I ignored her when she said hi (in korean obviously) yesterday. Her english was rather good and we followed with some beers in the lounge downstairs with a bunch of other aussies, kiwis, germans and surprisingly many japanese after I offer her to check the internet on my laptop. Apparently, Koreans have 2 ages when you ask them how old they are, the international age which is what we all use and the korean age, which is always 2 years older than the real age. Seems like it is counted the moment they are in the mothers' womb, but still did not quite figure out where did the additional year or so come from?

By 1am, I figured I should I should just go ahead to get to Pecs by train even though it will cost me €50. The alternative was to take a cheap bus, stay overnight in Budapest before buying the cheaper train ticket to Pecs directly from Budapest (Any train journey is expensive from Austria, but cheap in Hungary). A friend once chided me for complaining too much on my last train ride into Prague and said I am unromantic and should appreciate the joys of travelling on trains. Knowing that I have quite alot of train rides coming up in my next road trip, I decided I should prove her wrong :)