Austria, Vienna. Part 3
Austria, Vienna. Part 3.
So I won't waste time.
3.
This place is located just outside of Vienna. In the late 1100s, Richard I of England a.k.a Richard the Lion Hearted was captured by someone... his brother I think lol. No no no wait I'm thinking as I type. The Lion Hearted dude was on his way to MEET his brother and was captured by this other dude called Leopold of Austria :D
Anyways, from the most unreliable source of information, Wikipedia, : Richard and his retainers had been travelling in disguise as low-ranking pilgrims, but he was identified either because he was wearing an expensive ring, or because of his insistence on eating roast chicken, an aristocratic delicacy. ( btw what the fuck @ eating roast chicken ) *Wikipedia explanation ends*
In his solitude, he wrote a couple of songs and wrote something in French. yeah. Feel sorry for the man.
So NOW, the castle is in complete ruins and is open to everyone. There's a small town at the bottom of the hill where the castle is perched up on and it's called.... Durnstein Town. (original aren't they?) But just being around there, you could kinda imagine what it'd have been like way back then. Living in a small town and having a mean dude ruling over you, like you see in the movies. Woohoo picture time! ( FEEL HAPPY >:( )
The road up.
Durnstein Castle Ruins
from the bottom.
Highest view point.4. The Town of Melk
I don't remember much about this place. I remember it being home to some really old monastery. It's located right next to the river Danube. Surely you know what that is right? No? Well then kiddies, pay attention. The Danube is the second longest river in all of Europe flowing passed TEN countries, Germany, Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Serbia, Romania, Bulgaria, Ukraine and something else. But yeah, that's pretty long, no?
The architecture of this monastery is simply stunning. Inside and out. There was a tour that took us through most of the monastery except for the monk headquarters LOL. So many beautiful tapestries and it didn't feel like I was anywhere recognizable for a short moment. I don't have pictures unfortunately. Sorry folks.
5. The Austrian Alps (aka Look ma, snow everywhere!)
Sorry I had to. This place is sooooooooooo high up. SO HIGH UP ABOVE EVERYTHING. And there was snow everywhere! We had to take a train up to a certain point. Then we had to WALK. It was an awesome walk though. I remember carving my name on to one of the trees. Someone else's name too :P . So as soon as we reached civilization ( because most of the houses on the way up were vacated because of snow ), first thing we see? Skiers! There was this large square opening packed with flat snow and people were skiing. The place even had a bubble lift that took you up to a higher part of the mountain and you could ski down from there on a slope! It was so amazingzinggg. So naturally we didn't have enough time to ski which SUCKED beyond all suckiness. BUT we took the bubble lift up anyways and the skiers were like 'wtf'. I thought I was high before, but at the top bubble lift station.. WHOA. At the top, we saw a lookout tower which was EVEN higher then where we were! My mum didn't follow my bro and I for some reason or the other. So we walked passed the daredevil skiers and walked up the hill that took us to the tower. Then we CLIMBED the tower, which was like 6 stories high. I remember there were cubes of ice at almost every step so it was hard to climb and I fell once or twice :D Finally, at the HIGHEST point any human could go without putting him/herself at risk, the view was 'HOLY SHIT WHOA' . My bro and I took it all in. Everything. The view, the atmosphere, everything. Then we walked down the tower where I fell again. Thrice. bitches. anyways we got down and had some hot chocolate and hot dogs ( which was our regular meal in Austria ) and went on home.
Pictures:
Skiing.
This was the view from the base bubble-lift station. High right?
This is the view from the lookout tower.
It was absolutely amazing.Labels: reminiscences
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Thursday, October 9, 2008.
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