In Vienna

We had a liesurely trip to Vienna, arriving at the station well before our train. Changing krona into euros reminded me of Israel: standing in a long line for a clerk, who filled out papers and stamped them before giving me my money. I used up most of my extra krona by buying some Leonidas chocolates for Annie, Cherie, and myself.

While we reserved seats for the train, they didn´t give us one of the private compartments, like we had on our trip to Prague. There was a rather annoying American further up the car who chatted with his neighbors in a loud voice for most of the 4.5 hour journey.

I went to the dining car for lunch and spent an hour chatting with some Americans from Seattle who had been in Prague as part of a sea shanty singing festival.

Vienna is about as cold and grey as Prague. We´re hoping for good weather tomorrow. We hoped to go to the Staatsoper tonight to see La Juive, but they were virtually sold out (the only tickets left were in the 100 to 130 Euro range), so we´re going to head to Stephensplatz and walk around.