Dates - July 12th and 13th
We arrived in Vienna by train on Tuesday afternoon. Immediately, Vienna felt very different from Budapest. Even though much of the recent history and architecture is similar due to the Hapsburgs, Vienna is clearly a more modern city with better infrastructure. We arrived at Westbahnhof and switched to the subway (U-Bahn) to get to the city center; the U-Bahn was very efficient and well laid out. Soon, we had checked into our hotel in Vienna, and headed out to explore the city.
After checking into our hotel, we were hungry so we walked up Karntnerstrasse (Vienna's main pedestrian strip) to a cool little restaurant called Buffet Trzesniewski, which serves tasty little finger sandwiches and mini glasses of Pfiff beer (picture). After a quick lunch, we took the ring-road tram (picture) around the city center to get our bearings. From the ring-road tram, you can get a glimpse of many of Vienna's main sights, including the Hofsburg Palace, Parliament, City Hall, Museums, St. Stephen's Cathedral and the Stadtpark (with statues of many of Vienna's famous composers). After wandering around the city for a few hours, going into St. Stephen's cathedral, visiting the City Hall (which also had a festival going on) and seeing the Hofsburg Palace from the outside, (stopping for a nice coffee and Apfelstrudel at Demer's cafe - picture), we then went back to our hotel, changed, and headed out for dinner. For dinner, we went to a very local restaurant called EsterHazyKeller which has self-serve food and cheap wines in an underground cellar-like restaurant. This atmosphere was very unique and the food was quite good (I had a sausage and Nadya had a schnitzel - picture). After dinner, we spent some more time exploring Vienna at night, taking some night photographs (picture) and then headed back to the hotel.
On Wednesday, our second - and last - day in Vienna, we started off with a tour of the Hofsburg treasury (picture). This was a fascinating look at the history (and power) of the Hapsburg empire and the glory days of Vienna and Austria. From there, we took a tour of the famous Opera House (picture). One of the interesting things about this building is that a lot of it was destroyed during WWII; in my opinion, the original decor and architecture of the building was much nicer than the areas which were rebuilt after the war. For dinner that evening, we went to a Film festival at City hall, which had lots of food booths, and was very lively. We had some great beer in a very local, laid back atmosphere (picture). After spending a couple of hours drinking beer, eating good food, people watching and listening to good music at the festival, we then headed back to the center of town for a famous Sacher Torte and coffees (picture).
On Thursday, we took the train on to Prague, our last stop on this Central Europe trip.
Dates - July 9th to 12th
Budapest was the first stop on our Central Europe trip in July 2005. We took a SkyEurope flight from Paris to Budapest on Saturday morning and were in Budapest by the early afternoon. We were quite impressed by the hotel we stayed at, Artotel, which is a modern building of the Buda side of the Danube.
For our first day in Budapest, we spent the evening walking across the Chain bridge over to Pest and taking in a walk of the city. It is a very beautiful city, especially at night when the main sights are brightly lit up and reflect off the Danube river (picture). For dinner, we had a Hungarian donut (picture) and some wonderful stir fry and sausage on the Chain bridge (there was a market and festival (picture) on the bridge that weekend). In general, we were very surprised and impressed by Hungarian food, which is very flavorful and has a hint of Eastern influence.
On Sunday, our second day, we started the day with breakfast at the hotel. As far as European breakfasts go, this was probably the best we've ever had. After a nice, filling breakfast, we headed up to the Buda hills for a look at the Palace, and old city. The Palace (picture) is perched at the top of Buda Hill and is surrounded by a protective wall. Also on top of Buda Hill is the Fisherman's Bastion (picture) and the old town. For a late lunch, we stopped for (what else) Hungarian Goulash and beers (picture); this was my first Goulash experience and I absolutely loved the very paprika full taste. In the evening, we wandered around the central part of Pest and, to save some money, ate at Burger King.
On Monday, our last day in Budapest, we went to Hero's Square and the gardens. This area is a large park with an impressive monument to the Heros of the city making up the entrance to the park (picture). The park was beautiful, with a small lake, a zoo, baths and a castle (picture). Budapest has many natural hot springs and the Turks built bath complexes throughout out city (picture). In the evening, we had dinner at a Hungarian restaurant in Pest near the Danube. There we had some great fish soup, goulash, fish and beef (picture). The food was very good with lots of flavor and Eastern influences. In fact, this was some of the most flavorful food we've had in Europe.
On Tuesday, we caught a morning train from Budapest to Vienna.
Dates – July 1st – 4th 2005
Ever since we got engaged in Rome in December 2003, it has been our dream to be able to come back to Italy and spend our first anniversary in Venice. As luck would have it, our move to France in December 2004 set the stage for us to be able to easily make the trip out to Venice for our first anniversary.
We arrived in Venice on Friday afternoon after quite a long ordeal traveling from Paris. Nonetheless, the weather was perfect, and we were ready to discover the most romantic city in the world. Paul and Carlene had recommend a cute little hotel called Locanda Armizo (picture) right by the Rialto bridge in the San Silvestro area. It was reasonably priced, perfectly located and served a nice little breakfast in bed every morning. We spent almost all of Friday taking in the cities waterways, bridges and squares. We also had some very good pasta at a restaurant by the Rialto bridge. Before heading home for some late-afternoon rest, we dropped by an Italian deli to pick up some meats and cheese. When we returned home in the evening, we were pleasantly surprised to find a chocolate cake and some Champagne waiting for us at the hotel (picture); it was a present from my Mom, Dad and Ashish. The cake was great and we spent the remainder of the weekend eating it whenever we wanted a snack.
On Saturday, our anniversary, we spent the day exploring the city and went off to the islands of Lido and Murano (picture). On Lido, we found a nice dress for Nadya and had lunch. We also stopped at a local market to pick up some Apricots, figs, bread, and meats. On Murano, we looked at some of the glass shops and peeked into a glass factory. In the evening, we made up a little picnic (picture) comprising of meats, cheese, bread, figs, chocolate cake (that was sent to us the previous day) and some Moet et Chandon Champagne that we had brought with us from our trip to the Champagne region. We took our little picnic and sat on a dock near the Rialto bridge. The whole city was alive with tourists, but we had this little dock to ourselves to enjoy our picnic and watch the gondolas and boats float by. It was a truly romantic evening and we couldn’t possibly have imagined anything better for our first anniversary.
On Sunday, we spent more time exploring the back alleys and less-touristed areas of Venice. We took a vaporetto ride (picture) all around the lagoon and generally enjoyed life at a nice, slow Italian pace. By this point, we had seen the numerous sites of Venice many times over, including Piazza San Marco (picture), San Marco’s Basilica (picture), Rialto Bridge (picture), Accademia Bridge (picture), the Grand Canal (picture), the Doge’s Palace (from the outside), and numerous other markets, buildings and squares. Another nice surprise on Sunday is that there was a music festival in town, so there were bands playing music at every corner and square.
On Monday, our last day, we spent the morning in San Marco’s Basilica (picture) and had lunch by the Rialto bridge. The basilica was quite a sight with beautiful mosaics and golden finishes throughout. We also saw the four famous bronze horses which were taken from Constantinople and are thought to be around 2000 years old.
Dates – June 11th – 12th 2005
While Nadya’s parents were in town, we took a weekend trip to the Loire valley. We rented a VW Passat (free upgrade from Europcar) on Saturday and headed off for the Loire on Saturday morning. Our first stop was Chambord chateau (picture) , which has a beautiful double-helix staircase. We also walked the grounds of the chateau which is situated in the middle of a huge estate and national forest/park. Chambord has been used as the hunting grounds for the Kings of France and heads of state (Presidents) for years; President Chirac has decided not to take advantage of his right to hunt on these grounds.
After visiting Chambord, we headed off to the town of Chivernay (picture) and did some wine tasting and picked up a couple of bottles of wine. We then drove on though Chenonceau and to Amboise. We were planning on spending the night in Amboise, but there were no hotels available. So instead, we continued on to Tours where we did find a nice little hotel and then went for dinner at an Italian restaurant (picture).
As luck would have it, there was a classic car show in Tours on Sunday (picture); this was quite a pleasant surprise and we spent the morning at the show before driving to Chenonceau. Chenonceau (picture) is an absolutely beautiful chateau located on (literally) a river. It is basically built like a half-bridge and half-chateau. It is also well adorned with furniture so a tour of the chateau give you a pretty good feeling as to what life was like living in the Chateau.
After visiting the Chateau, we then headed back to Paris to end this lovely trip out into the Loire Valley.
Live, at the Acropolis
Originally uploaded by SaurabhA. Dates – June 2-5, 2005
I’ve been wanting to visit Greece for as long as I can remember. My longing to see the ancient ruins of the Greek civilization was renewed when we visited the Roman ruins in December 2003 on our trip to Rome and Florence. So it was with great enthusiasm that I jumped on the chance to sign up for the CE trip to Athens through work. For a minuscule price of 350 euros, we received plane tickets, hotel accommodations and breakfast for both Nadya and I in Greece.
We arrived in Athens on Thursday evening. The tour group had arranged for a guide to pick us up at the airport and take us all to the hotel. The guide provided general information on Athens and some common words and phrases to use. This was actually quite an amusing experience because, since the majority of our group was French, the guide was translating from Greek to French. From our perspective, this was funny because she was translating from one language we didn’t know into another that we didn’t know very well; we figured things out nonetheless. We spent the rest of our trip with some friends from work, Steve, Maria, Paul and Carlene. They were great company, and definitely made our trip even more enjoyable.
On Thursday evening, it was a little rainy, but we managed to get out and have some Baclava and Ouzo at a restaurant with a view of the Acropolis and Parthenon. It was a pretty short evening since we wanted to get a start early the next morning to hit the sights.
On Friday, we spent the day at the Acropolis and exploring the city of Athens. It was a hot, clear and sunny day so we made more than one stop for water, food and – my favorite – Frappes. We saw the Acropolis first (picture), then walked to Hadrian’s Arch (picture), the original Olympic stadium (picture), saw the changing of the Guards (picture) and then over to the Temple of Zeus (picture). The city is amazing and at every corner you see a blend of ancient ruins and modernity (picture). For dinner, we went to a great Greek restaurant in a trendy part of the city. This was a blast as the place was filled with Greeks eating, dancing and singing. I think the locals often thought I was Greek and the band asked me to sing a few times.
On Saturday, we took a fast boat out to the island of Hydra (picture). Hydra is a quaint little Greek island with windy streets and only donkeys (picture) for transportation. Before catching the boat for Hydra, we went to a Greek market and picked up some fruits, cheese, olives and nuts. Steve also picked up some Baclava which was some of the best I’ve ever tasted in my life. The only down-side of the Greek market was that there was an awful smell of meat and fish. In the 35 degree heat, this was really quite a bad stink. After the market, we caught our boat to Hydra. The rest of the day was generally relaxing as we slowly wandered around the island, stopped for food and ice cream and picked up some post cards. We got back to Athens in the early evening and, after freshening up in our hotel, we headed out for dinner. We found a great little Greek restaurant with authentic food. We sat on the rooftop terrace with an absolutely magnificent view of the Acropolis (you almost felt as if you were at the same height as it). This restaurant seems to have quite a past, with pictures of celebrities (such as Gorbechev) throughout the place.
On Sunday, we had a few hours to go back to the center of the city, have some gyros for lunch and wander around for a bit before catching our flight back to Paris.
I found the Greek people to be the friendliest people I’ve met in all of Europe; I would love to spend more time there getting to know these wonderful people. Next time, I think we’ll try to make a trip out to Santorini.
