Starting the day as early as we could, we had breakfast and took off to see the Schönbrunn Palace. This was the former Summer residence of the Habsburg’s Empress Maria Theresa, pretty much my mother’s house if I were a prince. Also previously residing there was Emperor Franz Joseph, Empress Elisabeth, and other gracefully rich powerful people. This place was huge and glamorous to the extent of money didn’t mean a thing. Gardens for days, ponds with giant fountains, high grass maze and just a magnificent place to explore, yet we still didn’t even get to explore the Zoo that was on the grounds. Too much space for so little time, we enjoyed every minute of it.

Gabriel rushed back to the conference one last time and I waited for him down the street from our hotel at the place I call ‘our spot’. It was the first place we went when we arrived to Vienna and the last place I felt I needed to see again. Right beside the river next to all the paddle boats and ducks was a little restaurant that served pretty much sausage, German breads, and great beer… did I mention that the lady that owned it had the reddest hear I had ever seen?

Finally on the train to Graz headed to the south of Austria, Gabriel and I were super excited to see a city that we both have never been to (fancy Gabriel seems to have been everywhere hahah). The train was great and I was finally able to work a lot on the previous posts for the blog (I barely had time to do that in Vienna). We crossed a lot of beautiful tiny villages in the mountains on our way there and it was so great because you could feel the train slow down when climbing tall mountains. Transportation here really gives me the thought of how much the U.S. or Northern America could benefit from having the infrastructure of public transportation like this (who wouldn’t want a nice beer or coffee while seeing the land outside the window next to you?).

Graz is the second largest city in Austria, even though this is not noticeable with the eye at first. We really experienced how large it is from the top view, with our first night looking over the side of the mountain enjoying a nice cold beer and some wine from the Schlossberg mountain. Gabriel and I took a vertical tram straight up the mountain to the highest point of the city and had the most amazing view. Looking out over the whole city and the mountains beyond while the sun was setting was more then I could ask for, for the short time we had in the amazing city of Graz.