Coming into Vienna, I really had no clue what to expect. Our first day there, we walked through one of the main strips that had a lot of shopping, food, and gelato. This lead to be quite a dangerous place for my wallet! Within the first couple hours of being there, I had already spent majority of what I had budgeted for that short 2 day trip!
After having a delicious lunch at a small café (that for once gave us our water for free!) we headed with the group to city center where we found a gorgeous monument with flowers rounding it. On either side of the monument, there were two of some of the most famous museums in the world. One was the history of nature and the other was the history of art. We were told that we would have to choose which one we wanted to go into, this was a very hard decision for me to say the least…
But before heading to the museums we got to walk further into the city. This in my opinion was the richer side of town. But in the center of it all was a beautiful gothic cathedral.
The next day we got up fairly early and the weather made for a beautiful morning. We headed as a group to the Vienna palace. There we were able to see the belongings of the royal family that had lived there before they had to flee their country leaving everything along with the imperial jewels behind.
This was also our chance to choose the museum we wanted to see. I ended up choosing the nature museum. Everything was super interesting and very, very, very, old! I go to see the world’s largest sea turtle, which happened to be found in South Dakota.
The rest of the day we had free to ourselves. A small group of us headed to my favorite place in Vienna. We found this amazing palace in the city with the most beautiful gardens in the backyard I had ever seen. I only wish that all of the flowers had been in full bloom. I think we came during the blooming season, but not everything was completely done blooming yet. The garden was still beautiful with all the green trees and white gravel roads. It reminded me a lot of the place where Taylor Swift filmed her music video for “Blank Space”.
After going through the gardens, we hiked all the way up to the top of the massive hill that sat behind the palace. On top of the hill, there was another beautiful building that was apart of the castle. People invaded the grass on the by sitting and enjoying the view of the humongous city below us.
I think this day by far has been one of the best days for me on this entire trip. I want to say it was because of the beautiful gardens and the city at our fingertips and the sun starting to set around us on top of the world of that hill, but I can honestly say it was because of the people I was with. I’ve learned so many different things on this trip but I think this trip taught me be thankful for the amazing people that surround me. Spending your time with people that have the ability to appreciate the beauty of the world around them and make good times out of the not so fun moments, these are my favorite kind of people. And I think this is what makes this trip absolutely amazing.