16th - 19th September 2004 Hello Everyone, Well I arrived in Vienna two days ago after a very long flight from Perth. Jet lag is nothing but horrible. However I am here and my introduction to the rest of the world is truly more than I could of imagined. It is amasing walking around this beautiful old ornate city where a unbelievable royal history is still very much alive. The weather has been great, sunshine and not to hot. My first wander around the city and I walked to the Kunsthistoriches and Naturhistoriches Museum which are two very interesting buildings that face each other with a lovely manicured garden. In my walk around these buildings looked at a photographic exhibition of unusual landscapes around the world, which gives me more ideas about where I want to go next. In my sightseeing we were approached by two austrian guys in old mozart type costumes selling tickets to a Mozart / Strauss Concert. In their speil they told us about the orchestra, opera singers and ballet dancers that would give us a evening to remember- experience part of the musical history of Austria. Anyhow in our state of exhaustion we bought tickets and went off to see the concert later in the evening. We were then seated in a lovely ballroom where the concert was to be held and we had a few laughs as people complained about not liking the seats in which they had ordered and payed for so we figured - go on holiday complain about everything you so willingley did. Meanwhile we were in a state of confusion as other people had different tickets to what we had, so we were left seated thinking we had gone to the wrong concert and even had a different program to what we had been shown when bought the tickets. So soon enough the concert began and the orchestra played for what seemed like forever as we slowly nodded off next to each other - a few elbows in the side as we saw each other almost fall off the chairs and we were sorted. Anyhow the wonderful opera singers - mainly the women though she sung a funny song where she appeared drunk - bottle of wine and glass goes a long way - laughter woke us up. Then we had the ballet dancers and the show was quite entertaining in the end - or shoud I say the interval where we decided we should head back to our hostel before aaron or ness started snoring and made fools of three tired looking austalians. The next day I went and looked around the Hofburg Palace which takes up a huge amount of area in the middles of the city. It is really quite amasing, people here walk past some of the most beautiful parts of their history everyday on their way to work something I think they may takes for granted I have found that so often I am completley bewildered by the intricacy of the statues even stairwells are fantastically crafted. While I was at the Hofburg palace sightseeing we did a tour of the Silver Collection - 1000's of plates and endless lines of cutlery and millions of the usual bits and pieces that would go with a royal banquet. Did you know that for ever new head of monarchy they would create a new dinner set with the new coat of arms set into it. I tell you I was exhausted by the amount of info I recieved about a collection of plates,pretty plates though but plates all the same, you can't even use them because they are locked in a glass cabinet. Moving on however they centre alot of their historical information and museums on Empress Elizabeth or as they affectionatley refer to her as Sisi. So we also went on a tour of the State Apartments or Kaiserappartments which were quite interesting although aaron and I couldn't help but note the fact that their beds were really very small in width and length, however I am fairly sure the Habsburgs weren't midget, I think they must of just been very uncomfortable when they slept. Also we visited the Treasury or Schatzkammer which displayed some truly magnificent pieces of sacred and secular treasure, although the amount of pieces of wood they claim to be part of jesus's cross what a bit long winded. They had all sorts of things though including a horn from a animal believed to be linked to the mystical unicorn which was pretty spetacular as it is just like you would imagine a unicorn horn to be however it was about 1.5 meters long. Also in our sightseeing of the Hofburg palace we visited the Burgapelle of Royal Chapel in which appparently there is an urn which contains the hearts of five members of the Habsburg Royal Family. Anyhow must be off to see more fabulous sights. Jen