Sunday, March 25, 2007

Greg is now 32years old



Greg and I have been together now for about 7 years. I can count on one finger the number of birthday parties he has had in that time. One. That was when we were dating. This year I was determined that we would raise that grand total to 2. I failed.

Monday, we put together a small family dinner which almost didn't happen as the birthday boy almost didn't come to the party. Anyone who knows Greg knows his predilection for meat. So we made him a bacon and egg pie instead of the usual birthday cake. We also made a standard chocolate birthday cake but that was more for Jordy and I.

Salzburg





Thursday, March 22, 2007

Finally! Getting to see a bit of Austria.

The local train company is running a special for 2 months. We didn't know about it so we missed a few weeks. But the special is that for 11 Euros($22NZ), we can travel anywhere in Austria from 12 midnight to 12 midnight Saturday. Including interrupted travel. So our first choice destination was Salzburg.

Before we arrived, Greg had a few provisos on our sightseeing list i.e. no Sound of Music tours and no sights of anything that had anything to do with the Sound of Music(SoM). Which turned out to be next to impossible.

The first thing we did was have lunch in The Mirabell Gardens, (featured in SoM when "I am 16 going on 17" is sung...I think). We take a packed breakfast and lunch to save money. but it also means we get to appreciate the scenery. Looked at the outside of a few touristy things, prince's apartments, a Baroque museum, the museum of modern art, but didn't feel compelled to fork out money for any of these things. Until we caught sight of the castle.

We walked up and down a few hills, sheltered from the rain in a few churches, but couldn't get close to the castle until we forked out some money. So we paid 7.50 Euros each, after hassling JOrdy for getting older at an inconvenient time thus deeming her no longer a child and no longer entitled to the discount prices. But we all felt that the Castle was worth the money. It had a few museums inside which were all included in the entry price - marionette museum, Historic war Museum, torture chamber, tower observation deck, mechanical organ, two whomping willows in the courtyard, a cow, some cannons, and the prince's apartments.

Sorry no photos yet as Blogger seems to be having some technical difficulties. We cruised the old town for a bit afterward enjoying the quaintness of the little streets before having dinner and some local beer.

Sunday, March 04, 2007

On the Way Home via Bratislava



Although this entry is coming a bit late considering that, we did this back in January, I wanted to enter it because it's the end of the trip so.

As you can see, where our backpackers was, looked like it was in a pretty poor area, and it certainly was the least posh of our accomodations so far, but it was more than adequate, and it was very cheap and the staff were lovely. Funnily enough when they heard we were from NZ, one of the receptionists wantedto know if we knew Russel Crowe. We quickly denied his being a kiwi. The Ozzies can have him.

Greg was happy to cruise around Bratislava a bit, but Jordy and I were really only interested in the chocolate shop. Funny that.