Day 05 - Saturday 30th May

We enjoyed a very nice buffet breakfast in the Hilton Hotel's restaurant which is located on the ground floor near reception. I enjoyed my omelet and Suzy particularly liked the apple muffin because it was so light.

Back in our room, we tried to set up my mini WiFi device with the SIM that Insight had supplied in our travel pack but without much success. Later we tried two other mini WiFi devices but once again couldn't get them to connect to the internet.

Last night, Suzy had asked whether there was a guest laundry at the hotel. Unfortunately they don't have one and she'd given Suzy directions to a laundromat three stations away on the train.

When we went to the concierge this morning to confirm the directions, he told us there is a much better laundry about ten minutes walk away but we needed to get there quickly because they close at noon on Saturday. He also told us we would be walking past the place where Beethoven lived - the house where he had written his ninth symphony.

We reached the laundry at about 10:30am and they agreed to do my washing and said to come back in an hour. When I returned, the drier was still going. Eventually, just after 12 noon, they gave me the washing in a bag to take back to the hotel.

They'd done good job of folding everything but it wasn't quite dry and so we had to hang it up all over the hotel room before we set out. We turned the air conditioning temperature up high to help with the drying process.

At about 12:30pm, we set off on foot to explore the key attractions in Vienna. The Hilton Hotel is located right on the edge of the city and so everything is within easy walking distance. We hadn't gone far when Suzy disappeared into a clothes shop where she bought herself some clothes.

Our first destination was St Stephen's Cathedral which is a large church with very tall spires and vaulted ceilings. It has ornate carvings and other impressive ornaments. In the plaza outside the cathedral, there were street markets, coffee shops and large crowds of people.

We found a coffee shop for lunch in a nearby plaza and happened to sit next to a nice young couple from Brisbane who were reaching the end of their four week holiday. While sitting there, a demonstration passed by with a police escort. There were campaigning for freedom for Biafra.

Next we headed for the Hofburg Palace that contains many ancient buildings, archways and large open areas including a beautiful rose garden. This was the winter residence for the Habsburg dynasty.

Beyond this area, we walked past the parliament building with its ornate architecture and numerous statues.

We took a circular route back to our hotel passing by numerous other statues and grand buildings. The streets are very wide - wide enough for cars, trams and buses with pedestrian walkways and cycle paths on both sides. All lined with rows of beautiful trees.

Suzy was pretty tired by the time we got back to the hotel because she is not used to walking such long distances.

Our Insight bus tour starts tomorrow and tonight we were due to meet our guide, David, and the others on the tour. It was a good sign that everyone was there on time at 6pm. We even had an extra couple who had got confused - they are booked on tomorrow's tour.

We also met our bus driver, Ferrence. We boarded the bus and drove a few blocks to an Austrian restaurant for a group dinner. The food wasn't brilliant and the service was poor but we enjoyed meeting the people on the tour. There are several Australian couples plus others from New Zealand, USA, Singapore and other countries - 28 people altogether.

There was a light shower of rain as we walked from the restaurant back to the bus.