When we awoke on day 4 we were cruising west along the Danube towards Vienna. We could feel the ship slowing down while finishing breakfast. We looked out the window, and suddenly we were watching a concrete wall instead of river scenery. We realized we were entering one of 25 locks we would be going through on our river trip. We went up to the sun deck and could see the back door of the lock closing behind us. Once closed, the lock filled with water to bring the ship up to the level of the Danube on the other side of the lock. Can you see the wind turbine in the background?
Once the level in the lock was raised to the same as the higher Danube, the lock opened, and we proceeded along our journey.
On board, the chef and his pastry chef did a demonstration before we arrived in Vienna. The chef prepared Austrian "Kaiserschmarrn". After the chef poured a flour and egg batter in a square frying pan, he mixed them every so often like you would mix scrambled eggs. When finished, the dough had a consistency of moist bread pudding. After sprinkling with powdered sugar, he served it to the audience with a hot plum sauce. Very rich but so tasty!
As soon as we pulled into our dock in Vienna, we went for a short walk on a bridge across the Danube. You can see our ship behind us along with some tree tops showing their brilliant fall colors. Yes, we are wearing coats due to the cool weather.
In the afternoon, we took a bus and walking tour of the Vienna city center. The opera house was magnificent.
This Neorenaissance style theater opened in 1869. Our guide explained that the lobby area was the only part of the opera house left standing after World War II. The theater and stage areas were rebuilt after the WWII. This is a view of the magnificent lobby.
Walking up the grand staircase gave us a feeling of royalty.
The theater was comprised of auditorium style seating on the floor with four vertical rows of boxes along each side of the theater. The open area to the far right is the standing room section. The charge for a standing room ticket is only 4 Euros, about $5.
The Opera House is run by the city of Vienna. Over 50 operas are performed each year with a different opera performed every night, requiring a huge stage so that multiple sets can be in place at the same time. In the US, a particular show typically runs for several consecutive performances before a different show begins.
The St. Charles Church was built in opulent splendor. There are over 23,000 small colored tiles on the roof. We were amazed at how many people were walking around this afternoon. Obviously, it is still tourist season here in Vienna.
Vienna is a majestic city well-known for the arts. While we enjoyed our visit, the city seemed too crowded to enjoy at a leisurely pace.
Our day began early with a city tour of both Buda and Pesh. Our bus took us past many of the major landmarks in Pesh before crossing the Danube to the Buda side. Each tour guide arranged for us narrates in English and is very knowledgeable about the local history, often extending back to Roman times. Our bus stopped at Hero's Square.
Heroes' Square was created in 1896 to honor the thousand-year anniversary of Hungary's founding and its greatest historical figures.
Paul is looking at the magnificent Museum of Fine Arts.
The Hungarian Tomb of the Unknown Soldier stood in the middle of this historic square..
After visiting Hero's Square we drove across the Danube to the Buda side of the city. Our bus dropped us off on Castle Hill, one of the highest points on the Buda side near what was once the site of the Hungarian Castle, now a museum.
We toured the Matthias Church which is over 700 years old.
There were many stained glass windows in the front of the Matthias Catholic Church. We were amazed as to the detail in this church.
After we left the church, we were able to look across the Danube to Pesh, which is behind Paul. The voicebox hanging around Paul's neck allows us to hear our guide clearly regardless of if we were directly in front of the guide or standing 50 feet away. A foggy day, so not the clearest pictures.
The Hungarian White House is located here on the hill. We were able to witness a changing of the guard right before noon.
As the other soldiers marched away, the church bells began to ring. The church bells are rung at noon each day in remembrance of the Hungarian victory over Ottoman Turkey in 1456. We were not as impressed as the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace in London, but the ceremony was majestic in its own way.
After our morning tour, we boarded the ship and began cruising north and west along the Danube. The views of the small Hungarian villages and towns along the Danube were delightful. It seemed like the history books were passing before our eyes as our ship cruised slowly along the wide but gentle Danube.
Another picturesque village
and the first of many church steeples with an onion shaped dome.
Our dinner this evening was the "Captain's Welcome Dinner". We enjoyed a scrumptious 5-course meal including a lobster salad, scallop appetizer, and a nice white fish topped with shrimp. The very attentive wait staff always seems to refill the wine glasses before they are empty.
We relaxed after dinner and thought about our day. This vacation is becoming all that we hopped for. Interesting sites, informative tours, delicious food and excellent service by the ship's staff.
This morning we enjoyed a sumptuous breakfast buffet. For those of you who have not been to Europe, the pastries are outstanding.
We had some time to explore Budapest on foot before our transfer to the river boat. Budapest is divided into the Buda side of the Danube and the Pest (pronounced pesht) side. Our walk of over 2 hours took us past many interesting sites. We noticed the very European narrow city streets.
really narrow streets,
historical architecture,
a statue (we couldn't understand the plaque written in Hungarian),
and some wide streets lined with outdoor cafes. The restaurants are now all non-smoking so many restaurants have added outdoor seating with an ashtray on every table. Most of these covered pavilions have heaters for the winter weather. These outdoor patios were everywhere. Do they use them when it snows? We assume the locals do if they want to smoke, and we saw smokers everywhere.
We reached the Danube River and were treated to some magnificent views. First, some apartment buildings on the Buda side of the Danube,
the Royal Hungarian Palace,
and the most famous Budapest bridge, the Chain Bridge.
All the bridges were destroyed by the Nazis during World War II. Here is a photo of the Chain bridge after the bombings. It took many years of rebuilding after the war to restore this bridge to its original splendor.
The luggage for our group was gathered from our hotel rooms and stored in the lobby prior to the bus arriving at the hotel. We appreciated the efficiency of the tour staff, as we did not have to transport our own bags from our hotel room to the bus and then again to our stateroom on the ship.
In the afternoon, we were transferred to our ship by bus. As we drove up on the dock, we were impressed with the sleek beauty of our ship.
Paul is shown by the gangplank prior to boarding.
This photo from the bow in front of the bridge gives you an idea of how windy this afternoon became. The Hungarian flag is flying next to the Uniworld flag. There are weights holding the flags vertical.
While we were taking a walk along the pier, we noticed the Budapest version of US Duck Boats. In Budapest, they have "floating bus" tours. The bus in the Danube,
and coming out of the river with the Margaret Bridge in the background.
After the mandatory emergency drill, we gathered in the Piano Lounge for a welcome from the captain, an overview of the cruise activities and a briefing from the cruise director on the next day's activities.
After dinner, we were treated to an evening sail towards the heart of Budapest so we could see the city all lit up. The Hungarian parliament building shone in all its splendor in the nighttime sky.
We thoroughly enjoyed our day touring Budapest. Our walk to the Danube took us past breathtaking architecture built centuries ago, now in the middle of this bustling European city.
For almost a year we have been looking forward to checking off one of Paul's bucket list items--a European river cruise. We chose a Uniworld river cruise along the Danube from Budapest to Prague.
Our flight left Atlanta on Monday evening for Amsterdam, with a connection in Budapest on Tuesday afternoon. All in all, this trip took about 14 hours. Why did we drive to Atlanta instead of leave from Gainesville? We were able to use the same number of frequent flyer points to depart from Atlanta flying business class as compared to traveling from Gainesville and flying coach class. A no-brainer decision!
Customs was a non-event, as we didn't even have to stop and show our passports. After a long journey, it was nice to see our driver holding up a sign outside customs, indicating that he was ready to drive us to our hotel,the Corinthia, in downtown Budapest.
Our hotel was a historic one, involved in the 1956 Revolution, when Russian forces entered the city on November 3rd to take over the country. Six thousand tanks fired at the city. One group of rebels occupied the hotel. The next day, a dozen Russian tanks surrounded the building and began a continuous bombardment lasting 5 hours. The upper floors were in flames for hours and the roof was completely destroyed.
Following 4 years of restructuring, the country's only luxury hotel reopened in 1961 but closed its doors in 1990. In 1996, it was purchased by the current owners and reopened as again as an elite luxury hotel in the heart of Budapest. The plaque in the lobby lists many notable guests. In 2015, Arnold Schwarzenegger stayed here in. We were welcomed with open arms, like we were really important guests. The hotel was more luxurious than we are used to. Is this a grand staircase or what?
After checking into the hotel, it was time to find some dinner. The concierge recommended a nice area close to the hotel with lots of restaurants to choose from. We chose a local establishment were we enjoyed traditional Hungarian food. Ann had chicken paprikash with homemade noodle,s and Paul enjoyed some wienersnitzel. Gladly, we passed up this American landmark across the street from our cafe..
We were jet lagged from our travels, so we crashed early. Tomorrow we will be ready to board a bus that will take us to the Uniworld River Princess.
We headed back to Florida on the Tuesday after Labor Day. While Ann worked half a day, Paul made the last minute preparations to leave after lunch.
We took a different route home to avoid the higher elevations down by Rattan Pass near the Colorado / New Mexico border, as our gas motorhome struggled coming into Colorado along that route in late April. This time we headed east to Limon, Colorado where we picked up I-70 to head east into Kansas. We turned south on I-35 past Wichita and into Oklahoma. After a short visit with daughter Laura and her family in Norman, Oklahoma where they now reside, we headed to the Dallas area to visit daughter Wendy and her family.
After the weekend, we continued east to Vicksburg, MS, Defuniak Springs, FL and then on to Williston, FL where we store the motorhome. Everything has been unloaded and we are in the process of getting familiar with our house in Gainesville. Since New Year's Day, we have been home only 2 weeks in the past 8 1/2 months, between spring training in Sarasota and our job in Colorado.
We are in the process of trimming shrubbery and weeding our yard. We didn't have nearly as many weeds because of the improvements we made to our yard last fall.
Paul did have a interested supervisor while he trimmed the bushes (top right of photo above) on the side of the house. You can see that these bushes were trimmed and this four foot black snake took his perch near the top to watch Paul finish his yard work. Wonder where the snake was while Paul was trimming this part?
Our return trip was 1940 miles, door to door. We averaged a 7.98 MPG even with the generator running most of the way because of the hot September weather. Gas prices were an all-time low for the six years we have been going away in the summer, ranging from a high of $2.60 per gallon (Limon, CO) to a low of $1.84 (Jackson, MS) per gallon.
We stayed at 7 different campgrounds along our route with an average per night cost of $37.64. Rates for campsites ranged between $27 (Vicksburg, MS) to a high of $49.45 (Williston, Florida).
ADDED BONUS TO THIS BLOG: We are taking a river cruise along the Danube River in late October. We will publish several additional blog posts in November once we are back to the U.S. and get the photos edited and the text written. Check back in November to share our adventure.
Where will we be next summer is always the big question. We have been invited back to Larkspur, Colorado, but we will make no commitments until at least November.
Last fall, when jobs for workampers began appearing online, we had several opportunities of locations in the country to go and work. We choose to work in Larkspur, Colorado, because we wanted to be near mountains yet close to civilization. Larkspur is a very small town located halfway between Denver and Colorado Springs. We were located about a 45 minute drive to either downtown area. More importantly, we were 7 miles from Castle Rock, which had several nice grocery stores, a great library, several restaurants, and a modern hospital which we utilized when Ann dislocated her elbow in early July.
In the late 1800's, this land was first explored by mountain men like Kit Carson and Jim Baker. Later, Carson led John Fremont, a noted explorer and American military officer, through this valley. The first white woman in the region was Sarah Coberly, who joined DC Oakes and his wife homesteading along East Plum Creek near Castle Rock. The cabins at Jellystone were named after these people.
The campground is one of 80 Jellystone campgrounds all across the country. A lot of what takes place in the way of activities, what is sold in the camp store, etc. has a Yogi Bear theme to it.
For
example, Yogi and Boo Boo raise the American flag and the Jellystone
flag every morning at 9 am. Yogi picks a camper to lead the gathering of
campers in the Pledge of Allegiance. This photo was taken on a weekday when there weren't as many children in the campground.
We serve an all-you-can-eat pancake breakfast every morning during the summer. Ranger Paul is standing at the pancake wagon waiting for some breakfast.
From our observations, Yogi is a huge hit with children, even children who might be too young to have seen any of the cartoon movies.
Yogi poses with our Yogi statue for a classic photo op.
Yogi gives Paul a hug after stealing his cap.
Yogi and Boo Boo have their own cabin. Below, Ranger Kevin is tucking Yogi into his cabin for his morning nap.
This photo of Ann and Paul was taken earlier in the season and appeared on the Facebook page for the campground. This was a simulation of "American Gothic" by Grant Wood.
The campground has many varieties of accommodations ranging from basic tent sites to RV sites,as well as a selection of cabins. We have basic cabins that sleep four with no bathroom all the way up to super cottages sleeping 6 that are like a hotel suite. Unique to this campground are tipi's.
The tipi below has a canvas floor. The flap in the front is the door and yes, there is a hole in the top where rain water can come in. If you have gone camping and had a leaky tent, you know how uncomfortable the night can be.
We have continued to be amused by the hummingbirds, as we attract them with hummingbird feeders at the campground.
The liquid food that these hummingbirds consume is sugar water. All summer long, we observed hummingbirds hover in mid-air, fly straight up and straight
down, forwards, sideways and even fly backwards! Did you know a
hummingbird weighs about as much as a nickel?
Each Saturday we have a large sheet cake for all our guests to enjoy. As you can see, our campground was a winner of a Travel Channel Top Ten award for 2015.
We have a small fishing pond for beginning fishermen to try their luck. Recently, this little boy caught a rather large catfish. Mom was so proud of her son.
Our campsite was located about 50 yards from a major north-south railroad line. This is an example of the freight trains, most of which carried coal, that would pass by at all times of the day. There was no schedule. After a few days, the noise of the diesel engines became white noise. Many of these freight trains were over 100 cars in length, with two diesel engines in the front and two in the back.
Ranger Kevin, our activities director, found this four foot bull snake. Bull snakes are good in that they help keep down the rodent population. Bull snakes do confuse some of our guests because bull snakes look similar to a diamondback rattlesnake.
In early August, we had a visitor at the Saturday evening movie. Yes, this 200 plus pound black bear was in a tree across from the 0pvilion where the movies are shown.
We had a much larger black bear, estimated by our neighbor to be over 500 pounds, ransack our neighbor's trash. Some campers just don't understand about leaving garbage out overnight. During the summer, the bears are trying to get all the food they can in preparation for hibernating over the winter. This bear left his calling card behind our RV.
The busy summer camping season has ended as schools are in session all across the country. Our co-workers who are students have gone back to school and most workampers are leaving soon for winter jobs in Arizona, South Texas, or Florida. We have completed our work in Colorado and have begun our journey home to Florida. We have scheduled stops to see family in Norman, OK and Dallas, TX.
