It can only get better from here...

So my head is still a mess and I'm coughing like a lung is going to come up.  I am still determined to save part of my first day of vacation! As proof, I am sitting here at the table in my apartment with a cup of coffee and a slice of organic (yes organic!) apple strudel from Gradwohl Organic Bakery http://www.gradwohl.info/.   And it's almost as good as my Oma used to make it - very, very close.

No, I didn't eat the whole thing, just about a third of it!

I slept late due to the fact that I took a 6 hour nap...stayed up about 4 hours, then tried to go to sleep.  I woke up around 9:30 and messed about the apartment blowing my nose, drinking hot tea and feeling whiny.  Oh it is also cold-ish and rainy (not supposed to get higher than 50) today.  I finally motivated my lazy and cranky ass into the shower, which made me feel marginally better.  Did I mention the lovely hot shower here?

It was almost noon when me, my camera, my umbrella, and I headed out.  Luckily, the Nachtsmarkt starts as the end of my street here, so it was almost impossible for me to get lost.  I walked down to one end and up the other side, overwhelmed by all of the shops and stalls.  Lots and lots of Middle Eastern/Mediterranean food as well as Asian (the Asian wait staff are very aggressive in trying to get you into their restaurants) as well as lots of places to buy Wienerschnitzel!

There are a couple of your basic tourist trap places (good place for those shot glasses!) and lots of places I needed to find...LOL.  I found a health food store with Echinacea cough drops and an organic bakery or two.  I got my strudel and a loaf of bread...woohooo. Lunch was grilled calamari in a nice seafood place.  The calamari was yummy but the starter I had of the house fish soup was AWESOME.

Walking down the street, I found that Vienna also has some totally awesome architecture.  I haven't been this excited about a building since I was in Glasgow.  Check this Art Deco Nouveau building out:

Edited later to add:  This is actually a very famous Art Nouveau building designed by Otto Wagner called The Majolica. 


Of course, the building next door was just as impressive, with it's gilt medallions:

This is the same building from the corner:

I especially liked the statuary on the roof:

I think this is a much better view of one of the ladies:

Then, I also like relief carvings on building facades as well

These were all the second tries at taking these photos.  I took the first batch before going to lunch and after I finished eating I was playing with my camera at the table and found that all of them were marred by a raindrop that had landed on the lens.  I had to go all the way back and retake them.

While I was re-taking them, I dropped my umbrella and an overly friendly man picked it up for me.  He ended up being one of the vendors at Nachtsmarkt and tricked me into buying WAY too much of his dried fruit. He and all of his little Russian buddies kept yelling at me "Hey Amerika" until I came over to their stall.  I came away with a giant bag of dried strawberries, pineapple, coconut...and a few offers for dates.  I'm a sucker, but not that much of a sucker...LOL.

I still have to buy a SIM card for my phone.  My landlord told me I could get them at the post office across the street, but they only have cards for minutes.  The postman at the counter with his "little English" and I mit meine "nur ein weinig Deutsch." muddled through nicely.  Tomorrow I will find a SIM card...that's what Google search is for.

I also took a trip to the local Billa grocery, where my credit card decided to give me a hard time.  It didn't seem that the cashier or any of the people in the line that backed up seemed to get upset...thank goodness for small favors.   I have my Milch, Butter, und Kaffe now, so the world can get back to spinning