Durnstein, Austria

We had a bit of a struggle trying to get out of Vienna because we wanted to take the scenic route and not the autobahn. The car rental places don't have great maps to give out either and the google maps leave a lot to be desired - I highly suggest a GOOD map of the area - the investment would be worth it!

Our first scenic stop was Durnstein. This was one of our FAVORITE places and I'm so glad that we took the time to tour this almost deserted town.

This is the ruins of the castle of Durnstein where King Richard I Lionheart of England was held captive in 1192 by Duke Leopold V of Austria after a dispute during the 3rd crusade. No one knew where he was being held do his minstral, Blondel, went from castle to castle playing the king's favorite songs on his lute. When he got to this castle, the King sang back. The negotiations could then start for the safe return of King Richard to England.

This valley was soooo beautiful. If I had it to do over again, I would have gotten started much earlier and done a bike tour along the Danube on the paved bike trails. That was our original plan, but timing was not in our favor.

The town of Durnstein - we met a few river boat tour groups - we realized that we were definately not old enough to be on these tours!

We climbed up to the ruins and had the entire castle to ourselves (a definate plus to the "older" tour groups being in town)

King of the world!!!!

The Baroque church tower in town can be seen through the window. I just can't get over how beautiful this was!

The Wachau valley and the Danube. We were surrounded by terraced wineries.

It was wonderful to be able to have full reign of the castle - we could explore and climb anywhere we wanted. I'm sure at some point there will be fences and guards.

What can be more romantic than a kiss under an arch in a medival castle??

The ruins - how spectacular.

This is the town below with the Danube in the background - still very much a rural setting.

We loved this area and it was quite a bit off the beaten path despite what the tour books say.

Vienna

I have to admit that in all my research and preparation for this trip - I thought that our magnificent site seeing would BEGIN in Vienna. I was a bit afraid of wasting too much time in the big city and then missing out on some other things. When we arrived, I was honestly a bit let down after Budapest. Budapest seemed more like the real city and Vienna seemed more like the upscale, country club version. I saw one petite older lady walking down the street with white hair done perfectly, her strait gray skirt and black shirt (designer, I'm sure) her string of pearls, her black pumps and a little clutch bag. She reminded me so much of Brad's grandmother who was very socially connected and very prim and proper her entire life. This to me embodied Vienna. It was nice, not quite as architectually compact as Budapest but a bit more upscale.

St. Stephan's Cathedral

The tile Mosaic roof with the Hapsburg seal on the roof.

One of the things that I kept reading about was the Sacher torte. Apparently, this recipe has been famous for centuries - it was the favorite of Sisi - the beloved Queen of the Hungarian/Austrian Empire. So, I insisted that we visit the cafe and have THE torte. Well, it wasn't as fantastic as I had envisioned (my sister in law makes a killer chocolate torte so I've been spoiled). This is Chocolate cake with a layer of apricot jam type filling and then topped with a dark chocolate Ganache. The experience was fun though!

We then wandered the streets to find our car rental place - that was quite an adventure. The logo of our company was no where to be seen so we stopped to ask at a different place that was somewhat near the address we were looking for and they said we had found the place. We filled out the paper work and then they turned us loose - "Go down the street to the parking garage and your car will be down there." We asked if there would be anyone in the garage to show us where the car was and she said, "Maybe, just press your key and you'll find your car." Several streets and allies later we found the garage and there was no attendant and no beeping noise for the car location. We finally spotted the briefly flashing lights and started our grand adventure.

Egar, Hungary

The day after we arrived in Budapest, we took a train for 2.5 hours to the little city of Egar. In preparing for our trip, we asked some people we knew who had lived in Hungary, what we needed to see - all answers were the same - you have to see Egar. It was bigger than I had pictured it, but still very quaint. Soon after we arrived in Egar, we found the Mormon missionaries walking down the street. It was really cool to see someone we had an immediate connection with. They took us to the market and pointed out some sites to see. One had been in Hungary for a while and was fluent in Hungarian, the other was brand new and looked quite shell shocked. Apparently it is a very difficult language to learn (I vouch for that - I only BARELY learned "Thank you" toward the end of the trip.

What a beautiful church!

Walking the streets of Egar - wouldn't cobblestones and bricks add a whole new dimension to our streets (I'm guessing that upkeep and plowing would be a beast though)

One of the magnificent churches in Egar.


Ok, this needs a little explanation. In the middle of the old town, there is the "Minuet" dating back to the 1000's and has Turkish influence. It was a lookout for the city. For about $2, you could climb to the top and see the view. The guide book says that it is narrow and not for the claustrophobic and I thought - oh, no problem - I'm not afraid of anything. Well after about 5 steps I couldn't go any further. The "stairs" were more like uneven ladder rungs and it was dark. I had visions of me slipping on my in laws mostly normal staircase and then of me totally falling down the entire spiral of this thing - without even a railing to grasp. I backed out and when the money taker saw the horror on my face, she just reached in her bag and gave my money back to me.

Me - attempting the climb

Brad made the climb - this is looking down - into the abyss.

View from the top - do you see the dot with the pink and light tan in the bottom right of the picture - that would be me!

Views from the top - I'm glad that Brad went up with a camera!

This is the tower from street level.

I just love the narrow streets!

The castle ruins - we didn't do any of the museums - that way we could wander at will at no cost!

View from the castle - in the center of the picture is that tower that Brad climbed.

Ready, Aim, Fire!

This playground was a bit different than the ones we have in the US - the "toys" were big enough for adults - I don't think our 2 year old would have been able to make this work!

Another church - there is just so much to look at - almost too stimulating.

We took this picture for our horse loving daughter, but the history of this town is impressive. There are statues honoring the peasant women who fought off the invaders by standing on the castle walls and throwing pots and pans at them. This town is known for its heroic efforts at resisting invaders. I try to imagine myself throwing my pots and pans at invaders - maybe, in a sense, that is what I do by turning off my television and monitoring all media input in my house - trying to keep "invaders" out of my house!

On our ride back to Budapest, we found a car with "private" compartments. I felt like I was going to Hogwarts!

Budapest - THE RACE

Being part of Team USA was a really neat experience. It was great to walk around Budapest and see a person wearing a Team USA jacket and know that you automatically had something in common with them! We were a really large team, but I think Great Britain had a larger team. If you aren't into the "Where's Waldo" games - Brad is next to the person holding the blue corner of the last flag on the right. Who took this awesome photo, you ask? Well, there I was holding Brad's camera when the Team USA organizer came up to me. "That looks like a pretty fancy camera - does it have a wide angle lens on it?" she asked. "Why yes it does" I replied. Suddenly, I was voted in as the team photographer because their photographer was stuck in traffic and we were on a tight schedule. When it was determined that I needed to be about 5 feet taller to be able to see the back row, an older gentleman offered to put me on his shoulders. Seeing him, and thinking of my own grandpa having to lift me up - I declined saying that I was probably too heavy. He replied, "Yeah, but you are cute." Good call on my part to turn him down. Another younger man offered to hoist me up - and he looked like he could actually handle me on his shoulders so up I went. I wish someone had got the shot of me taking this picture - I'm sure it was quite the site. From that point on, I was the most recognized member of Team USA.

Brad, after the photo shoot.

Silly me, didn't get any pictures of the parade. The camera was not with me during that portion (I know, boo, hiss!!!) Below are some of the pictures from the Openning Ceremony Party. As you can see there are TONS of people from hundreds of countries. It reminded me of some of the street parties downtown Salt Lake City during the Olympics!

RACE MORNING!

After an entire week of rain and overcast weather, we were expecting more of the same. I asked Brad if he needed his sunglasses for the run (He typically uses them) and he just looked up at the sky and laughed. He has quite the race day routine from what time he gets up, to what he eats for breakfast, to his warm ups...

Now it is time for the long wait to be called. Notice the game face!

His wave is finally called down to the holding area. If you miss your heat, you don't get to race. These are just the men between 35-39. Brad is the one in the yellow cap. :)

The mass start looks like spawning fish. Taking pictures of the swim beyond this is a waste of film. All you see is legs, arms and colored caps. Someone told me that he once saw a racer in a neon wetsuit - I'll have to look into that!

I do know when Brad comes out though - he is definately among the very first!

The nice thing about this course is that there were several laps so that spectators could see their athletes several times without having to move. The bad thing about this course was that there were several laps so the athletes were constantly having to break to make the turns! Oh well!

After I saw Brad a couple of times on the Bike, I took the shuttle boat down the river so I could catch him in a great photo spot on the run. The shuttle boat was like a short river cruise without having to pay the "cruise" price!

Sites on the river...
Mixing the old with the new - this building was under construction - how very unique!

I'm not sure what this was or why I didn't see it during my street wanderings!

The green statue with the columns behind it is what is actually on top of that waterfall I talked about in the previous post.

Here is a better idea of what the tiles on the church in castle hill looked like. Amazing what sunshine can do. Speaking of sunshine, yes, I think by the time Brad got to his run, he was wishing he had his sunglasses. Prayers do get answered!

More cool "I wonder why I didn't see that on my wanderings" sites.

This is the Bridge the athletes were running over. It had never been closed down for an event before.
A view of the finish area.

After I got off the boat, I ran over to the photo spot I scoped out the day before...

What other race has you running up to the steps of a grand cathedral - I'm suprised Brad could run as fast as he did, I would have been too enthralled with all of the sites (ok, stop chuckling, I know that I would not have even attempted to run even in a barren field, but the sites here WERE amazing!)
Another view of the bridge they got to run over.
I was sitting in the stands and took this picture of the jumbo tron showing runners coming across the bridge. I wasn't sure where Brad was on his run and as I was trying to keep track of the racers coming and going I heard the announcer call out Brad's name. I tried to snap some pictures of the actual finish area but it was hard to get to unless you were some big VIP.
Somehow, amidst all the people, I was able to find Brad after the race - looking good, eh? He finished 5th!!!! Only 1minute and 46 seconds off of 1st place gold! Having "seen" first it really makes him want to do this again!
He wanted to get a picture in front of the bridge and I had to snap this picture of his back end. Having the last name on the rear end really helped as the athletes whizzed by on their bikes or their run. You could cheer for people by name - really cool.