Bicycle Jousting

Bicycle Jousting
Originally uploaded by kerrieconover

welcome to the longest day ever

We are at the airport, sitting on the floor because the only waiting areas not at the gate are full of smokers. We were kind of nervous walking around the airport, because we are just outside our gate and have not yet gone through security. Apparently here in vienna, they have security screenings at EACH gate, and they are glassed in, so once you go through, youre stuck in that one waiting area, away from shops, drinks, bathrooms, etc. so we're going to wait a bit longer.

to update from last night:

yesterday was one of our best days here, and was topped off nicely by a great evening. Romy and I relaxed at the hotel for a bit, then decided to go out and grab some food, and then indulge in some ice cream at this old ice cream parlor, called Tichy. For 1.50, I got a triple scoup cone. Yum. We walked across the street to a little park area, and found a group of people gathered. It was kind of interesting, because I think every punk rocker in the area was present. Colored hair, dreadlocks, black clothing, studded belts, etc were all present. An acrobatic performance was going on that was basically a play fight between a guy and probably one of the strongest looking small females I have ever seen. They were really impressive together. This was followed by bicycle jousting. What!? Yes - bicycle jousting. They had modified bikes so that they were twice as high as usual. Each one had 2 frames, one stacked on top of the other. They made jousting polls, and would race towards each other to knock the other off. I had definitely never seen that before.


We barely slept, and the sun came up at about 415am. We got up at 6, and took the train by 7am, and got to the airport at about 815am. Now we're waiting... It is going to be a long day, and I wish we could just teleport home.

Leapin' Doggies!

IMG_0589
Originally uploaded by kerrieconover

These dogs were the gargoyles on the church. I love them!

breakdancers

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Originally uploaded by kerrieconover

These guys were awesome!! They were dancing in front of the Stephanplatz

Fresh veggies

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Originally uploaded by kerrieconover

So many fresh and colorful foods at the Nachmarket

My favorite pizza place in Vienna!

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Originally uploaded by kerrieconover

Pizza places are more common than German/Austrian restaurants here. This one was my favorite!

market day

Today we ventured out to the Naschmarkt where we saw all sorts of fresh foods - vegetables, breads, fish, meat, grains.... and on and on... at the end was a flea market, that looked pretty much like every big flea market I've been to... a bunch of junk that no one wants hahaha. I guess that is universal. We found a great little place to eat though where I indulged in some Goulash that was really delicious, then walked across to another place and split an apple strudel and some sort of other amazing dessert.

We walked up the through the Karlsplatz again, which seems to have been the main landing point for us all week. It's the center of town basically.

The Kärntner Ring area has tons of shops, where we got a few things to take home. We kept walking and found ourselves in the Stephansplatz. There is a huge church there, and tons of street performers. We were surprised to happen upon some Indian dancers (feathers, not dots hehe). I purchased some watercolors from an artist who was set up in the square - I love her work! Closer to the church, a group of guys were breakdancing and had a huge crowd formed around them. They were really incredible! I took tons of photos.

The church, Stephansdom, is one of the tallest in the World. I think my favorite part of the Gothic church were the gargoyles - they were crazy looking dogs leaping off the building with crazed looks on their faces.

Afterwards, we took the train back to our hotel's stop, got some things at the grocery store (wine, some snacks) and came back to the hotel to figure out how to pack our bags again, with our goodies that we bought. I'm working on uploading photos and writing the blog in the lobby of the hotel right now. I'm worn out and ready to come home. We are going to try to take it easy tonight and get to sleep early (hopefully). We have to leave the hotel by 7am tomorrow, so we have plenty of time to get to the airport for our flight at 11:55am. (It'll take about 45 minutes or so to get to the airport.. and we have no idea what customs will be like here, or crowds. Tomorrow is going to be another near-24 hours of travel. We land in Atlanta at about 530pm EST, then get to Dallas/Fort Worth at 9:15pm CST... which will be the equivilant to 4:15am Vienna time. I'll then have a 30-45 minute drive back to the house, after driving Romy home. Whew.

I'm doing NOTHING on Monday!


This trip has been incredible. Thank you TCU for letting me come here!

Blue

Oh - - and Can someone please tell me why the bathrooms at the university have blacklights in them that make the room blue? there aren't any other lights, just black/blue lights. WHY?!

Happy 4th of July!

It's the 4th, but there are no fireworks here tonight! Imagine that! Today was a really great day.

We went to the conference, saw some good and some awful presentations. Our timeblock had three presentations grouped together, and ours was last. We were actually the very very very last presentation of the entire conference (best for last right? ) The first of the 3 didn't show up.... the second was this woman from the Czech Republic, who was presenting in English, but barely spoke English... her presentation was full of uhhh errr ummm ohh errr. We nodded encouragement, and eventually she started making jokes. It was good. We were up last and gave our presentation well. Just a few slides, no notes, just speaking from what we knew. It's always nice giving a talk when you are really comfortable with the content and know and believe what you are saying. We had about 20 or so people in the room (a big jump from the Czech woman's 4 people (two of which were Romy/me). We got a bunch of questions afterwards, and eventually were kicked out of the room because they had to lock it.

We were told that we were the best presentation of the week that some went to, and that we are on the cutting edge and our research was really valid and on the mark. YES! :) It's always reassuring and exciting to get encouragment like that.

Romy and I left and walked back towards the U1 line, treated ourselves to a Frappucino (yeah I know, it's sick that I had to feed my starbucks addiction all the way in Austria.) When we got back to our neighborhood we are staying in, we stopped in at a grocery store, got a bottle of austrian wine (that was quite tastey), some gouda cheese, and a baggette, and walked back to the courtyard in the hotel and celebrated a good week/good presentation.

The weather changed last night, as a storm rolled in, so it was finally we had a high of 78... it's 70 right now. It's been totally beautiful and perfect today/tonight. Last night was finally a comfortable temperature for sleeping. Thankfully tonight should be too!

After our cheese/bread/wine, we ventured out in to the neighborhood again and had some pizza. Before you harrass me about not eating more German/Austrian food, let me explain something. We had to actively seek out GErman food last night. Every other place is Pizza. In fact, around our underground stop, you can stand in one place and count about 5 italian places. What's up with that? It's crazy. The one thing that is not quite as plentiful is water. I can't seem to drink enough water here, but there are no water fountains, and the bottles of water you can buy are small, or hard to find, or ridiculously large. It's crazy.

Tomorrow is our last day here (we leave Sunday morning). I believe we are going to find a market, go to a palace, and do some shopping. I'm so glad we have had several days here, I feel like we gotten a good overview of the city, found our way around and seen a lot of the main sites. (it would take more than a week to see it all. ) My feet are ready to come home. They are screaming for me to stop walking. I miss my dog Charlie a lot. I see dogs everywhere here (street, subways, restaurants, etc). Chuck would love it, though he'd need some bigtime training to remember that he is a dog and cant hug everyone.

by the way

I am on the slowest WiFi known to man right now at the hotel. It won't let my photos upload fast.. or even at all. So, I know you are waiting on pins and needles for new photos, but hang on my little friends. I'm going to have my laptop at the university tomorrow, so hopefully they are a bit speedier :) Yay!


Get excited!!

Walking to the Tower

It's Thursday! I was still dealing with jet lag last night/this morning... I couldn't fall asleep until about 230am... I slept pretty well though once I did sleep, so that is good.
This morning Romy and I wound up sleeping in a bit late, but went straight to get some fish and chips, then to the conference. We sat through a few hours of presentations. We picked up on some good information and ideas, but for the most part we figured out that what we are doing at TCU is pretty ahead of the curve globally, which is pretty exciting. It is still amazing to me that so many people have no idea how to a) give a presentation and b) put a decent looking powerpoint together. I don't understand what is so hard about that....especially when we are dealing with people in education and technology.

We left the conference and rested at the hotel a bit and recharged ourselves, then head out to hit the U1 line (underground). We took it to the Vienna International Center, which is where the UN is here. We walked (far) through a beautiful park, and then to the Danube Tower. We took the tower all the way to the top. It was close to sunset, and the view was just beautiful. I was thankful for a breeze, as it was almost 90 degrees today (plus humidity, ew). The walk from the train to the tower and back was about 3 miles

We then took the Underground back to Karlplatz and found a little restaurant slightly off the beaten path, and had some fabulous Wienerschnitzel and potatos, and of course I had a beer. It was quite tastey, and I loved every bite! My feet felt like they were going to fall off on the way back to the train, then from the train back to the hotel, which is where I am right now.

I am pretty proud of myself. I have been the navigator the past two days, picking out our adventures, leading us there and back... and even figuring out the menu, despite not really knowing German. Somehow I have been able to muddle through it and know enough words, or can figure out the context well enough to not be lost at all. (Dad, aren't you proud?!)

I think in all we walked about 5-6 miles today. My shoes are really comfy, but I'm not used to walking on hard pavement all day. I'm covered in blisters and my feet want a break. They can't have one though until Sunday! :)

It was a good day. We feel prepared for our presentation tomorrow. I feel good about it and am ready to go celebrate afterwards! It will be strange having July 4th without any fireworks, but I think settling for the Vienna cityscape will do just fine as an alternative. I will make due ;)

Speedo Guy

Speedo Guy
Originally uploaded by kerrieconover

This guy was painting the Belvedere Palace.... in a speedo. Yes. I can't make this sort of thing up.

Shoes in Vienna

IMG_0082
Originally uploaded by kerrieconover

I always take photos of my feet and the places they take me. So here I am at Belvedere Palace, in Vienna, Austria.

Belvedere

Belvedere
Originally uploaded by kerrieconover

This is the Bevedere Palace

To Belvedere and Beyond!

After doing some web surfing in the lobby last night, grabbing some late night food, and watching SuperBad on dvd, Romy and I finally crashed out for some much needed sleep. We slept in and felt so much more rested this morning. We ventured out to do some exploring before heading to the conference. We walked for, what seemed like forever. Did you know it's like 87 degrees here with a TON of humidity? And here I thought I was leaving the heat in Texas! The route we took is here. It seemed like we walked more than 2.67 miles, but the blister on my foot says otherwise :)

I'm the map navigator here, and overshot our turn by a few blocks, which took us first to Stadtpark, where we saw some beautiful gazebos, with columns covered in grapes and lots of flowers. We then walked uphill for what felt like forever to Belvedere
To quote the website: "The Belvedere’s two magnificent palaces, the Upper and Lower Belvedere, were built in the 18th century as the summer residence for the important general Prince Eugene of Savoy (1663-1736). He chose one of the most outstanding Baroque architects Johann Lukas von Hildebrandt (1668-1745). The palaces with their extensive gardens are considered to be one of the world’s finest Baroque landmarks. Momentous events have taken place in the Upper Belvedere’s Marble Hall and from here there is a spectacular view of Vienna."

In this palace, we got to see Klimt's famous painting "The Kiss" which was absolutely incredible. The photographs I have seen in books, etc don't come anywhere close to giving the painting justice. We saw a lot of other baroque, mannerist, surrealist, impressionist, and some rococo paintings/sculptures. I was so impressed with the work.

A funny scene we saw at Belvedere was a man painting the outside (they were doing some restoration work. Typically you wouldn't even notice someone like this, but when he stood up, apparently he dropped something. I realized at this point, he didn't have pants on, but instead he had a speedo. Did I mention he was bent over from the waist? Yeah of course I photographed him. It was too funny not too. Who paints AT WORK, AT a historical place, outside, in a speedo? This guy. I bet he gets all the ladies.

We then walked to Karlplatz and saw Karlskirche which was also beautiful. We took many photos, of course.

After all of this, we went to the conference and heard a few presentations. We took a pizza break, then went back to view the poster sessions. There was some interesting presentations/posters. Tomorrow should be a full day of presentations. I'm actually looking forward to it. (So are my feet desparately wanting some rest).

It is so beautiful here. It's interesting how you can communicate well with people, despite not knowing the langauge. People have been kind, though pretty much ignore us. Thankfully we are not sticking out too much. My Euro-wear is working out pretty nicely. :) The city has a nice mix of modern and old. It's pretty easy to navigate, the pubic transportation is great, and it doesn't seem too overly expensive. I could live here, but I would HAVE to learn German to survive....and I'm far from really wanting to learn German, so I think I'll just come back to visit! :)

Tuesday, Continued

I'm hoping I'm sounding a bit more coherent now. I wish I was asleep right now though. Romy and I went out earlier to check in at the conference. It was a fairly easy walk back to the underground (funny how much easier it is without a suitcase and when walking a more direct route). We're just two stops away from the Vienna University of Technology, which is where the conference is being held. I think we both feel pretty safe walking around and are happy to have found our way to/from our main destinations.

We walked a little bit and made our way to a little cafe. I had some gnocchi gorgonzola that was delicious. We barely made our way back to the hotel, as exhaustion was setting in big time. It was 330 pm Vienna time... and 830 am. I finally started to feel better after a shower and slept for a little while. It's about 830pm now and I'm awake, but wishing I was asleep. Hopefully tomorrow I'll be back to being a normal person... or as normal as a Conover could be :)

I realize that day one of my blog is far from exicting...but it was a travel 24 hours... so there isnt much to say other than we got here and we're tired!!

I do think I need to talk about the hotel first for a few minutes. It really is going to be fine, however it is not as glamourous as the website made it look. Imagine that! Upon our arrival, the front desk guy insisted that we were double booked... 2 double rooms. I whipped out my email confirmation stating we requested 1 room, and after him giving a little display of panic (this involved a conversation in German in front of us with another manager, which somehow we understood him to say that the credit card had already been charged twice and who did this and why... and that he couldn't undo it. the other guy basically said no big deal. refund the 2nd charge... give them the 1 room). We finally got our key...which was an actual key with a giant keychain on it. We were instructed that their "security" policy is that the keys don't leave the hotel. We are to turn in our key when we leave the hotel, and then when we come back we have to show this little flimsy paper card to get our key back. Wow. hehe. There isn't a lock on the inside of our door to deadbolt the door, though it is locked. No air conditioning, though our room overlooks this cute little courtyard and our windows open widely. It's a lot hotter here than I thought it would be (i think it was about 90 today). Hopefully it will cool down nicely tonight and cool things down a bit. Despite the silliness of the "security" here, we feel safe. I don't have any complaints, just amused by how different things are.

I've been reading up on my Vienna book and have picked out where we are going tomorrow, besides the conference. It is beautiful here and I am excited to pull out my camera and start documenting everything. I think we are going to go to the Belvedere tomorrow. They have the Klimt painting "the kiss" there, among many other paintings, gardens, beautiful rooms, etc.

So you can put a face with the name, if you don't know Romy... the photo above is us as we are about to fly out of Dallas/Fort Worth Airport.


I am posting photos as i shoot them into my Flicker Account in a Vienna set. So if you want to keep up as I shoot, bookmark this baby and check out my pix! There are just a few up right now... nothing too exciting yet, but you know there will be soon!!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kconover/sets/72157605891068308/

view from the plane

sunset over atlantic ocean
Originally uploaded by kerrieconover

This was what I got to look at during my flight. It was so beautiful. My photo didn't do it justice, but it gives you the idea.

This is somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean looking north...

What time is it?!

We got to the hotel just a little while ago and are completely disoriented about what time it is. My computer says 5:39am...my cell phone says 6:39am. and I have no idea what time it is in Austria, as there is no clock in our hotel apparently. haha

Anyway - - we took my suv, 2 highways, 1 plane, a train, another plane, 1 more train, 2 subways and walked a lot longer than the 300 meters we were told it was to our hotel, but we made it all in one piece. We slept a little on the plane, but not very comfortably as expected. I did think it was cool that on the plane, in between movies, they had a map on the screens that showed our route. Apparently we flew from Atlanta up over DC, NYC, Boston... Nova Scotia... over St Mark... then Ireland, UK, and then over the main continent. The northern lights (is that what they are called?) above iceland were incredible. It was like a big rainbow on the horizon for the whole evening.

We are worn out and going to go pick up our registration info for the conference then crash out. I'm rambling anyway.

To be continued!

bag packed...ready to go

bag packed...ready to go
Originally uploaded by kerrieconover

It's official. I'm packed and ready to go!

I have no idea how I got everything in a medium sized suitcase... but im totoally not stressed and am ready to go. time to sleep and then get up and go tomorrow! YAY!!!

The Day Before!

Well, here I am, 6:49pm on Sunday. I leave for my adventure to Vienna tomorrow!

I am 97% packed and just have a few things to clean up around the house.

camera? check
passport? check
clothes/shoes...but not TOOO much? check
medium sized suitcase? check (this is amazing. i usually need the large suitcase. woo!).
laptop? check.

Tomorrow I pick up Romy at 10am then we head to the airport... fly to Atlanta, then on to Vienna. We will get to Austria at about 1030am (which will be about 130am CST I believe.

I'm so excited and totally not nervous... despite our presentation not being fully put together yet! eek! That's what a 3.5 and 10 hour flight is for right?

I'm going to try to update this as much as possible. Of course, I will be taking tons of photos, which will be linked from here to my flickr site so you can see my adventures!

Before I complete my first post, let me dazzle you with my German:

Guten tag! (hello)
Zwei bier bita (two beers please)
Auf Wiedersehen (goodbye)

yep i think that covers it.

Cheers!

Kerrie