The First Days of Austria

The flight to Vienna was full of Franciscan Students. I went through a little culture shock seeing all of my friends again the first few days at the Kartause. When we first arrived there, the little kids of the professors greeted us with yellow roses. When I got my room assignment with Victoria I found out that I am in the same room Laura was. :-).  The first few days were crazy busy. The school took us to Melk Abbey and Durnstein. In Durstein, we hiked a mountain to the ruins of a castle where Richard the Lionhearted was kept prisoner. I swam in the Danube River with some friends and had a blast singing Irish pub songs on the way back to the Kartause.
The first weekend the school took us to Vienna. It was pretty cool being back there after five years. I met my RD named Tony Ertell and found out that he was good friends with Laura in college. Such a small world!
The second weekend I went to Salzburg and Munich. I had some awesome Austrian food in Salzburg and Fr. Brad took us on a walking tour of the old city. My friend Mary and I ate an awesome chocolate dipped pretzel that was like the size of my head. In the evening, I went to the Augustiner with a bunch of people and had good beer and sausage sandwiches. Munich was beautiful. Me and Victoria walked around with a bunch of our guy friends. We listened and danced to German Jazz music while random tourists took pictures of us for their photo albums. lol. We ate and drank at the Hofbrauhausse and then went to a festival along the river. In the evening we got gelato and Mark Radabaugh had to help me back to the bus because I had blisters and was walking on cobblestones with heels..woops.
On the way back to Gaming in the morning, we stopped at Mondsee. We had mass at the church of St. Michael's where Maria VonTrapp was married at. Then we had lunch and swam in the warmest lake in Austria. So much fun. The sun was shining and we just relaxed and swam for awhile. The town was really quaint and pretty. Back at the Kartause I hit the books and the laundry. :-/