Palaces and Museums........and sleeping in cars!

Palace complex
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As it only cost us €5 extra per night to stay in a heated cabin as opposed to a tent, when we got to Vienna we decided to splurge! After checking in we were told it was to early to get the cabin so they would leave the key in it for when we returned. Happy by the though of a great warm nights sleep we ventured into Vienna on the bus and train and were soon walking down the pedestrian only mall towards the huge Gothic St Stephans cathedral. As mass was taking place inside we quickly popped our head in before wandering around the exterior. As both are gothic, St Stephans looks similar on the outside to the Koln Cathedral in Germany, however it had an almost shabby forgotten appearance in comparison and the pigeons do nothing to add to the charm! We wandered down towards Hofburg, the imperial palace where the once far ruling Habsburg family once resided. (The next day I did a tour of the imperial palace apartments and the 'Sissi' museum dedicated to the beloved Empress Elizabeth who was assassinated and had a very interesting and perculilar life! Justin went to the Austrian military museum where he had a great time looking at armory whilst learning about the Habsburg family rule and Austrias part in war). After walking through the palace complex (which is huge and now houses many museums) we hopped on a tram and did a circular loop of the city where we passed the Greek revival style Parliament house, Baroque churches, palaces, opera houses and gothic churches. We caught a glimpse of the Donau river and as it was getting late we headed back to a great grill restaurant for dinner. The food was varied, delicious and very reasonably priced and Justin had the obligatory and very good 'Vienese snitzel'. Tired and looking forward to our beds we headed home on the train and bus. We got back just before 10 to find to our unwelcome surprise that they had forgotten to leave our cabin open. In desperation we tried every cabin that looked unoccupied but had to concede defeat, drive our car to a darker more private parking area in the camping ground and sleep in the car as it was late, cold and raining so we didn't even bother with our tent!