Vienna, Austria

On Thursday morning we hopped on the train to Vienna, Austria, which is mid-way between Prague & Budapest. We weren’t originally planning on stopping here, so we didn’t have anything planned except for a last-minute hotel we booked. We walked through town, ate a great lunch, and decided that we must go back and do Vienna properly – ie get a guided tour through the city.

St. Stephen's Cathedral in the Stephanplatz

Flower Market (these are all over Europe, including Moscow, and they are just so beautiful!)

Small side street

Prague, Czech Republic

Our first trip outside of Russia was at the end of May and we were well overdue for a trip outside the motherland. I can tell you that we certainly will not go another 5 months without traveling somewhere!! On this trip we flew to Prague for 3 days, took the train and stopped in Vienna for a day, and then ended the trip in Budapest for another 2 days.

A View from the Charles Bridge of the Castle District

The Prague Castle

Tyn Church in Stare Mesto (Old Town) with the astronomical clock on the left

The astronomical clock

At a local beer garden

Prague was absolutely beautiful. We had a great little hotel which was extremely close to the Old Town Square with the Astronomical clock. Our first night we walked around the square and across the Charles Bridge before we stopped for dinner on the square. The following day we took a 6 hour tour! Lots of walking around town getting to know everything. We asked our guide for a good beer garden and she recommended a place that the locals frequent on a hill just above the river. Walking there we had to go through some beautiful parks which Cameron commented were just waiting for a few people to go out and throw the football around. We got to the beer garden and it was a bunch of picnic tables and a walk up beer stand with beer served in plastic cups. But – it had the most fabulous view of the city and completely reminded us of the vibe in Austin. Extremely low-key with dogs and slobber which of course found its way to Cameron’s shirt! I think that beer garden was my favorite part of Prague.

After the beer garden, we went back down to the square where we went on a “Ghost Tour.” Completely cheesy, but lots of laughs – especially when a guy with a mask jumped out in front of me and I screamed bloody murder!

On our third day in Prague, we were buying a hat for Cameron at the Four Seasons (no, unfortunately we did not stay there!) when we got the call that Chase Cameron Markle was born in Ft. Worth! We were most excited as we knew we’d get to meet Cameron’s namesake, our newest niece, just a few weeks later.

Victory Day with the Brays

We’ll go back to where we left off – which was right after busy season (thank goodness that’s over!). We had friends of ours on a tour in Paris, Chris & Mary Beth come visit us over Victory Day (May 9^th). It was a long holiday weekend, and we made the most of it. We awoke Friday morning to the flyover, which consisted of helicopters and other various jets (Cameron will have to give you the detail on those!). Then we watched again from our window all the tanks and such heading down Tverskaya to Red Square for the 1^st military parade on Red Square since the fall of communism. It was definitely something to watch firsthand.

That afternoon we lunched at our favorite patio spot in town, Scandinavia, with a group of friends and took breaks to go out and watch the Soviet parade out on Tverskaya.

We spent the rest of the weekend sight-seeing and eating fabulous food! It was great to have such fun houseguests and we were glad to get out and about in this city which we live!

Chris & Mary Beth in front of Christ the Savior Cathedral

New Blog!!

OK - We've decided to try out a new blogging format which will hopefully be more user-friendly. Let us know what you think! I know we're behind on our posts, but I will hopefully catch up by next week!