Day 184 to Day 188 - Who'd have thought we'd pay to see horses prance around a riding arena??

Prague (Czech Republic) to Vienna (Austria) - Der Wilhelmshof Hotel

Day 184 - Being the now savvy European train travelers that we are we didn’t pay for a seat reservation, just plonked ourselves in the first available compartment and settled in - and of course they'd been reserved by someone else! Another lesson learnt, check the paperwork on the outside of a compartment before you enter! After hauling our luggage down from the racks we finally found a compartment with two unreserved seats. Every trip you learn something more!

We disembarked in Vienna a few hours later to a blast of heat - not what we had expected. As we had a few days planned here we decided not to venture into town yet, instead we just explored the local area near the hotel.

Day 185 - The temperature is to be in the mid 30’s for a whole week here, which we are told is unusual for Vienna and certainly makes sightseeing a challenge. There seem to be very few hotels, shops or restaurants in Vienna that have air conditioning, they probably don’t need it enough to warrant it but it makes weeks like this difficult.

Today we had planned to visit Schönbrunn Palace. We had read about the crowds and the long wait in the sun for tickets so we made sure we were there for opening at 8.30am, even then the palace was still surprisingly busy with tour groups.

After touring the castle and walking around some of the extensive grounds we left a couple of hours later glad we weren't part of the crowds now waiting to get in. When you go to these major tourist attractions you realise that the crowds must be like this day after day and you get an appreciation for how many tourists there are around

Back in the city we wandered around to see the sights, and we stumbled onto the Spanish Riding School, for which K has a ticket for Saturday's performance. We were surprised to find it right in the centre of town, though if we'd done some research we would have already known that!

We then caught the train down to the banks of the Danube (with some pretty uninspiring "beaches") and walked around until the heat did us in, arriving back to our air conditioned room about 4pm.

We are staying a few train stations out of the city and we had dinner at a pizza/pasta place around the corner from our hotel. Amazingly sitting at the table next to us were the couple we had shared the carriage with on the train from Prague – as this is such a huge city, it was an amazing coincidence.

Days 186 and 187 - Our lack of planning has started to uncover some some gaps in our future travels, so we decided we needed to spend some time figuring out where we'll go over the next couple of months. It's obvious we do not have the time to see everything we want, one of the reasons being that K can only stay in Europe for 90 days. As a result we have started narrowing down our list of highlights to see, as well as working out the cheapest way to get around. It also seems a good way to make use of our time at the moment and escape the heat of the day.

We did still get out and about though, just not as much as usual. We visited the huge park near our hotel called the Wiener Prater, which contains an amusement park. In the park is the Wiener Reisenrad, a giant ferris wheel that was built back in 1897, as well as many more modern rides - though we didn't go on any of them.

Day 188 - K had a ticket for the first performance of the Spanish Riding School since their summer break. The place was packed out and the show absolutely stunning. It was the young horses' first performance and there was lot of shying, some taking off and even some bucking thrown in.

The seasoned performers were as striking as you would expect. The riders all looked liked clones. There was only one female rider, the rest were all very long legged men with the most perfect leg positions you have ever seen. Everything you'd expect to see was in the show but K did wonder whether the one time changes on the long rein was appreciated by the audience, but as it turns out the applause was so huge that the trainer actually looked up and smiled at the audience, the only time any rider seemed to acknowledge that the audience was  there.

K had one of the best seats right near X in the front row. The head rider of the school came out for the last performances, quite a bit overweight and no one has obviously felt like pointing out to him that he is losing his leg position! For K, this would be the best show she has ever attended and she could easily go again tomorrow.

(M: I didn't go to the riding school, and I don't even know what any of this means so I'll just leave it as it is ....K tried to explain what a "one time change" is but I still don't get it .........).

Later in the day M went for a long walk in the Wiener Prater and guess what .... lots more stick walkers, most of them walking not very fast at all! From what we can tell though, they are doing something called "Nordic Walking", there's even a club in Australia (no, we won't be joining it when we get back).