Slow start this morning try to even figure out what's in this city. A lot of the attractions seem to be related to the palaces of the old monarchs and some museums, which I'll definitely look into. The hostel doesn't have a kitchen, but it does have a kettle and I took full advantage of that to boil up some Slovenian ramen in a camping pot. The Slovenes apparently don't know anything about making ramen; it was terrible. I don't know how you screw up ramen since it's just a matter of adding enough salt that there are no other flavors but somehow they've managed. I met up with Jade in the early afternoon and we walked around those museums for a little while - she's completely broke and didn't want to pay to go in, but I'll probably return to see them on my own time. Unfortunately I don't think I'll be doing that tomorrow since apparently it's "National Day" - that Austrian equivalent of the 4th of July that celebrates the end of allied occupation. It seems a little strange to celebrate that in this sort of way since they were entirely responsible for, and completely deserved, the situation they were in, but so it goes. Anyway, I went back to the hostel in the late afternoon to get some housekeeping issues out of the way (Among other things I called an old colleague from Geocomp about the position I'm likely going to be offered, his perspective was encouraging) and then headed downstairs to find a beer pong tournament underway. I met some interesting characters here, none of whom I felt an especially strong kinship towards. I talked with a Dutch guy for a while who was helping this Kiwi girl with her travel plans for the Netherlands, and was very validated by his thoughts on Amsterdam. Apparently Dutch people all hate it for what it's become and he voiced pretty much all the same complaints that I had. After getting harassed by a very annoying drunk British guy for a while I called it an early night; I was surprisingly tired anyway. Sleep was difficult last night thanks to this guy in the dorm snoring more loudly than I've ever heard before, but I was saved by my earplugs.

Vienna seems very nice, but probably not as interesting as a lot of other cities I've been to. I'm here until Monday when I'll probably have to take a bus to Bratislava since the boats are sold out. The museums being closed might make things difficult but I'm sure there's cool stuff to explore down by the Danube. It's actually a pretty big city - I never thought of it as being anywhere near the level of Rome or Berlin, but it's right after them in ranking of EU cities. I have a 72-hour subway pass so I can ride it as much as I like, which I fully intend to take advantage of.