Na Zdravi

Well, my flight was cancelled. Fortunately though I managed to get on the next one out which was only two and a half hours later; which is about how long it took me to go through security. I was at terminal 4 which was probably a lot less busy than the other ones, but I generally thought it was quite well handled. People were patient and the airport was relatively well organised. I managed to call BA and have my flight changed, I felt for the people who were queuing for the ticket desk which was out the door, around the corner, and then fed by two further queues set up in marquees in the car park!

So I got to Vienna only a little later and met Rob who had been waiting patiently for me. We went to our hotel, which was cleverly selected for its proximity to Schnitzelwirt, dropped our gear and headed out for lunch. We went to Schnitzelwirt when we were travelling around Europe 5 years ago, they have the most amazing schnitzel there and we have been raving about it ever since; Vienna (a city of immense culture and history) was chosen so we could go back and eat these schnitzels again. I had already joked that with the foiled terrorist plot causing problems in getting there; Allah was conspiring to prevent me from eating pork. We joked further on the way to the restaurant that wouldn’t it be funny if it was closed.

It was!

Closed for the holidays between July 24 and August 20.

Oh well, the irony of it all. We still found a couple of other places for schnitzel, including a really good Austrian beer hall which brewed its own beer. We managed to stuff ourselves silly and loosen our belts by a couple of notches.

The next day we took the short train trip to Brno, the capital of Moravia in the Czech Republic. We met our friend Roman who drove us to Trebic where we had lunch (more schnitzel) and then to the tiny village of Horni Vilemovice. There we spent the afternoon at a farm-house - chatting, playing games, drinking and enjoying a Czech-style-BBQ. Suitably feed and boozed, at 10:30pm it was time to hike through the forest to the neighbouring village where a rock cover-band were putting on a show. When we started throwing back shots of a spirit named after Boozy-Boris the former Russian president - we knew things could only go down hill from there. Rocking to some classic Czech rock music in a random hall in the Moravian countryside, was not something that most Australians would find themselves doing; but we did it well. Needless to say the trek back home through the pitch dark at 3.30am was an event, one that included Rob falling into a ditch. Pure gold. It was really fun night and boy did I suffer the next day; without a doubt the worse hangover I have had in a long time meant that the trip back to London was not much fun.

We made it back though without any hitches, in fact our flight landed 15 minutes ahead of schedule as the chief flight attendant so gleefully announced. It was another top weekend with Rob, we always seem to make the most of things together. We always know exactly what we are thinking and I am sure that eventually we will be able to communicate telepathically since we usually know what the other is going to say before it has been said. I’ll miss him a lot when he’s gone, but there’ll never be any goodbyes, just see you later.