Durnstein and Danube Cruise

We went on a cruise to see the Summer Solstice Festivities an hour from Vienna. We walked around a town called Durnstein, which is where the boat departed from. The festival was really beautiful! 

Carolyn and me at lunch

View from Castle in Durnstein

Ryan and Jeff

Playing in the river

View from the boat

Church in Durnstein

Our group!

Castle in Spitz and another boat

Fireworks!

The hill is a vineyard, which was lit by people holding torches

Fire waterfall on castle

Bonfires

Rippin and Rollin and what not

Rafting Austrian style on the Salza River. The Salza is about 2 1/2 hours from Wien. According to our tour guide (the guy without a shirt in the below picture), this river is one of the most beautiful places to raft in Europe. The water was clear, which I thought was amazing because I've never seen a clear river! Vienna gets 1/2 of its water from this river and has the 2nd highest ranking in Europe for water purity. Our guide was fantastic and has traveled on the river for 27 years. His wet suit was a little old...he had a hole in the butt!! He was a lot fun and made the rafting that much more exciting. We camped out that night and had smores, then the next day we went on a high ropes course. Such a great weekend!

On the bus to the river

Practice makes perfect

This was my favorite part, leaning backwards while on the raft!

The whole gang (minus Corey)

The water was very very cold...(8 degrees C)

Water Fight

Lunch

Ryan before he jumped into the freezing river!

Putting on harnesses for the ropes course

Go Ryan!!

Slowly making my way across

Ryan after he finished the course. We had to jump off of a platform and free fall...I screamed really loud for this part.

Me laying on a wobbly board trying to get across

Le Poissons...Le Poissons...he-he-he....hah-hah-hah

We went to Paris last weekend and it was fantastic! We ate lots of banana and nutella crepes, drank the worlds' best hot chocolate, and..o yeah, ate pig intestines! Mmmmmm... We walked along the same streets as Monet and Salvador Dali in Montmartre, bought tons of paintings, and went to 8 museums! There was so much to see, so we'll have to go back if we get the chance. Sadly we saw no mimes, and only one man wearing a beret...talk about a misconception! 

Our first glimpse of the Eiffel Tower

View from the Eiffel Tower

Sparkling!

The Louvre

Mona Lisa!

Venus de Milo, one of the most famous ancient Greek sculptures

Napoleon's Bed

Monet's water lilies at the Musee l'Orangerie de Tuileries

Van Gogh's Starry Night over the Rhone

Thinker by Rodin

Ryan thinking...

Centre Pompidou (modern museum) 

Painting by Kandinsky

Painting by Salvador Dali 

(Ryan really likes his art)

Notre Dame

Gargoyle and view from the top of Notre Dame

no Quasimoto...sigh..

Saint Pierre de Montmartre

Obelisk that was a gift from Egypt's Viceroy

Musee d'Orsay

The lucky artist who sold us a bunch of paintings

The Arc de Triomphe

View from the Arc

And we serenaded Paris with the lyrics from the LIttle Mermaid

Les poissons
Les poissons
How I love les poissons
Love to chop
And to serve little fish
First I cut off their heads
Then I pull out the bones
Ah mais oui
Ca c'est toujours delish
Les poissons
Les poissons
Hee hee hee
Hah hah hah
With the cleaver I hack them in two
I pull out what's inside
And I serve it up fried
God, I love little fishes
Don't you?

Slovakia!

Sunday, I went to Bratislava, Slovakia with a couple of friends. We had fun walking around the old town, visiting an absurdly creepy art gallery, and window shopping. We had some amazing food, called Pirohy,  which looks like ravioli, but is filled with potato. 

Me and Pui-yung

Street

Church Door