< ![CDATA[  We’ve been in Vienna for two weeks now... we’d intended to stay five days. We’ve seen the Albertina (art museum), the Schonbrunn (palace of the Hapsburg family), the Natural History Museum, the Prater, the Naschmarkt (which has the BEST little street side restaurants ever), St. Stephen’s Cathedral, and more little stuff than we can list. Sadly, the oldest zoo in the world got rained out. The last four days have been very uncomfortable, and yet lots of fun. The weather took a turn for the worse and we’ve had day after day of steady, cold rain. The nighttime temperatures have dipped almost to the freezing point and we can stay neither dry, nor warm. Not a good combination. The fun part: The Adams family. Our new old friends from the Czech piled into their van and surprised the children with two days of camping, Miller style. Well, almost: they rented a bungalow and we split the cost of a new hot pot so that we could have hot tea and coffee all evening long in their cabin! There are no words to describe the scream of delight that split the grey day when Adams started piling through the opening of our drippy little abode into the lemon yellow interior of our tent... all eight of them, Miss Gina made nine. Elisha said later, “Mom! I was so surprised and so happy to see them that I cried a little. I tried not to let them see me... it was happy tears!” And so “it” was. We’d hoped to create a real Miller style “edventure” for them, most of which got rained out. However, we did cook them some of our usual travel food and toured all over the city followed by our ten little wet, cold ducklings. There is nothing for “fun” like taking the train into the city and walking a block in the rain, only to discover that the museum you’d come to see is closed on Tuesdays... the guide book failed to mention that detail. No matter, we had a great lunch at the market before schlepping back two train stops and walking another block in the rain to discover that the children’s museum in Vienna, “Zoom,” is closed for a whole month for renovations. We spent over 20 Eu on train fair... for lunch out. Drat. We were all sad when they pulled out of the campsite yesterday afternoon, with big hugs all around. Caleb, their fourteen year old was my hero for the day because he left his extra pair of BIG grey socks on my feet when they left. (He laughed at me all over the museum for wearing them pulled half way to my knees under my gauchos... hey, I was cold!) He declared himself my “sock buddy” as they left. We were so happy to see them come, and so sad to see them go... but we know we’ll see them again... Tunisia, maybe? Over glasses of Sturm (the first pressing of wine grapes, before it is bottled and fermented... kind of a fizzy grape juice) we decided last night that we’ve had enough of the cold and the wet. The next week is meant to carry more of the same. We’d hoped to cycle up the Danube and across to Salzburg over the next week, but we’re wimping out. We’ve moved so slowly and had so much fun that we’re now far further north than we’d planned for this time of year and we’re going to treat ourselves to a direct train to Venice, Italy in the morning. For the last time in Austria... guten nacht.]]>