TRAVEL | grinzens day 2 + 3

Saturday was ski-day! I think the last time I was on ski's was when I was 10, or younger, I don't really remember anymore. I definitely took more than a few tumbles on my way down the slopes. Romans friend managed to get one particularly spectacular fall on camera.

Roman and Karsten, on the other hand, are excellent skiers and helped a out a lot that day. Especially when I would fall so bad the skis would snap off my boot the one of them would have to chase the ski down and then come back help me stand up.

On the third day I was completely out of commission due to skiing the day before. Everything hurt--my arms from using the ski poles to scoot myself through the snow, my buns because I bruised them from falling, my shins because the ski boots dug into my leg. I was done, dead. All I wanted to do was it sit in the flat and take a hot bath (did I mention our apartment also had a sauna? Wild.) Anyways I did drag myself outside to get some fresh air for an hour to two so and explored the little village we were staying in. Really cute!

TRAVEL | innsbruck day 1

First post of the new year, of the first trip of the new year!

Few weeks ago Roman planned a spontaneous ski trip to Austria for the weekend. Some people are capable of making plans on the fly but I am definitely not. We confirmed the trip on the tuesday, booked an (amazing) accommodation that same tuesday, packed our stuff and was in the car heading down south by thursday evening!

After a quick pit-stop thursday night in Nürmberg, we woke up bright and early Friday morning
and drove to Innsbruck, an Austrian university town near the Austrian/German border. Even though
we were taking a 4 day trip, I had only planned to ski one day, maybe two tops. So Friday and
Monday were technically working days for me. Therefore I just found a cafe that has wifi via google
maps, the boys dropped me off, and I had the whole day in Innsbruck to myself.

I've always thought Austria was among the most beautiful countries I've visited. I clearly remember
remarking how "everything is so green" out loud on a bus when I was traveling around Europe in 2013,
which resulted in a few weird glances my way as I'm sure people were wondering whether or not I've ever
seen trees in my life.

This is Grinzens. These photos didn't do the scenery justice at all. Snowy mountains are not
 something I'm used to seeing at all. Just image, these people living in this village gets views
like this every day. 

We cooked dinner on the first night. I made a salad with roasted vegetables while the guys cooked
spaghetti. Unfortunately the stove broke down halfway through cooking so we didn't get any pasta
and had a healthy veggie dinner instead. I did feel bad for the boys though, because I'm usually
starving after doing sports.

Last two images were the views from outside our apartment at 8am. I literally hopped out of bed to
see what the mountains looked like in the morning. The camera couldn't quite capture the subtle pink
glow of the morning sun hitting the mountain caps but I assure you, they were there and so beautiful.

TRAVEL | vienna

It's been a while, but I think I'm finally jumping back into this project again. There's still a few more cities from my 2015 trip I'd still like to share. Hopefully I'll finish up editing the photos from the other cities soon (stay tuned for Budapest, Salzburg, Munich, Barcelona, and Lisboa) so I can get started on my book!

So, since it's been so long since the actual trip, I don't have much to say about my time in Vienna. I just remember I was glad to get out of Sweden as it was getting too dark and too cold for me to handle.

Most of the stay was dominated by the walking tour of the filming locations for Before Sunrise (one of my favourite films), and I also met up with some friends I had met in Amsterdam and Antwerp.



Alt & Neu, the record store where Jesse and Celine listened to { Kath Bloom }.
Now that I've been studying graphic design, I have an immense appreciation for
beautiful typography. Just look at that--so lovely!

This was { Trzesniewski }, a Polish spot famous for their little open faced sandwiches.

There was over a dozen different sandwiches featuring a variety of chopped/minced stuff.
You can choose ones with mushrooms, anchovies, egg, or minced sweet gherkins (too many
combos to list here) and each one is was a delight. Definitely a place worth stopping by for
some good, fast, and cheap food.

I would recommend Kleines Cafe even if you weren't a fan of Before Sunrise (location of the

fortune telling scene btw). The cafe is located in a quiet little courtyard a little ways away from
the busier shopping streets. I thought it was a nice place to stop for a coffee and a little bite to
eat. One thing is that this place is not so great for non-smokers. I couldn't sit inside or else
I'd come out wheezing.

TRAVEL | vienna travel diary

Vienna is possibly the grandest city I have ever visited. Just about every street or boulevard is lined with picturesque buildings—my camera was basically glued to my hand—and the rest of the city was littered with warlike statuary. It was truly beautiful. And to my delight I was checked into a dorm on the top floor of my hostel. It was probably the best room I had stayed in throughout the trip, and what’s more, it had a killer view. The first thing I did, even before washing or changing out of my awful bus clothes, was climb up to the rooftop for a stunning 360 degree view of downtown Vienna. My hostel was located by { The Naschmarkt }, an outdoor culinary experience where you can find various delicacies from every country from dawn till dusk. By the time I made it up to the rooftop it was nearly sunset and most of the people have gone home. But not all was lost as I got to watch all the merchants pack up their daily wares and I even managed to take a few photos before the had sun set completely.

The rest of the afternoon/early evening was spent wandering downtown. I started off at { St. Stephen’s Cathedral }, a monumental Gothic structure right in the center of town. The area was buzzing with businessmen and tourists, it was hard not to get excited for all the exploring I had ahead of me. The one thing I learned that day was that the Danube is entirely incidental to the city. From the maps I had completely underestimated how far it was from downtown and the furthest I got was to the Donaukanal before I decided to turn around to walk home.

On the way back I passed several important buildings but the one that blew me away was the famous  { Vienna State Opera House }. Vienna is known for it’s incredible history of music. The Wiener Staatsoper is one of the busiest opera houses in the world producing up to 60 operas per year and ten ballet productions in approximately 300 performances. It is quite common to find a different performance being produced each day of the week. My friend was able to catch a ballet before we left, I was supposed to join her but due to an unfortunate event I had to cancel. Anyways, I ended the night with another trip to the rooftops, this time with new friends Mish and James, and it was even more incredible to see the city lit up at night. While the city looks deceivingly similar to Paris during the day, it had an entirely different vibe at night. It was louder, grittier, and more exciting than Paris’s silent streets.

Unfortunately, the rest of my stay in Vienna wasn’t as magical as the first. It was all thanks to the cold I had caught the first night that left me bed-ridden for the rest of the week (into Munich). I did manage to muster the mental and physical strength to hit the streets for several hours each day to visit all the places I had on my itinerary (and even several that weren’t), but mostly I was completely drained of all energy. There were several pick-me-ups I did manage to stumble across that did make me forget about my aching muscles for a brief moment. The first was this one friendly little café, { Hawelka }, tucked away in a small alleyway around the corner of Stephansplatz U-bahn. Hawelka is a very traditional Viennese café; inside it was cramped, musty and quite dark. It was a miracle I didn’t knock anyone over in my clumsy state. The rest of my last afternoon was spent searching for all the shooting locations of one of my favorite films: Before Sunrise. The whole film was shot entirely in beautiful Vienna and thanks to several websites I had the pleasure of visiting all the places I’d seen in the movie including the Kleines café, the record store, and the amusement park and ferris wheel, to name a few.