It was another early morning for us, but today we ate pastries, cheese, and coffee in our rooms.  As Mandy was arriving this morning we just rested in our room and waited for her.  About 11:30 a.m. after she had arrived and showered, we all headed out for lunch.  We walked to Cafe Segafredo about 2 blocks away.  This is a restaurant chain where you can get a quick drink and something to eat in various sites all over the city. We sat as far away as we could from the smoking area which was enclosed but they kept opening the door and leaving it open.  Lunch for Mike was Puten Cordon Bleu (like a turkey schnitzel with swiss cheese and ham inside) plus potato salad and sparkling water.  I had fried cod (Kabeljau) plus potato salad and still water. Mandy and Jody shared a salad, calamari and fries.

Once we finished lunch, we walked up the street shopping in the various shops.  After a short time, Mandy who had a cold was getting very tired, so she and Jody headed back to the hotel.  Mike and I continued up the street shopping.  We found Confisserie Heindl and bought some Viennese chocolates and then to Anker Snacks and Coffee, a pastry shop, where we bought some pastries for tomorrow’s breakfast.  Then we also went back to the room to rest for a little while.

About 4:30 p.m. we met up with Jody and Mandy and walked around looking for a place to have dinner.  It was shocking that by 4:30 p.m. it was full dark here—of course it was autumn, and Vienna is further north than we are in St. Louis.  We ended up at a restaurant about 3 blocks from the hotel called the Meidlinger Wirt.  It was a little neighborhood place.  We were rather early for dinner, but our bodies were ready!  I had the fried perch (Zanderfilet gregrillt) and buttered potatoes with parsley (Yum!). Mike and I both had a glass of the Grüner Veltliner.  Mike, Jody, and Mandy all wanted the goulash but were told it wouldn’t be finished cooking for another hour.  So instead they had soup with semolina dumplings (Mike and I thought of you Barbara and your love of broth as this was straight broth with a teensy amount of chopped vegetables and two large dough balls called  dumplings).  This was called a Rindsuppe Griessnockerl.   The food was very good.  After we had finished, the waitress brought each of us a shot of a local after dinner liqueur.  It was something like a pear schnapps.  I thought it was REALLY vile!  So, Mike, who doesn’t like to waste anything, drank his and mine.  As we were leaving the restaurant the place was beginning to get crowded with what appeared to be local people.

It was dark and cold so it was time to head back to our rooms.  Jody and Mandy bought a tea/liquor drink at the hotel bar to take to their room while Mike and I went up to the room where we ate our chocolates and drank the small bottle of Chardonnay/Sake mix we had bought at the Hofer (doesn’t that sound odd?  It was actually not too bad).  After attempting to watch television—our tv has strange channels like Chinese tv, a finance channel, etc.  Where was the BBC channel?  Where was Al Jazeera?  We felt as if we were in a news vacuum without tv news or newspapers.  Ah well about 11 p.m. we just gave up and went to bed.