Justin got up around 06:30, and Crystal around 07:00.  Justin left the room shortly before Crystal woke up.  He saw Martin just out front.  He looked much more comfortable, having gotten almost everyone back to the airport in one piece.  He mentioned there were no issues with anyone overnight.  His flight back to Prague was a couple hours after ours – we assume that this is standard practice for the guide’s flight to be last.

Justin walked the rough path of yesterday morning’s walking tour, but without the rain this time.  It was much nicer not having to hug the sides of buildings whilst walking around.  He walked up on the top floor of the mall, near the Triumph Arch, and could see the Alexander statue pretty well without the giant Skopsko sign behind it.  When he got to the bottom level of the mall, he saw a couple tiny kittens eating food in a protected nook.  He walked over some of the pedestrian bridges over the river, including the Bridge of Art (going between the St Patrick’s Pub and the Public Prosecutor’s Office), and the Bridge of Civilizations (with the Archaeological Museum on the north side).  He got back after an hour or so.

We went to breakfast for only the second time on the trip.  We figured that since our flight was boarding around noon, we might have a hard time grabbing lunch at the airport.  At breakfast we tried to plan out our afternoon in Vienna.  We decided that if the weather was good, we’d go to Schönbrunn and/or Belvedere, and if not we’d go to the Kunst to see the Skanderbeg helmet.  We asked to see the wine list, to check if they had any of the Kamnik wine from yesterday.  They did, the blend that was great value, but when we tried to order some they told us that they couldn’t serve alcohol before 11:00.  Well, we tried.

We went upstairs and got cleaned up and ready for our flight, and Crystal listened to podcasts while we packed.  We went downstairs at 09:50 for our 10:00 pickup.  In the lobby we saw Martin again.  He told us when our vehicle had arrived, and then we said our goodbyes again.  We told him we hoped to see him in Prague in December.  Our car stopped itself backing out, as it thought we were too close to something and the automatic brakes engaged.  The driver mentioned this happened quite a bit.  It was an easy drive east to the airport, and thankfully the automatic brakes were not needed a second time.

At the airport, there were short lines for immigration and security.  We thought it was a bit odd that immigration was before security, but then it crossed our mind that this was one of the only commercial airports in the country (Ohrid is the only other one), and since there are no flights between Skopje and Ohrid, literally every flight is international.  To our welcome surprise, once through security we saw there was actually a lounge, and even better, it actually took Star Alliance Gold members.  We were in there and with drinks in hand by 10:45.  Justin finally started to look at some of our photos.  Usually he checked them regularly, but we’d been on the go basically the entire time on this trip; we assumed they were fine, but didn't really have any idea.

We got in the boarding line a little before noon.  The flight was clearly delayed, as there was no plane yet, but no one had announced anything.  The “final call” on the message boards was before we even started boarding.  To its credit, the plane boarded extremely quickly, and the flight was pretty straightforward.  We had seats just across the aisle from one another.  We landed just after 14:20, and we were the first ones through immigration – we’d picked the right spots on the transfer bus to the terminal to beat the rush.

We got on the s7 train a little before 15:00, headed towards Wien Mitte.  At the station we transferred to the U3 line on the Underground, and we popped up at Stephansplatz, staring directly at St Stephen’s.  It was about a five minute walk to our hotel, Pension A und A, and we got to our room a little before 16:00.  We put our stuff down and immediately went out.  The weather wasn’t great, so we decided on the Kunst.  It was a short walk over there, basically just across the Hofburg complex.  We had the idea to ask about the Skanderbeg helmet before buying tickets.  This was a good idea because the woman told us what we were looking for was in the Welt Museum across the street.

We’d never seen or heard of the Welt Museum, despite invariably having walked by it dozens of times before.  Before we bought tickets there, we again asked if the Skanderbeg helmet was there, and the woman confirmed that it was.  We walked directly to where she mentioned, took some photos, and inspected the helmet and sword closely.  With our mission accomplished, we walked around that floor of the museum.  There was a lot of old armour, but also a lot of old musical instruments.  It was fine, but we aren’t really museum people.

Since we’d already paid the entry fee, however, we decided on the walk back downstairs to look at the other floors.  The first thing we saw was a room with a bunch of paintings that looked nice, but again, not our thing.  But then we came upon a bunch of rooms with things from across the globe, collected on exploration missions from centuries ago.  We saw many things from Cook’s excursions to the South Pacific (e.g. Hawaiian headdresses), we saw Native American headdresses, many things from Benin, items related to Día de los Muertos in Mexico, and much more. 

We were shocked at how eclectic everything was and how much of everything there was.  There was nearly anything you could think of.  On the bottom floor there was an exhibit on camelids - camels, alpacas, etc.  We were surprised to see that camels went the opposite direction from humans across the Bering Sea land bridge, going from North America to Asia.  Humans killed off all of the North American camels – humans are the worst.

Nearby the Welt Museum, we literally stopped to smell the roses at the Volksgarten.  Every prior time we’ve been to Vienna, it’s been at Christmas, and nothing was in bloom.  Today there were roses of seemingly every size, shape, and color.  They looked incredible, and this was on a gray day.  We heard loud speakers at the Rathaus and walked over to see what was going on – it was very weird seeing it with no Christmas Market in front.  We saw the Parliament building without any scaffolding and/or construction for the first time ever. 

From Parliament we took the tram to Belvedere Palace.  It was very odd seeing it with no market either.  We walked through the grounds from Upper to Lower Belvedere, and then towards the Donaukanal.  The park near the Donaukanal was very peaceful, with lots of people sitting around and enjoying the afternoon, plus some kids playing drinking games.  It was very odd seeing it light so late, as in December the sun sets around 16:00, and today it was still light at 19:00.

We got to dinner at 3 Hacken around 19:15.  There was a special asparagus menu, as it was in-season.  Crystal was very excited to see this, and ordered an asparagus soup for an appetizer.  She also ordered Tafelspitz for her main course.  Justin ordered Schaufele.  Crystal got wine and Justin got a draft beer.  To our surprise, we remembered our German fairly well for not having used it in five months.  Justin made a worthy attempt at finishing his dish, maybe 90% of the meat and 60% of the crispy skin. 

We were debating whether to go to Pisco or Kleinod, and decided both.  Even though Pisco was a bit closer, we thought it would fill up later than Kleinod, so we went to Kleinod first.  It was standing room only when we arrived, but they let us in.  After a few minutes, before our drinks arrived, we got a table.  Crystal got a French 75 and Justin got a Mangue Azul.  The spicy mango margarita was quite good.  Today the drinks were better than the service, but it was understandable.  There was a table of 4 attractive young women on one side of us, and a table of 2 more attractive young women on our other side, and a couple were flirting with the waiter.  So we weren’t getting his attention easily, but we eventually did order a second round, another French 75 for Crystal, and a Lemongrass Passion for Justin.  When the table next to us left, one of the women left the waiter her IG handle - that must’ve replaced phone numbers for the 2020s.

When we left at 22:00 it was completely packed, and we had to squeeze between people in order to get out.  Thankfully it was not as crowded at Pisco, and we nabbed the table in the front corner.  Frankie Ruiz was playing on the stereo.  Mentally we switched off our German and switched on our Spanish.  We got two Maracuya Sours for the first round, and a Maracuya Sour (Crystal) and Chilcano (Justin) for the second round.  For one afternoon and evening, we thought we’d been able to accomplish quite a bit.  We got back just before midnight, with just enough time to do Duolingo before crashing.  Justin couldn’t find the wi-fi at first, but Crystal pointed out that what he was seeing as “Ah-oon-duh” was actually “a und a.”  It was probably time to hit the sack.