Vienna was a pretty chill place. We stayed in a beautiful hotel! It was suuuch a nice change, we've been really lucky with our hotels but this one was fantastic. The night we got there we went for a swim and were very pleased when we saw the pool. It was surrounded by palm trees and lusicous green plants. We could have spent the entire night there if it wasn't for the awkward couple acting as if they were the only ones there.. luckily the trees blocked our view of them, but it was still wayyy weird. We also went to a restaurant across the road from the restaurant for diner that night and were surprised to find that you could smoke inside. Europe is a bit behind on the whole no smoking thing, but most countries have banned it inside. We later found out that Germany and some of the countries surrounding it have been tentative to establish smoking laws because Hitler was extremely against cigarettes and they do not want to be seen as following his path. We spent out day in Austria by going on a nice walking tour and then getting some world famous apple struddel paired with a great coffee. After our snack we made our way to an amusement park which was very similar to the ex. Kirsten went on this crazy ride that had a huge beam that rotated like a ferris wheel but was way faster and had two seats on either end, as the the beam span the seats around and up and down, the seats were also doing theyre own flips. She screamed the whole time and had a few euros fly out of her pockets to who knows where, but absolutely loved it!! When we'd had enough of the rides we grabbed a snitchel burger and headed for the schnapps (or shwerrps as some people call it) museum to meet up with the rest of our tour group. When we walked into the museum/ factory it felt like walking into another century.. or decade or something. Everything was extremely old fashionned and most of it had not been replaced since that factory was made, it was really cool because it was so original. The oldest, happiest (probably drunkest) man showed us how they made schnapps and told us which ones had which percentages and told us what to mix with them. We then followed him upstairs where we got to taste test as many as we wanted, (in other words, we all did a TON of shots) then spent a TON of money in the gift shop. We are both still very happy about our purchases however, so the alchohol didnt get to us too much. We each bought a bottle of Red Rocket schnapps (which is 46%) and we bought a bottle of absince together (the good stuff, which is 60%). Be ready for it when we get home guys!! Kirsten also bought a shirt saying "they told me I had a good time"... very appropriate :) After the best museum so far we headed back to the hotel to rest up for the german beer hall the next day and Kirsten's birthday. The next morning we loaded everything back onto the bus once more and were off to Munich!

Munich was much like Florence, short lived but great! We got to our hotel and left almost immediately to head into town (most of our hotels were on the outskirts of town, as they are much cheaper that way). We bought a couple of souvenirs and then made our way to the Hofprahaus, an original German beer hall. As soon as we walked in we knew it was going to be a good time, the place was packed and filled with noise and the smell of beer! There was a band playing german songs and wearing authentic german clothing (short leather shorts, suspenders and all). We grabbed a bench right in front of them and ordered our first round of one litre beers (or for some of us, half lemonade/half beer.... which tasted exactly like your deliscous drink Dave, but was a lot less strong :P).. anyways they were without a doubt the biggest beers we'd ever drank! We were only there for about half an hour before a "lovely" 80 year old man who had been asking all the young ladies to dance came up and asked Kirsten to dance. She of course agreed, who could say no to such a sweet old man, right? Well as most of the blonde girls on contiki found out Max was more of a drunk mess than a sweet old man. Everyone had a great laugh watching her face turn bright red as she awkwardly danced with him. Attack of the blondes, take one. After what felt like ages to her the song finally ended and she took her seat again, only to be harassed by a random Russian man 15 minutes later. Eventually one of the guys called the waiter over who removed him from our table and we were happy again, until we recieved our dinner.. Apparently the Hofprahaus does everything super size, because our food was just as big as the beer. We all had either schnitzel as big as a regular sized dinner plate, a pork nuckle the size of 2 fists, or a half chicken the same size. Everyone put in a great effort trying to eat it all, but no one even came close. By the time our we were finished eating everyone was a few beers in and having a great time! We were making some new friends with another contiki group and a random bunch of spaniards when our tour group was asked to leave. (apparently they didnt like us walking on the tables or the stupid amount of glasses we had broke.. really though, what do you expect when you serve litres of beer!?) Half the group decided to call it a night, but a few stayed out with Kirsten to celebrate her birthday with her (which although all 40 of them had sang to her at the beer hall, was at midnight). We made our way to a little pub down the road just in time to grab a drink for her birthday. A while later we grabbed a taxi and headed back to the hotel in time to get a few hours of sleep before hopping on the bus again the next day.

We can safely say Munich kicked Kirsten's butt, and there was only more fun to come in Prague.

We arrived in Prague in one piece (barely) and had a couple hours to regain our strength before the pub crawl that night.