I would like to start by apologising for my blogging slackness lately. With limited internet time I'm afraid it's low on priority list after finding a place to stay, checking that i haven't run out of money etc. Luckily it's 4.30am and the boys in my room snore so loudly I've found the perfect time to blog. Hurrah! No line for the computer, that's for sure.

Both Vienna and Bratislava were 2 night, 1 day stays. Vienna was beautiful. I stayed at Wombats Hostel which had great rooms, cheap internet and was unsurprisingly packed with Australians. I managed to meet two Canadian girls though and the next day we did a tourist walk that mainly consisted of us trying to see (not go inside of) all the major tourist attractions on a postcard we found. It worked really well but i have to confess that from now on whenever i smell horse shit i will think of Vienna. Lovely, huh? But there is a downside to that old-fashioned carriage ride. We also went to a free organ concert in a beautiful catholic church. The name of the church totally escapes me but it was very pretty. We also partook of the baby pink chain of dessert restuarants for afternoon tea. I finally had strudel in Austria and it was delicious.

Bratislava kind of sucked. I'm not sure exactly why. I think i'd hit a travellers wall or something. The hostel had gone for a festive and warm concrete motif which i think had something to do with it. I met two hard-core kiwi travellers and a Melbournian who works on Brunswick St who knows Em (or of Em). On the face of it i should have had a good time. On my first night we went for midnight drinks and castle-climbing (not as stupid as it sounds, we only got one beer before they kicked us out) and ended up in this tiny hole in the wall pub.I slept in, wandered around the main squares the next day and after some vigrous hand gesturing and a complete lack of Slovak/English communication I ended up with a ticket to a opera/choral/orchestra concert which turned out to be pretty amazing. Leigh (Melbourne guy) and I went to a movie and hung out and I left the next day. I truly don'tknow why I didn't like it all that much. It was definitely the dirtiest and most graffitied of all the cities I've been but it was also the cheapest. A pint of beer was less than $3. The people i met were great though and they've started a travel initiative about a travelling hoodie that you can read up on at www.Hoodelicious.blogspot.com

I am currently in Krakow. The only big city of Poland to remain relatively unscathed after WWII. I've met up with Fiona, an Irish girl I met in Budapest and we have been making our way through some pubs, cafes and restuarants as well as visiting the old Jewish Quarter, walking past the castle (that totally counts) and we're planning a visit to Auschwitz tomorrow. It should be interesting as well as utterly depressing and I probably won't blog again until the end of Prague (my next and last destination on my Eastern European sojourn). But for now, you're all up to date and I'm off to wake up the snoring Frenchman so I can get some sleep.