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Vienna In Vienna I mostly just walked around and took pictures nothing really too exciting. This was my first stop after the Tour so I was still taking it easy. Also it was extra hot here so I barely got around so see a whole lot. Bratislava I got off the FlixBus in Bratislava and after finding my way out of the station I was in awe. You walk right into the old town area it's great to see all the old buildings. Many areas would use some work and repair but it's still a nice little area. I eventually found my hostel, they didn't make it easy to find. Got settled down. Then I took a walk around to see nearly everything I marked up on my map. Almost literally everything. The old town isn't as big as I had thought. After about an hour & half I had seen most of it. At the hotel they mentioned a free tour so I headed back to the meeting point in a rush so I wouldn't miss it. I ended up 10 min early, again. Small area, that I was just now starting to realize. Then the tour began. Fit was a free tour and I'm sure it's being done by people who are still learning so even though it wasn't the most informative or creative tour it was still interesting. After I believe I headed in search of food. Found a place and sat down. Thankfully they had pictures. I picked one that looked good but that I was hoping was not too filling and dove in. Little did I know filling food was the only kind of food you can find here. I got a start with a soup which was somehow still good to someone who isn't supper keen on soups. While eating talked with another person, Alessio, there on vacation. After mentioned some things he had still wanted to take a look at, some places I had yet to see, so we headed out to round up the local sights. Most of the rest of the sights were in the old town area. One place we went to was the Bratislava Castle. It was later in the day so we couldn't go inside but were able to walk the grounds and take some cool pictures of the cityscape. And the weather wasn't so bad by then so it was good. On the way there we did, or at least mostly me, manage to almost get ran over by a tram. Those things are crazy quiet. Luckily Alessio realized it and kept me alive. And again the next day when it almost happened another few times while we were out and about. On the way back to our hostels, while walking through old in the crowds we were approached by some girl about going to a strip club. She quickly got turned down from Alessio with a no as we separated though the crowd. I on the other hand, went the ignore route when she b-lined it to me. Which didn't work so well. Eventually she requested a yes or no so I gave her a no. Later he would told me he read up about that and if your mean to the girl they have someone "rough you up". He would also later call that our girlfriend and we would purposefully avoid that area the rest of the time. It just seemed safer. We soon called it a night after a few more pictures and headed to our hostels. I woke up a bit early as is usual for me in a hostel. Even though people tend to come in at all hours of the night and make noise when they stumble into bed. I headed out early to grab some pictures and get out of the hot hostel room. Then I sat by a fountain for a little while and rested for a bit. Eventually I messaged Alessio and asked if he was still planning on heading up to the castle. Shortly after I got a message saying he was already there and was waiting for me cause it was opening at 10 am. I think something was lost in translation when we talked about it the night before but that is fairly typical for me when tired, sometimes barely being conscious of the conversation i’m in. Sorry man! With that I decided to rush over to try and make the 15 min journey in about 10 minutes. Which would be so bad if it wasn't all uphill and I was of course lacking sleep. But I made it. Drenched in sweat but I made it! I met up with him, we got our tickets and headed inside. The castle itself wasn't exactly the greatest. It has been near completely remodeled which took much of the excitement out of it. After words he had some other activities planned that he wanted to do. Which I thought was great because I didn't really have any plans and welcomed the change to see how someone else vacations. We next headed to the Bratislava Zoo. Alessio said he always visits the Zoo in a new city a new city because he loved the animals. A little confused at how to get there he asked someone in one of the offices at the station where we can get tickets and she said we could buy tickets on the train. So as we saw the bus we needed ready to take off we ran over and jumped on. But became instantly confused when we couldn't find a way to buy tickets. So we just jumped off at the next station and started walking still very confused and cursing the local transit system. Never finding a taxi we eventually made it to the next station. Where we found a ticket box we had seen before but this time Alessio figured it out. You buy tickets based on how long your going to be on the bus. So we started buying tickets for future trips because these boxes were far and few between. After one transfer. We had made it to the Zoo. Unfortunately. They had a few empty cages and because of the intense heat many weren't out to play. Which was a bit of a bummer. The main killer thought was probably all the hills and confusing paths there. We were a little defeated but headed onto the next adventure.  Next stop Devín Castle in Devín. It is a bit of a trip from Bratislava but we made it. Mean while on our long ride though casual Instagram stalking came to find out we quite a few similar interests. I had us get off a little early which meant hills and torchorous death to our bodies. Alessio refueled with a (dessert dish) at a restaurant then we were on our way. The castle itself was mostly destroyed but you can get some good views on the way to the top. Steps steps and more steps, maybe we didn't think it through it too much. But at the top it was nice, it was worth it for the views. Then back down we went and walked around the base of the castle which borders the Danube river. Alessio was determined to touch the longest river in Europe so we walked a bit farther down so we were sure we were far enough away from another river that feeds in and off he went down the slope and mission completed, Alessio touched the Danube the longest river in Europe. 2nd longest in the world he told me. I missed getting a photo for him as proof of his accomplishment so I tried to take a video of his scaling the slope which ended up being easier than expected. Also I didn't capture all of his cheer because you know I don't know how to take video much less video of people.  Off we went back to old town to get some surprising cheap grub. I got the meal that he had the night before when we met as he said I needed to try and I had passed up trying some of his and luckily it was a smaller dish because wow it is insanely filling. He said it's all the fat in it. I still don't really know what it was except mine had sheep cheese (I think his was from goat) and amazing bacon. Every time we sat down to eat I started yawning. Which made me feel like a jerk because to me that's almost like saying I'm bored with the dude. But then maybe everyone is used to it because i'm sure i do it a lot. But rather I was just running on little sleep, the heat is killer, and the food while good was just insanely filling and soo much of it.  The next morning waited till i had to checkout then wandered around town got a green machine juice from a juice place then headed up to a WW2 Monument. It Was a bit of a trek. Up hill of course. But eventually i made it. I rested for a while. Headed Back down. Got a skewer then picked up my luggage from the old hostel, checked into the new one. That Head AC did some laundry and called it a night. The next day stayed until checkout headed to the bus station and off to Vienna Airport to wait for my flight that night around 8pm. I initially wanted the most amount of time so i could see more. That's why i chose the later flight. A delay or 2 later I was on the flight back to London. Got to the hotel around midnight and crashed.  Then in the morning woke up organized my stuff and off the the airport for my flight home.
More delays on the flight to Montreal so that when we landed in Montreal I had 30 minutes to make it to my flight. Little did i know that aside from being an insane walk i also had to pass through security and TSA and US Customs. Ya i was confused but insanely tired and just rushed though it all. Made it to San Francisco then a sleepy ride and I was home.
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