I woke up at around 8am and got ready to leave, packing up all my things once again. The host let me check-out an hour late at 11am so I took a quick nap on the couch after getting everything ready to go.
My bus back to Trieste, Italy was at 12:45pm so I went to, you guessed it, the hotel restaurant nearby. They’re most known for their breakfast so I had to try it for myself.
I ordered green tea and three other items on the menu. As a side note, I’ve begun to get in the habit of ordering too much food on this trip because the pricing throws me off and I feel like each dish is going to be smaller than it actually is. When everything came to the table, I was surprised by how much food it was. As expected, everything tasted great and I had to ask for two boxes to take the rest with me.
The bus came right on time and because the pharmacy had created an EU QR code with my negative test results, he was able to quickly scan the paper and let me onboard. I’ve been trying to see if there’s a way for me to get an EU Green Pass but unfortunately I think I’m stuck with my paper CDC card.
The bus ride from Rovinj to Trieste was a little under an hour and from there, I had 45 minutes to wait before catching the train to Udine.
I arrived in Udine after an hour and a half.
It was dark at this point and since there weren’t many people around, I felt slightly lost. I was able to navigate my way to the correct platform with 10 minutes to spare and boarded my last train of the day.
The train from Udine to Vienna was around 6 hours. I went to the restaurant car and there wasn’t anyone in there so I had my leftovers from breakfast. We had a slight delay waiting for a connecting train, so we didn’t arrive at the station in Vienna until a bit past midnight. This is where things got ✨ fun ✨
The hostel was not within walking distance, so I decided to take the trains that they suggested. It was going to be a quick 15 minute journey with one transfer. I checked Google Maps and it gave me the same route.
The first train arrived and I got onboard, but noticed that we weren’t following the route outlined in Google Maps. The final destination was the same, but things seemed off. I immediately got off at the next stop. At this point, I was a mile away from the hostel and walking through the cold at 12:30am did not sound like a fun time so I tried to find a different train.
After walking around the station aimlessly for 30 minutes and trying to connect to Wi-Fi, I noticed an option in Google Maps for something called Bolt. Similar to Uber and Lyft, it’s a rideshare app. Uber operates in Vienna but it wasn’t working for me and Lyft does not exist.
The Bolt app took forever to download and then I created my account and added my credit card only to find out that it wasn’t working. I tried with another card and ran into the same issue. Finally, I noticed that the app took cash and I luckily had enough euros left. I was making progress.
At this point, it was almost 1am. I ordered my ride and the driver was on the way, but then I ran into another problem. He didn’t know where I was and although I was walking around trying to follow his location on the map, he didn’t speak English and ended up cancelling the ride. I was having a wonderful time. I ordered another car and stood exactly where someone else had gotten picked up.
The driver showed up three minutes later and his trunk wouldn’t open. He eventually figured it out and helped me put my suitcase in. We were finally on the way to the hostel, I was out of the cold and no longer on a random street corner in Vienna, and I was exhausted.
After arriving at the hostel I checked in and headed up to the room, quietly trying to get everything situated without making too much noise. I paid extra for a room with a nice view and the city looked beautiful at night.
I headed downstairs to retell the story of my trip to a few friends and eat some snacks before going upstairs and getting ready for bed. I ended up going to sleep at around 4am, determined not to stray too far from my working schedule. It had been a long, long day but I was excited to be somewhere new.