Castles and Quaint towns

As we headed toward Vienna, it is funny to see all the castles appearing. Hey
Lincoln look at that castle and that one. All massive structures, located on tops of
mountains or into rocks. Who built these structures? How did they ever get
materials to these site? Was there a budget? How do I hire these people? We had issues building Lincoln's patio-hauling sand, pavers up a set of stairs transferring to a wheel barrow and manuevering over tree roots. No way building a fortress of such detail and magnitude would be easy.

I read about cute river towns. We headed off the highway and up along a scenic
route-Melk towards Spitz, Durnstein and Krems. These are charming river towns.
Towns on either side of the river. Have to make sure of the location of the
towns you want to ride through-no bridges. We were lucky.

The towns have heurigen. These are wine taverns. The vineyards are their
backyards and pine branches over the doorways indicate open. We wandered into
one. It is hard to enjoy these local taverns without speaking the language. All
german with no communication either way. We had a spritzer- wine with water.
Wines are white and since we were driving-and language barrier mostly- kept us
sober. Couldn't order so easily. Some patrons tried to talk with us-no idea.

We strolled around-nice bed and breakfast guest houses-would have been great to
experience- after a few minutes-very frustrating.

These side trips reinforce why renting a car is best option. On a train you are
scheduled and miss the non city adventures.

Off to Vienna at last...