May 19, 2007
Women's Volleyball Travels to Europe

Day 11 - May 19 - Kristin Rinne's Blog
Day 10 - May 18 - Megan Pollard's Blog
Day 9 - May 17 - Devon West's Blog
Day 8 - May 16 - Rachel Bonertz's Blog
Day 7 - May 15 - Ashley Scheible's Blog
Day 6 - May 14 - Kristin Wolf's Blog
Day 5 - May 13 - Meagen Tracey's Blog
Day 4 - May 12 - Nakia Thompson's Blog
Day 3 - May 11 - Brett Starbuck's Blog
Day 2 - May 10 - Jill Nyhof's Blog
Day 1 - May 9 - Laura Obert's Blog

European Blog #7 - Vienna, Austria - May 15 - Ashley Scheible

Today was a sad day because we had to leave the gorgeous Slovenia. But luckily we were headed to BEAUTIFUL Vienna! After a short 2 hour bus ride we arrived and were all wide eyed with all the pretty buildings that surrounded us. Although it was raining, it didn’t stop us from venturing the streets to see all the sites. We started off by seeing one of the most beautiful Theatre’s I have ever seen. The entrance had flames on either side so this immediately caught our eye. Then as we all slowly saw what was behind us all the cameras came out of our bags right away. It was this massive detailed building that the people of Austria called the “RatHaus”. Rumor has it, that there is a man that lives in the tall towers so he can ring the bells. All of us obviously thought it was the hunch back of Notre Dame. A little down the road was the Parliament. This, we found out, was one of the main places the United Nations meet. It was so detailed and was covered with sculptures. We walked on through the rain until we arrived to the underground. Our tour guide Brook gave Brett and me the challenge of getting her a ticket to ride on the underground. This task seemed almost impossible at first because the whole thing was in German, but 5 minutes later we found a small button the simply said “English” and it made the whole process much much faster. After a lovely ride on the underground we arrived in the center of Vienna. Here Brook showed us a beautiful palace. It reminded us all of the old movies we have seen walking through the courtyards in big poofy frilly dresses. Brett, Wolf, and I were privileged to see the 50th anniversary of the Austrian Military celebration. A nice young military member (with a very large gun) was nice enough to take some time out to explain everything to us. Our team then got to see St. Stephens Catholic Church. This is the main church in Vienna which is still active today. This was just simply breath taking. We all just stood in the middle with our jaws dropped and starred until we realized we wanted to take pictures so we could share with our families. We then found that pictures could just not do the huge masses of intricate sculptures justice. It was just amazing. After our tour through the town we all noticed the sculpting was all so detailed and had this wonderful gold trimming on it. Brook informed us that the same architect made all of the magnificent buildings in the town of Vienna, but when he went on to Budapest he lacked all the funding he once had in Vienna so unfortunately Budapest was not blessed with the same gold sculpting. Next was FREE TIME! Of course with 11 girls we all finally could go shopping. We got to experience Manner Chocolate factory which we were told was the best chocolate in Austria. Then we ventured to different stores to buy things for our families and some odds and ends for ourselves. After a long day of shopping we got to sit down for a nice dinner. Oddly though, it started out with some PANCAKE soup. That’s right I said it, pancake soup. It had long thin strips of pancakes in a soup broth. We all shrugged off how odd this was for us and ate it anyway. After this long exciting day, it was time for bed and to see what the next day held for us.