Journey from Italy to Austria

I was super excited to finally be heading to Austria.  Even before my trip, I was looking forward to Austria much more than Italy, and by the end of my 9 days in Italy, I was ready to leave as the culture really just didn’t suit me.  I was constantly frustrated with the tardiness and relaxed lifestyle that I know Italians enjoy.  This is definitely just a conflict with my personality and there are many aspects of Italy that I thoroughly enjoyed and there are still many places I’d like to visit. Perhaps, one day when I’m older and don’t mind the slower pace of life as much…

After 9 days of dealing with Italian tardiness, I was very impressed with my first exposure to anything Austrian.  I had purchased tickets for a 9:40am bus from Venice to Villach and the doors of the bus closed exactly at 9:40am and we were pulling away from the curb a few seconds later.  I was already loving this Austrian punctuality!  And the bus driver was amazing as well – he had to speak 3 languages to us the whole time – Italian, German, and English.  There was hardly anyone on the bus and I knew that the next stop it would make wasn’t until we got closer to the Italian/Austrian border, so I was very thankful for the comfortable bus ride. 

After the 3 hour bus ride, we arrived at Villach where I had to change to a train.  The train ride between Villach and Salzburg had some of the prettiest scenery I had ever seen – lush green rolling hills with small villages at the foot of each hill.  I wish the train had windows that could open so I could have taken some pictures! 

The train arrived precisely at 3:50pm and half an hour later, I was already checked into my hotel and ready to start exploring Salzburg. 

This was one of the easiest travel days I had on my entire trip.