Our trip to Vienna

We just got back from our trip to Vienna, Austria.  Mike was there giving a paper at the University during the Society of NT Studies Conference.  It was a working trip for him and I got to enjoy being the accompanying person and going on prescheduled tours with other spouses.  While there, I did get a much greater glimpse into what Mike does (and how little I understand it).  We had lunch and dinner each day in the building above, called the "Rathaus" or town hall.  There were around 300 NT scholars all very interested in discussing apocryphal gospels - it was as if they were all speaking a foreign language (and many of them literally were).  While there, the conference truly hosted us well.  We had a dinner and dance in the center of the town hall courtyard with a welcome from the Mayor of Vienna.  The next evening, we went to a winery and got to eat Austrian favorites, as well as sample wine grown in their vineyards.  

Here we are eating under the vines with grapes hanging down:

         

One of my favorite experiences was enjoying the Vienna coffee shops.  Here we are at Cafe Central, enjoying cafe melange, hot chocolate and sachertorte (chocolate cake with an apricot layer inside).

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We also visited the church in city center.  Check out the pulpit on the left of the picture.  It is guarded by a gate and is reached by a spiral staircase.  I think Mike secretly wants to preach from a pulpit like that.