Tuesday, May 15, 2012 we toured Vienna.  We started with a tour of  the Scheonbrunn Palace where Marie Antionette lived (and the rest of the Austrian Royalty). It was beautiful, inside and out.  We also drove through Vienna and our tour guide did a great job of explaining everything that we went past, but I was too busy trying to look at everything... I should have taken notes, huh?  One of my favorite places was St Stephens Cathedral.
Then we had a couple of hours of free time to eat lunch and shop, before returning to our hotel to rest before our "farewell dinner".
Our dinner was at another farmhouse, a little ways outside the city limits. It was a beautiful drive, but when the bus driver dropped us off at the bottom of the hill and Ans told us it was "just a short walk" I'm sure more than a few of us were not sure that we could take another step.  But we did, and it was worth the walk.  We had the whole upstairs of the farmhouse/cottage/resturant to ourselves. We had a buffet style dinner, so we could try any of the local food we wanted too.  We also had our own entertainment... two guys sang to us (one played the guitar and the other the accordian).  It was great.
We left around 9:30 PM, since most of our group had a 3:00 AM wake-up call to leave for the airport at 4:00 AM.  The second group had to leave at 7:00 AM.  The last group left at 10:00 AM.  Luckily, Evelyn and I were part of the last group.
We made it to the airport in Vienna in plenty of time, but we were a little confused because our tickets said we were leaving on an Air France flight, but Air France France told us that we were flying Austrian Air.  We both loved Austrian Air... we had more room on this plane than any other plane that I have been on.
We arrived in Paris on time, but then the confusion started again.  First we had a hard time figuring out where we where and where we were supposed to go to catch the next flight.  We finally figured it out and after a lot of walking made it to our next gate.  While this plane, from Paris to Atlanta, was a huge 777, it was a "tight" fit for a long 9 and half hour flight. I think I'm going to stay away from any more "long" flights for awhile.
We finally made it to Atlanta, and that's when things started getting real crazy.  First we only had a little over an hour to catch our connecting flight to Jax.  Before we could do that we had to wait in a LONG line to go through Customs (they didn't care how soon your next flight was leaving).  Then we had to pick up our luggage to go through another Customs line. After waiting for every piece of luggage to go through, we realized that our luggage was MISSING.  It didn't make it to Atlanta.  They told us to go to Lost Luggage at the airport in JAX, to file a report.
In the meantime, we had to go from Terminal F to Terminal A to catch our JAX flight.  I didn't think that we'd make it in time, but we did. Of course, they closed the door right after we boarded the plane.
We finally made it to JAX... exhausted (after all, we'd been awake for 22 hours).  Scott picked us up at the airport, then I drove Evelyn home.
As soon as I got home, my puppies were happy to see me!  I said a quick hello and plugged in my cell phone to charge, because I was anxious to read the text message that Todd told me he would send as soon as they finished at the doctor's office.  Within 5 minutes, it was charged up enough that I could read Todd's message.... "Still at the doctors but we are having a baby boy!!!"