Along the way; Vienna part 1

The travel from Helsinki was not as bad as expected with a four hour wait in Riga. The connection from the airport to the city was good and comfortable with the airport train. After that I was on my own and what could you expect fromme than to get lost while looking for my hostel. I even had a map for that. I eventually got to the Ruthensteiner (click), which was a pleasant, cosy hostel in a very nice location just a walking distance from the Westbahnhof.

So first things first, when visiting new places; checking out other life forms in the area. The Vienna zoo is a big zoo with big cages and very impressevely decorated yards for the animals. I have never seen most of the animals in their natural habitat but I guess they were happy (at least happier than in a simple concrete box). And a large variety of them; I kind of missed the monkeys, for they had only a few, but they made this up pretty well with pandas and penguins, both which I have never ever seen before. There's a lot of things to see, five hours was not enough to go all around it. I would say this is the best zoo I've ver been to.
One of my absolute favorite animals is the meerkat. If I ever get my own place I will just cover my floor with sand, fill it with these and throw in some heat lamps. I could watch them for hours. At least they actually do something and are quite interactive, as the pandas were just eating with their backs turned to the audience; therefor no pictures, because all of them are just of the back of their heads. Makes me believe even more that they are just some mythical creatures and those were just some guys sitting around in panda bear costumes.

How adorable can a baby elephant be?! Very. I've never seen penguins in my life (or if I have I'm sincerely sorry that I don't remember us meeting) and I was so excited to experience this. We also spotted the Madacasgar Penguins, apparently keeping their base here. Sorry to inform you Skipper, but your disguise is failing.

I really love how they put effort in presentating the animals (or at least some). I.e. there were these tubes going all around as pathways for the ants to run around from one cage to another and do their ant stuff.  For this, this place provides also great surroundings for some amateur photography.