Travel up the beautiful blue Danube.

“Travel early and often. Live abroad if you can. Understand cultures other than your own. As your understanding of other cultures increases, you’re understanding of your self and your own culture will increase exponentially.”  TomFrestonAfter a lovely introduction to part of Europe and a wonderful day parading about Budapest we press forth! Away and up river lies our destination and we will find it with a laid back leisurely putt putt while we indulge ourselves with naps, fine food, and lovely entertainment. So much so it would make a Ancient Greek celebrating Dionysius blush. It becomes so incredibly clear why rich people with more money than sense get boats and putt about. From the party yachts of Caligula to the party yachts of pretty boy Leonardo DiCaprio, of which I assume similar acts take place upon, it would appear the best way to travel and indulge oneself. While drinking and partying to the excess of the previous mentioned might not float our boat so to speak we are finding the trip rather agreeable in a sense that connects you back to a basic human thread causing you to pause and breath in life. Even just two days in it becomes clear how quickly one is able to become so caught up with “life” in this case referring to work and plans for the future, school for Alex and general worry as we set plans in motion to to track our lives for years to come, you overlook “life” in the right now and here. At a pace akin to a Sunday walk, with no easy means to change the course we’ve placed ourselves for the next two weeks and after the familiar anxiety of trying to plan and think of what you must or need to do, you take a breath and realize sometimes the best part of life is doing nothing but being here, where ever that is, just alive. There are deep rooted differences between life in Europe at least in the areas I’ve traveled previously and where we are traveling now and life in America. The labels of past expansion to the “New World” from here the “Old World” fit still today it would seem as the way of life here and the way of life back home seem polar. Then again my perspective is most certainly not universal, but it is mine. There is great truth in the quote with today’s post. Interesting and incredible clarity comes with self discovery you can only find by placing yourself in different settings. From culture to langue to basic differences in human personalities or people who will debate different opinions contrary to your own and which on this boat we are graced with a plethora. It tantalizes my appetite of what’s to come as even as I myself have traveled before this experience, now older, no longer alone and married in fact, traveling with my wife (still weird to say) and by methods I couldn’t have dreamed of I’m my younger years this will prove to be something nearly unfathomable to predict and Alex and I can’t wait to continue. They continue to feed us excessively! We indulge them of course, to not be rude, and imbibe ferociously trying to find the bottom of our glasses. They have live music in the afternoon in the lounge and each evening which we have made a habit of attending. We have had good fun being sociable and informal with the staff whom are so professional it makes you feel like a Brit in one of the old imperialist films, in other words they are too nice and it makes us feel funny so we joke around with them as being pampered upon to this extent is unfamiliar. All the “Mr. Martins” seems unnatural and I love ever bit of it. Today we travel upriver most of the day and will arrive in Vienna tonight around 7pm in time to go to a Mozart and Strauss concert. We had a fire drill this morning which was interesting as we got to a late start on our breakfast and I took my coffee and pastry upon the top deck in my life vest. This afternoon we are attending a talk outlining and reviewing optional excursions to which we’ve signed up on nearly everyone and following that we will be having a Hungarian tea time during a presentation where they will be showing the traditional method of making apple strudel. This continues to be incredible in every way.