Today, I proudly introduce our first Guest Blogger and my good friend, John Seale. John is one of my frequent travel partners, from across Texas to the other side of the world (2 trips to Kenya). From Texas to Beyond is excited to bring you his unique perspectives on travel, along with some fascinating locations. In this four part series, John takes us to Vienna, Austria, after which he leaves the conventional European vacation behind with destinations in Kosovo and Albania.

My wife Katie and I planned nearly the perfect itinerary for a three-destination trip. The weak Euro was making European travel cheap, and the threat of terrorism was making Kenyan travel cheap, so we were combining a visit to my sister with a visit to a former ministry I volunteered with for years. Most of our long-hauls were overnights so we could sleep, and we even had a long layover in Chicago, where my wife has family.

The only problem was a long layover in Vienna, Austria. Unfortunately long, really – over 9 hours. I’ve done my fair share of long layovers in airports, and nobody likes them. Naturally, therefore, I started looking to see if it was enough time to have a valuable visit to this beautiful, historic city. Turns out, it was plenty of time, and I’m here now to share how we did it and how you can make it work on your long layover too. Continue reading