Today we took a side trip to Slovakia and toured the Hapsburg imperial treasury in Vienna. We saw lots of old stuff. We learned lots of new facts. And we didn’t especially care about any of it. We are soooo ready to go home tomorrow.

Here are five tell-tale signs that you’re ready for your vacation to be over:

All you want to do is sleep. You don’t want to climb another 200 steps to see another thousand-year-old monument with great historical significance. You want to pass out in the back of the bus and drool on your spouse’s shoulder. Nothing is more precious than a nap at the end of a vacation.

“New adventures” become “irritating inconveniences.” Public washrooms that require coins, TVs that don’t speak English, and drinks that aren’t chilled almost have you in tears. You’d rather buy a stale sandwich at the hotel gift shop than figure out how to get downtown on the subway. You’re done.

Restaurant food makes you gag. No menu anywhere will satisfy you. You want a simple home-cooked meal piled high with vegetables accompanied by the biggest glass of ice water you can imagine. You’re tired of deliberately dehydrating yourself in order to avoid having to find a bathroom.

There’s a powerful stench coming from your suitcase. You pity the airport security official that chooses to pull your bag aside for a random check. You still have to figure out how to explain to your friend that you packed three pairs of your dirty socks inside the souvenir mug you bought her in London.

You can’t imagine ever wanting to get on another airplane. You wish you could just beam yourself home. You dread dealing with three flights, 19 hours of travelling and a nine-hour time change. You’re convinced that once you finally make it home, you will never want to leave again.

(You are wrong.)

Some of Vienna's greatest attractions are just outside the city proper. Chief among them, especially for royal history geeks like me, is Schonbrunn Palace, the former summer home of the Hapsburgs. The poor man's version of Versailles (it's only one-sixth the size of its French rival, but it still has 1,441 rooms), Schonbrunn was used by generations of Austrian emperors between the 17th and 20th centuries. We walked through 40 of the state rooms where Maria Teresa held court, one of which was where Kennedy and Kruschev met in 1961. Awesome.

We also took a tour of the Heilingenkreuz monastery that lies 30 minutes out of Vienna. Dating from the 12th century, Heilingenkreuz is the oldest continuously occupied Cistercian monastery in the world — 40 monks still live there today. We saw the cloisters, the cathedral, and the chapter house containing the tomb of the last Babenberg emperor. I'm not usually big on church tours, but this one was actually quite fascinating.

Other highlights of the day included a photo stop at Liechtenstein Castle (which is not actually in Liechtenstein, but is owned by the ruling family of Liechtenstein) and a drive-by view of the hunting lodge at Mayerling where Crown Prince Rudolf and his very young mistress were found dead in 1889. Good stuff.

One day left…

Our guide started the day with a story: in Europe, heaven is a place where police are British, mechanics are German, cooks are French, lovers are Italian, and everything is organized by the Swiss. (I should have been Swiss.) On the other hand, hell is where police are German, mechanics are French, cooks are British, lovers are Swiss and everything is organized by the Italians. Both our guide and our driver are Italian (!) but they're pretty good at keeping things organized, so I guess stereotypes don't always hold true.

They certainly need to be organized, because we covered an awful lot of Austria today. First we drove to Mondsee, where we toured the church that was used for the wedding scenes in The Sound of Music (we really should watch that movie someday). Then it was on to Melk, where we saw the famous Benedictine abbey. Originally founded in 1089, the present building dates from the early 18th century. Very impressive.

Melk is also where we began a short cruise down the Danube past beautiful forests, quaint villages, and the occasional medieval castle. The highlight for me was seeing the ruins of Durnstein Castle, where King Richard the Lionheart was held captive in 1193. Admittedly, it was just a bunch of rocks, but the history nerd in me found it pretty cool.

And at last we made it to Vienna! City tour tomorrow…

And I do mean in the clouds. Dense fog and steady rain plagued us all along the drive from Salzburg back across the German border to the compound known as Hitler’s Eagle’s Nest, 1800 metres up in the mountains. In nice weather, you can get amazing panoramic views of the Alps from the top; in the fog, we could barely see the trees 20 feet from the windows. Oh, well.

The Eagle’s Nest was the second most important Nazi command centre during WWII — this is where many of Hitler’s crucial decisions were made. The tunnel leading to the elevator and the elevator itself are still as they were in the 1940s, though the massive doors to the tunnel are missing a knob (it was presented to Eisenhower after the war). At the top, we saw the dining hall, the conference room, and the hallway leading to an outdoor terrace. The rooms themselves were a bit of a letdown; the original furniture is in a museum in Munich, so we were basically looking at empty spaces. But it was still a nice taste of history.

We also had a walking tour of Salzburg’s historic centre, but I spent most of it wishing we could just sit down somewhere and relax. I have no interest in either Mozart or The Sound of Music, so most of this town’s attractions are wasted on me. Besides, it was raining. And I’ve been here before. And I still have those toe blisters. Sigh.

To Vienna tomorrow…