Austria – Kelsi's Travel Times

The End of an Adventure

My German friends that I was able to see one last time before leaving.

As I write this, (or at least the beginning of it because my laptop will probably die before I finish) I’m sitting in the Airport in Amsterdam waiting for my next flight which will take me home to Canada. I’m finally going home with the intention to stay, as far as I know at least. I first left for Austria 13 months ago and it has been a whirlwind of a year. The first few months were still “normal life” while I was there, but since last March the program of this trip has been constantly changed and redirected because of Corona (of course).

My crew from the last month with a snowman we made, affectionately named “Thicck Rick”

I decided to leave now because the center where I’ve been volunteering in Austria, Tauernhof, found out that they would have to remain closed for at least a few more months. And because I didn’t want to spend another few months in relative isolation in Austria I came to the conclusion that it was the best thing for me to come home. I have a lot of peace about this decision, probably because it’s not totally unexpected, but of course this isn’t exactly how I would’ve hoped my time here would end. With that being said though, I was actually able to say goodbye to many of my friends yesterday before leaving and that was a huge blessing for me and definitely gave me a degree of closure.

Mya and I at the train station in Schladming

I started my travels home yesterday when I took the morning train from Austria to Munich. After a tearful goodbye to a few of my friends in Schladming, I wasn’t really feeling the best about the whole situation, but in Munich I got a surprise visit that cheered me up a lot. Well, actually at first it terrified me, because my friend Marianne thought that it would be super funny to come up behind me, grab one of my bags, and try to run away with it. Of course at first I panicked because she was wearing a hat and mask and was completely unrecognizable, but once she pulled her mask down and hugged me my terror faded into joy at being able to see her. I had planned to take one more train from Munich to Ingolstadt, where I had made arrangements stay for the night. But Marianne had come to the station with a car so I ended up unexpectedly getting to drive the rest of the way with her, which was obviously much preferable to trying to haul all of my heavy luggage on and off another train.

Marianne and I on the way to Paul’s place

We then drove to my friend Paul’s house where we would both stay the night. I worked with Paul in the kitchen at Tauernhof, but interestingly I actually knew his older sister before ever meeting him because she was one of my roommates when I was at Bible School in Sweden. Small world. We spent part of the afternoon just talking and getting caught up before driving to an open parking lot where we would meet the rest of my friends who were volunteer staff at Tauernhof this season. They had all found out that I would stay one night in Germany before flying out and insisted on coming to stay goodbye which of course I was very happy about. So we were able to go for a walk in the countryside near where Paul lives, broken up into groups of two or three at a time to at least some semblance of social distancing. It was so awesome for me to get to see them one last time and say goodbye. Because when they all left for Christmas break we thought that we would be seeing each other again in a few weeks so we didn’t really say goodbye.

Rebecca, me and Mia. These girls have been my besties for the last few months!

Unfortunately most of them couldn’t stay for too long because they had to be home before their community curfews at 8pm and had to drive a ways. But it was nice to see them even for a little while. After they all left, Paul, Marianne and I went back to Paul’s house and played some games. Then we had dinner and watched a movie before going to bed pretty early because we knew we’d have to be awake again in a few hours.

At 3:15am my alarm went off to wake me up and by 4am Paul and I were headed out the door to the airport. I’m so thankful for friends who are willing to wake up that early to drive me to an airport an hour away. Otherwise I would have to stress a lot more about transportation. We were at the airport by just after 5am. The check in desk opened shortly after we got there and it was pretty easy from there. I had to pay extra for an overweight bag which was sucky though not unexpected, but on the bright side, I was able to check my carry on suitcase for free right from the desk instead of hauling it all over the airport with me.

Right before security I said goodbye to Paul and pretty much just breezed through from there. The airport was not busy at all that early in the morning so there was no one else in line for security. I was at my gate an hour early so I called a friend and took a nap before boarding. The flight from Munich to Amsterdam was about 2 hours and I slept the whole way.

Now as I said, I’m sitting at my gate in Amsterdam waiting to board which will likely not be for another hour or so yet. And look at that my laptop is still alive! I still won’t publish this post until later though, because I want to add a few pictures and I can’t do that until I get home because my phone is being silly and won’t connect to the WiFi here. So that means that if you’re reading this, I’m back on Canadian soil and have been for awhile!

Since this is the end of my time here in Europe, (for now) I won’t be using this platform much anymore – at least not till I plan my next trip. If you’ve been following along in my journey, you know how strange it’s been, but thanks for sticking with me and I hope to see you soon!

Time off in Austria

The view from the top of the ski hill that I live beside

In my last post I gave a little update on what my Christmas and New Years plans were going to look like as far as I knew. I was still waiting on a Visa to stay in country and waiting to hear more about whether or not our season would be able to go forward. Since then I have gotten my visa which is great because it gives me lot more freedom to leave when/if I want to, but things regarding my job here are still a bit uncertain as the restrictions in Germany and Austria remain in place. This means that we can’t start our programs yet and probably can’t for awhile yet and so I’m currently on the fence about whether it’s the best thing for me to stay here and keep waiting, or if I should just head home when it’s possible.

I’ll post another update when I get that all figured out, but for now I mostly want to just tell a bit about my last few weeks and show some cool pictures of the area where I’ve been living for the last while.

Most of my crew for the last month. Zach and Bree (from canada) and Merr (from Romania) On a walk up in the mountains on my birthday.

Christmas this year was a bit different to how I would have normally spent Christmas if I was at home, but I guess in some ways it also held some similarities to the last two Christmases that I also spent away from home. I was able to spend Christmas with a family that lives here in Schladming that I know because they work at the school here. With their four kids and a mix of German and American traditions, it definitely felt a bit more like home. My family usually celebrates with a mix of traditions as well so lots of the things that they did (for example, opening gifts on Christmas Eve) were very familiar to me. On Christmas morning we had sweet rolls (like a different version of cinnamon buns) and homemade eggnog which was delicious. After breakfast the rest of the morning was spent just playing games with the kids and chatting and such. It was relaxed but wonderful to spend Christmas with a family.

The days between Christmas and New Years were good as well. I had my first few ski days which were really fun and an awesome way to pass some of this endless free time. On New Years Eve I celebrated my twentieth birthday with pancakes, pizza, friends and a beautiful walk up in the mountains. Definitely the most low key birthday I’ve had in awhile but it was really enjoyable nonetheless. We ended the year off by watching a movie until midnight and then watching fireworks from our balcony. It’s a perfect vantage point because the main building here is one of the tallest in the area and has a wrap around balcony that allowed us to see fireworks all over the city which was super cool! My friend Mira also came to visit on New Years Eve and she’s been here since then. I’ve really enjoyed having a roommate again and the constant company that she’s provided!

Mira and I on the top of Planai (the ski hill)

The days since New Years have been a very relaxed cycle of skiing, reading, going on walks and playing a lot of games. There are currently five of us living at the center which isn’t much but it is nice to have a little bit of company. Other than those activities we haven’t done much because everything is still closed. We’ve been to church in Salzburg on Sundays and this last week we went to an open air Skating rink while we were in the city which was really nice!

This is the daughter of a family who lives on campus and she’s been my little pal these last couple weeks! Skating in Salzburg.

Ski day with Mira. The clouds were so cool in the valley, it looked like you could just ski off the edge of the mountain and continue right onto the clouds.

A lot of people that I’ve talked to lately have been pretty curious about how skiing here works since everything else is closed. It is also interesting to me that skiing is something that the government considers necessary to be open but I’m definitely not complaining. There are restrictions with how many people can be on a hill at a time, but with the lack of tourists here they’ve never reached capacity. You also have to wear a medical grade mask in the lifts, lift stations, gondola, bathrooms and anytime you’re waiting in life. They are really strict about enforcing it which is really good to see. Those are the main two things that allow them to keep the lifts open but I guess it does make sense to me that they can stay open because it’s really easy to social distance while skiing and it’s really nice for locals to have something to do during this quarantine time. I know I’m definitely taking advantage of this!

Mira and I on Reiteralm, which is 2 ski hills over. We went there to watch the world cup ski cross races happening there on January 9th and 10th.

So for the most part that’s what I’ve been up to lately, and just trying to get things figured out as whether I’m gonna stay here or head home. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this small update about my last bit of time here. I also want to put some pictures in here of the town of Schladming where I’ve been living for the last while, so if you’re interested to see what an Austrian tourist town looks like, then keep scrolling!

This is a picture of one of the more expensive hotels in Schladming, how it looks from the valley.

This is the lecture hall here on the Tauernhof campus.

A view from the valley of one of the ski hills, Hochwurzen which we can see from the school.

One of the main streets in Schladming leading to the square.

The white church is one of the two old church buildings in Schladming

This picture I think needs some explanation. So these are called Krampus and basically it’s just people dressed up who run around in the beginning of December with bells and whips in the town squares. They legitimately chase you and smack you with branches or whips if you get too close. They wear bells so you can hear them coming. It’s actually terrifying to be anywhere in town when you know they are there but the local kids think it’s really funny to hang around and get chased by them, so to each his own I guess.

A sunset view of Schladming from the climbing tower on campus here.

A view from a popular walking trail beside Schladming

Still in Austria?

It’s been a hot minute since I last sent out any updates, so here’s a small part of what I’ve been up to the last while!

My last few months have been eventful to say the least. With a busy bible school schedule and adapting to new Covid rules, it’s been a pretty unpredictable the whole time. The first 6 weeks after having my appendix out had to be pretty lowkey because I couldn’t do anything too strenuous, but since then I have been able to do more normal things again which has been really nice.

Our schedule had to change a bit when Covid regulations got tighter here, for example we couldn’t have any guest speakers coming into the school anymore, and a community curfew affected certain activities that we could do in the evenings. But overall it was super cool that we could continue with our programs for the most part unchanged, because most of the other hotel/retreat center facilities in our part of Austria had to close. We also had to be a lot more careful about wearing masks during work and when we came in contact with anyone outside the “bubble” of our school.

So for the most part I just want to tell about a few different activities and hikes that we’ve done in the last few weeks with some photos included. I could also tell more about work and stuff, but none of that has changed too much except with a few new rules, so I decided to stick to the few things that are likely to be a bit more interesting.

The first really active thing that I did after getting my appendix out was a walk/ hike up to a waterfall with my friends Johann and Emma. It was about three hours up to the top, more of a long walk then a hike, and really fun because we were just chatting the whole time and it was really great to finally do something active! When we started walking it was super sunny, but once we got a bit higher up we were in the shade behind the mountains so at some point it was pretty cold and frosty, but it definitely made for some cool pictures!

There are some parts of the valley that never get any sun during this part of the year so there was really thick frost in a lot of places

Once we got up to the top we stayed up there for awhile and had some lunch and admired the waterfalls, it was freezing up there but luckily we could get a ride back down to the school from one of the staff. It was overall a super fun day!

You can’t see the whole waterfall but it was really beautiful!

A few weekends later we went on a different hike, one that I’ve been on before with another friend of mine. It was definitely a bit more difficult than the last one, but still super enjoyable so I’ll put some pictures in here, it was such a beautiful day!

Have to be a little bit Canadian and build inukshuks when I find flat rocks!!

We spent a lot of time at the top trying to walk up this creek without cracking the ice, it was slippery but very fun!

Next adventure type thing that we did was take a day trip to Salzburg. We went as a group of five people and just walked around the city for most of the day, walking to see a bunch of the different tourist spots in the city and just admiring the old architecture and seeing a few different things. Mostly everything was closed because of Covid but we could still go into a few churches and old buildings which was really cool. It’s hard to believe I’ve been in Austria for so long and living so close to Salzburg and I’d never really spent much time there until now, but at least I got there eventually and could enjoy spending the day there with my friends! I could try to write some more details about our day, but since pretty much everything was closed, I think our day in Salzburg would be best told in pictures. So here’s a bunch of pictures from our day , most of them were taken by my friend Emma with her Camera so they are actually nice!

These are the Bastions Gardens outside the Mirabell Palace. It’s really beautiful, they still have flowers even though these were taken in December!

A super cool view of the Castle taken from one of the many bridges in the city that crosses the Salzach River.

This is the group I was in Salzburg with: Ruth, Emma, Mikayla, Johann and I

The Hohensalzburg (upper Salzburg) Fortress. Unfortunately it’s closed right now because of Covid but it’s still beautiful and you can see it from a lot of different places in the downtown of the city!

Pictures definitely do not do it justice but this is inside the cathedral, there were so many beautiful paintings on the walls and ceilings. One of my favourite things to do in older cities is visit old churches so this was super cool for me!

In the summer this is a pretty cool fountain, but it was pretty frozen while we were there. The paintings are still cool though!

Even though there aren’t Christmas markets this year because of Covid, I thought it was pretty cool that they still put up the Christmas decorations throughout the city!

So those were the more exciting events of my last few months here. Despite all the previous and new Covid restrictions it’s amazing that we could still run our Bible school and that I could be here! It’s really crazy to me that this fall season here is already at an end, I feel like it flew by, but I’m also looking forward to what will come next even though I have pretty much no idea what that will be for me.

Trying to figure that out is slightly more complicated. When I first came to Austria my plan was to stay here one year, and since I started here last December that usually would have meant that I was home by now. But mid November I was asked to stay on staff here, and since I didn’t have plans as to what to do when I came home, I decided to say yes and stay here until this April. Things since then have gotten more and more complicated. At first I had planned to still go home for Christmas, but due to cancelled flights and difficulty rebooking I figured it would just be easier for me to stay here or stay in Germany with a friend of mine.

After those plans fell through the Austrian government decided to keep borders closed to winter tourism until January 10th which would meant that I would have to stay in Austria because of the closed borders. Then last week they extended the closure again until January 24th, so I was planning to figure out a way to go to Germany to be with friends. But my visa expired on the 17th of December (which I didn’t really take into account), and so I can’t travel out of the country until I get my visa renewal, which is still in the process.

So long story short, I’m stuck in Austria for at least the next few weeks until I get my visa. Kinda unfortunate to be here over Christmas but there is a few people here that I can spend a bit of time with so I’m thankful for that! It’s also kinda cool to have so much time to myself during this season. This time alone has already given me a lot of opportunity to process these last months and this year in general, and the quietness of this Christmas season has also been a reminder to me of what this season is really about. I think taking the busyness and stress out of this season will definitely be a change for a lot of people – myself included – but it’s a good way to force us to focus on simplifying things for ourselves this year, and I really do think that is a good thing!

Hopefully you’ve enjoyed this little update about my last few months. If you have any suggestions of how I should occupy my next five weeks of what will essentially be a lot of me time, please let me know! I’ll obviously have a lot of free time so if you want to call me or send me an email, feel free! I’d love to hear from you.

Merry Christmas!

Saying Goodbye… To my Appendix

Ice cream: my food of choice pretty much this whole week

The last two weeks for me have been very different from the rest of my time here. Two Saturdays ago I had to have an emergency surgery to remove my appendix which was obviously pretty unexpected, so here is that story.

I started having pain in the lower right side of my stomach about two days before I went to the hospital, but at first when it started it wasn’t that bad so I just assumed maybe I had eaten something weird and it would go away on it’s own. It slowly got worse and worse over the next two days but it was still not so bad that I couldn’t work. I talked to my house mates about it and one of them told me that she was pretty sure it was my appendix, but I didn’t really want to go to the hospital so I just kept hoping it would go away.

By the time Saturday morning came however, it had gotten really bad really suddenly to the point where I could hardly stand so I decided (with the encouragement of my coworkers) that it was probably time to go to the hospital. I was nervous because of the language barrier and dealing with insurance and all those kinds of things and that’s the biggest reason it took me so long to go get checked out. They got me into an exam room in the hospital right away though due to Covid restrictions I wasn’t allowed to have anyone come with me at the beginning. The doctor came in and poked around my stomach a bit and told me that he was 95% sure that it was my appendix because of the degree of pain I was in and the location, but he wanted to do an ultrasound to be absolutely sure. His English was pretty good which was really helpful for me to be able to know what was going on.

He only did the ultrasound for about 30 seconds at which point he said that it was definitely my appendix and it needed to come out as soon as possible. He didn’t even finish the ultrasound, just called the surgeon and had the nurses start getting me ready for surgery. My friend Rebecca was allowed to come and see me before so that she could take my stuff with her and also to get instructions from the doctor as to what I would need for the next two days. I was really glad to have her there even for a few minutes because I knew she would be able to get everything sorted out for me with work and bringing the things I would need for after the surgery. So barely twenty minutes after going into the hospital I was taken upstairs for surgery. Luckily I hadn’t really eaten anything the day before or that morning so that made everything easier because they didn’t have to wait. The doctor told me after that it was good that we came when we did because if we had waited even another hour my appendix likely would have burst.

I went into surgery sometime around noon and woke up in recovery around three hours later, very sore, very tired and very doped up on painkillers. Everything is a little bit fuzzy from those first few hours of being awake. I think I was in recovery for about two hours before I was taken up to my room in the hospital. At some point I was able to call my family and tell them about it; I would have called them before but there would have been no point because the time change meant they were still sleeping at the point where I went into the hospital.

About 10 minutes after they took me to my room, my friend Johann came and brought the stuff I would need for a few days in the hospital which my roommates had packed up for me. They all wanted to come but I was only allowed to have one visitor per day for 30 minutes due to Covid. I think he was probably a bit confused because as soon as he came in I started bawling my eyes out for absolutely no reason. So when I say I was doped up on pain killers at that point, I really mean it. But we talked for awhile before the nurses kicked him out and it was nice to have some company for a bit.

I really don’t remember taking this picture to be honest but it was on my phone so I guess I did

The next two days that I was in the hospital were long and painful. I was really really sore which is normal of course, but it was also difficult to be somewhere where it’s hard to communicate with anyone. I was in a room with three other older ladies, only one of which spoke any English. And while they were really kind I also had a hard time understanding them because of their local dialect and so I couldn’t really talk to them much beyond very basic things. So both days I was really glad when Johann came to visit because then at least I had an hour where I wasn’t bored. I also slept a ton though because of the pain killers so it was okay even though I couldn’t do anything. I basically just read and napped and listened to audio books for those few days. Not the most interesting but I wasn’t up to much else.

The day after surgery, it’s hard to tell in the picture but my stomach was so so swollen for days afterwards

On Monday morning the doctor came and looked at the incisions and told me that I could go home that day if I wanted. He actually recommended that I stay a few more days so that I could have better painkillers but said that if I thought I was good enough I could go. In hindsight I definitely should have stayed longer because the first few days back at home were really difficult for me, but at the time I just wanted to not be in the hospital anymore so I went back to Tauernhof. One of my coworkers and one of the full time staff came to pick me up and I was really glad that my coworker, Ilka, was there because dealing with the insurance, banking and pharmacy stuff would have been even more of a nightmare without a native German speaker.

So after a few stops we were back at Tauernhof and I was pretty happy. Even though I couldn’t do anything by myself at first, even walking, I was happy to be back somewhere with people again. Basically the first three days I spent almost entirely in my room in my bed because I was still in a lot of pain. But I was really well taken care of by my housemates, other staff and students. That was the really amazing thing about this whole experience. Because I always had help when and how I needed it and they never made me feel like I was a burden on them even though I definitely was.

Pretty much the whole first week I needed help with every little thing, every little action just exhausted me and put me completely out of breath, but once I started feeling better it got better really quickly. This whole last week has been pretty good for me because even though I still had to rest lots, I was able to listen to the lectures with the students and spend a lot more time out of my room building back my endurance. On Wednesday I got the stitches out and all three cuts have healed really well, the only reason I wasn’t able to start work again mid week was because the biggest incision had a lot of bruising and formed a small hematoma so the doctor said I needed to wait a few more days.

Tomorrow or Monday I’m allowed to start work again and I’m really looking forward to it. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to do a full work day right off the bat because I still get tired really quickly with some things, but I’m sure I’ll figure out pretty quickly how much I can do.

So that is the adventure that was my last two weeks. Completely crazy, hard and unexpected but also a good time of rest and reset for which I’m really thankful

Hiking Photos

These last weeks have been pretty busy for me so much like with my previous post I’m just going to load some pictures from a couple of hikes that I’ve done with friends to give you an idea of what it looks like a bit more here in Austria!

#1 : To Duisitzkarsee

This was a small hike that I took with a friend of mine from my Bible school in Sweden, Rahel. This hike was about a 20 minute drive outside of Schladming where we both live right now. It was pretty chill and the view at the top was so beautiful!

The path up to the lake often went back and forth zigzagging through this waterfall which was really beautiful and so cool!

Our final destination with a beautiful view of the lake and surrounding mountains

#2 Scheichenspitze

This was a longer and more challenging hike that I did with four coworkers of mine. In total it took us about 6 hours from start to finish and the peak is at a height of 2667 m. You better believe it’s pretty hard to breathe at the top. We left for the hike around 6:30 in the morning, below the cloud line it was still a bit dark but as soon as we passed above the clouds it was so light!

You can’t see in this photo the place that we started our hike because it’s below the cloud line but this was taken after about a half hour of walking

Finally made it to the peak in somewhere around the 3 1/2 hour mark I think. Crystal, me and Amelie.

At the peak of most of these big hikes there is a cross. You can actually see this cross from Schladming down in the valley on a really clear day. But like, that view though!

Paul, Johann, me and Amelie representing that we are indeed all working at Tauernhof while admiring the view of the surrounding mountains. We actually were super fortunate with the weather on this hike. Though it was cold at the top I actually got a bit sunburnt throughout the day. We ended up being really glad that we went on that particular weekend because it snowed the weekend after and that would have made it impossible for us to do it without more equipment.

Starting the harder part of the decent. We basically spent 2 hours sliding down rock fields which is actually really really fun. The only downside is that my feet were so so sore by this point because I was wearing hiking shoes that didn’t fit me very well. (My good hikers are still in Canada because I’m dumb) You can kind of see the chain near the bottom of the picture that you can hold to help stabilize you on this first really steep part of the route, though it’s actually there more to help people climbing up than people going down.

We hiked down to the bottom of this ravine and then a bit further. The clearing that you can see in the middleish right side of the picture is kinda near where we ended our hike. The actual place would be a bit more to the right side, a bit further down from the clearing, behind the peak on the right. It took us about 2.5 hours to get down.

By the end of this hike we were all just wiped. We ended at the Gondola station for the Dachstein mountain where we ate traditional Austrian Kaiserschmarn for lunch around 1:30 and were picked up by friends!

If you look up to the 3 mountains in the top of this picture, the left most peak is Scheichenspitze which is where we hiked to. Because of the bad photo quality you can’t see the cross but I could see it very faintly when I took this photo. We started from a bit higher up so not right in the bottom of the valley but it was still quite a long ways .

Adventure Photos

Since being back in Austria I’ve taken 2 different day trips. Since it would take a really long time to write all the details about each one, I’ll just share photos from each of the days that will give you an accurate picture of what each day was all about!

Adventure #1 : Day in Hallstatt, Austria

Hallstatt is a small picturesque town about an hours drive from Tauernhof. I went there for a day with my friend Johann on one of our days off and it was super fun!

This is probably the most famous view of Hallstatt, it’s where all the tourist (us included) stop and take pictures and it’s the picture that’s on like every post card

Something that I found was really cool in the town is that most of the houses are painted bright colours and they nearly all have really great flower gardens in the front or huge garden boxes on the sides of their balconies which makes everything look so beautiful

Of course we have to goof off a bit so we tried on some funny hats and sunglasses at a little tourist shop off a side street

This is the main square of the town. We were really fortunate to be there on a day where there were really minimal tourists so it was really nice and quiet on the streets, even right in the middle of the town.

Being typical tourists at the popular viewpoint overlooking the town

This picture shows really well how the town is really built into the side of the mountain. So there are actually very few streets where you can drive in this part of the town because it is built so narrowly into the side of the mountain

So we spent the first part of the day until about 2:00 in Hallstatt, just walking through the streets and enjoying the view. By the time the afternoon came we had pretty much been through the town, (it isn’t very big) so we decided that we would use the rest of the day to find a lake within driving distance where we could go swimming.

The picture below is a lake about 20 minutes away from Hallstatt and we literally just searched for lakes on google maps until we found the closest one. We decided not to swim in the lake in Hallstatt because there were a lot of boats there and though there weren’t a ton of tourists there were still some so we wanted to find somewhere a bit quieter and more chill.

This lake was near the town of Bad Aussee, I’m not sure exactly sure where but it was in such a beautiful place. The picture absolutely does not do it justice because the whole area surrounding the lake was really beautiful. We swam out to the little dock that you can see in the bottom right side of the picture. The water was really really cold but luckily it was a warm day so you warmed up pretty much as soon as you got out of the water.

After a few hours of hanging out at that little beach we drove back to the school which was also a really nice drive through the Austrian mountains which are so green at this time of the year.

A picture taken from the car window which is why you can kinda see my reflection. But just focus on the beautiful mountain behind it 🙂

Adventure #2: Day trip to Venice

So this was probably our craziest idea because we literally planned it the day before. Venice is about a 4 hour drive from where we live so it was a really long day but totally worth it I think. I’ve wanted to go to Venice for a really long time. If you’d asked me for the last few years “what’s one place you’ve always wanted to go?” My answer would have been Venice. Now I guess I have to find a new answer to that question. I drove there with 4 of my co-workers and though it was really hot in Italy we had a good time there!

My co-workers that I went with: Crystal, Simon , Johann, Me and Hanna

This photo is from a little bit later in the day. The light got quite soft and pink and made for some really good pictures of the bigger, more open canals.

Of course there are no cars in Venice which leads me to wonder if there is gas stations for filling up your boat?

We passed this Canal on our way to find St. Marks square in the middle of the city.

Right as I was taking this picture there was a boat passing under the bridge that had a wedding party in it so everyone on the bridge was yelling and cheering.

Me, Crystal and Hanna right before we left the city in the evening

The Sunset light was so beautiful and makes all the buildings just glow in the craziest way because of the reflection off the water. It’s the coolest thing.

We left the city around 8:00 because we still had a 40 minute walk back to our car and then a 4 hour drive home. It was so cool to finally get to see Venice even if it was only for a day, I definitely want to go back there sometime when I can spend a few days there and see more of the city at a more relaxed pace. It’s a really unique place.

So those are a few pictures from my most recent day trips. Some thing that I LOVE about living in Europe is how close you are to so many cool different places. It gives such a unique option so see a lot of places even if you don’t have so much time or like me are fitting it into days off around a specific schedule. I’m excited to see where the next few months will take me!

I hope you enjoyed these pictures and as always feel free to send me a text on Facebook or whatsapp or send me an email if you want to know more about my time here in Austria.

Beginning of a New Season!

Our fall staff here at Tauernhof. Such a fun group!

It’s now almost a month since I’ve been back in Austria and so far it’s been really great! We are now pretty much at the end of the summer season here which means that this week is the last of the week long camps and we are now moving into the fall Bible School season. This group of people that have just arrived at Tauernhof will be here until December so it will be an interesting change in dynamic to go from having different guests every week to having long term guests here. I’m really looking forward to it!

The last month has definitely been really busy as I’ve been adjusting to life here again with different people, a different schedule and some different rules which had to be changed due to Covid. But this last week was really good as I finally felt more comfortable and less overwhelmed by so many new things that had changed since I was last here.

But now with students here it will be great to get to know them and have a more consistent family feel with people outside of the staff here. We also have new volunteers here now than we did in the summer. They’ve been here 2 weeks and I’m really glad that we are getting along super well so far, I’m really happy that I get along especially well with my 3 new housemates.

Housemates picture! Gwen, Mia, Rebecca and I

These next few weeks are all about learning new things for everyone here. For me it will be learning to work with a different team than I worked with for the last 8 months, for the new staff it will be learning their new roles and for the students it will be learning the new routines and the way we do things here. Some of the students who came from Canada (and a few other non European Countries) have had to be quarantined for the last few days here while waiting for the results of a Covid test that they took upon arrival. Thankfully today we found out that they all tested negative so they can join the rest of the students for regular activities which simplifies a lot of things.

This week the students will do a variety of outdoor kind of sporty activities such as hiking and climbing to bond them as a group before they start lectures and family groups and that sort of thing next week. For the staff this week its all about getting to know the students and making adjustments to our routine to prepare for this new season. So far its going really really well and I’m so excited for what these next twelve weeks will bring!

Stay tuned for some photos of recent adventures that I’ve had while here in Austria!

What’s Up Now?

In the last update that I sent out things were changing a little bit. Well, they have definitely changed more than a little bit to say the least. So I’ll just give a little picture of how these last few weeks have been for me, not necessarily that eventful, just with some unexpected things happening.

I’m staying in German right now at the house of one of my coworkers, where I’ve been for the last week and a half. When we left from Austria I don’t think that I or any of the other people that I was with expected that things would get this serious or change this fast. The majority of us thought that it would be no problem for us to return to Austria within 5 weeks as planned. This meant that I left most of my clothes and other possessions back in Austria and only brought with me the things that I would need for 5 weeks that I was planning to be in Germany.

Our last day at Tauernhof with all the volunteers, right before we left.

But as is pretty much common knowledge by now, the boarders between most European countries are now closed and it’s basically impossible to get through without being a citizen which I obviously am not. The closures happened the day after we left Austria so it ended up being a really good thing that we left when we did. As I mentioned previously I’m staying with a friend of mine, Johann, who I’ve been working with for the last few months, and his family in a small town near Karlsruhe, Germany. At first I thought that I would only stay here for a few days before going to stay with a different friend who lives nearby, but things haven’t exactly turned out the way that I thought.

Once we arrived in Germany we found out that because we were coming from Austria, we were supposed to be in quarantine for two weeks automatically. But since Johann had a slight cough, his doctor thought that it would be a good idea for him to get tested for the virus just in case. This was on Sunday and the test was scheduled for Thursday. On Monday we found out that some of the guests from Tauernhof had been diagnosed with the virus so that was enough to make it feel a little bit more real, but still we hoped that maybe we hadn’t actually had contact with whoever it was. On Wednesday however, we found out that some of the other staff had it, so it was pretty likely that we would have it as well since we all have such close contact all the time. When Thursday came he got the test done and on Friday we found out that the test came back positive.

None of us were that surprised because we had kinda expected it, but still, none of us had anything beyond mild symptoms. He had a cough and I had been a tiny bit congested for one day, but nothing serious. We definitely have been super fortunate that neither of us, nor anyone from his family have felt any of the severe symptoms that we’ve heard others are experiencing. Hopefully it stays that way. But since we got to his house and now for another few days we obviously have to be in isolation until we are sure we aren’t contagious anymore.

So what have we been occupying ourselves with for the last few days? Well to be honest, not that much. But I’ll give you a little run through of what a typical day has been looking like for us here.

Playing one of my favourite board games from home!

Pretty much every day since I’ve been here both Johann and I have been running on the weirdest sleep schedule ever. Sometime going to bed earlier if we’re tired or sometimes going to bed at 3am. In the morning we’ve been waking up at different times but whenever we wake up we usually just have been spending some time reading together in the morning. Lately it’s been the New Testament but other days it was a book or just whatever is on the News. Around 10:00 we usually eat breakfast, typical breakfast here is homemade bread with jam or Nutella or cream cheese. Basically whatever you choose.

After breakfast we have often been spending a good chunk of the rest of the morning just reading outside on their trampoline. The last few days it’s been a bit too cold but when it’s been warm enough, we’ve been out there. It’s just nice to be outside even staying in the yard, because we spend so much time inside right now. Usually we spend a few hours out there, sometimes reading the whole time, sometimes just chatting or taking a nap.

We look incredibly bored in this picture, but this is what most of our mornings look like

Around 2:00 we usually eat lunch with his family, since being here I’ve gotten to try lots of different traditional German foods and to be honest I don’t really know what most of them are called but there haven’t been any that I haven’t liked at this point. We helped Johann’s mom to make pretzels once which was super fun but we kinda sucked at it. But they still tasted good so that’s what counts!

In the afternoons we do a variety of things. Sometimes just spending more time outside, sometimes playing pool, darts or ping-pong, passing a volleyball or football around or playing basketball outside. It’s a little different every day but a lot of the same activities and it’s usually pretty relaxed. In the later afternoon and evening we usually watch a movie or some episodes from a TV show. Sometimes we play a game, read a bit more or call friends or family. Always different depending on the day. Sometimes in there we eat dinner, sometimes we eat together with his family and sometimes its just everyone kinda makes their own thing.

So that’s kinda what our very chill quarantine life looks like right now. Even though we have been in quarantine for 2 full weeks already, we still had to stay mostly in the house until yesterday because that’s the official two weeks since Johann was tested. And I guess the only thing really left to tell is what is coming next for me?

Well the answer to that question is still a bit unsure. As of right now I will probably be staying at Johann’s house until this Saturday before I’ll go to stay with a different friend of mine who lives pretty nearby. More long term I think that I will probably need to be heading home in the next few weeks here. At this point I won’t be able to go back to work in Austria for at least 12 weeks, possibly more and so I’ll probably end up coming home. Nothing is really set in stone yet but I’m checking for a few flights which are available and not crazy expensive which can be a bit hard to find right now. But for right now I’ll kinda just be hopping around to a few different friends and focus on being able to enjoy the time with them!

Feel free to shoot me and email or a text to let me know how you’re doing! I’d really love to hear from you:)

February and the Unexpected

Has it been a hot minute since I last sent out an update? Yes it has. And I could blame it on the busy schedule that we have, but to be honest it mostly comes down to poor time management on my part. But here I am, to let you know what I’ve been up to in the last month so that you know that I’ve been doing well! There are some big things changing for me around here, but more about that later.

With the more routine things first, the work I’ve been doing here is still going great. When I first came here I wondered if I would be bored after a few months of the same jobs every day, but so far I can’t say that I’ve ever been really bored in the last 3 months. There is always new things to learn and new people to talk to. Working in the kitchen there is always opportunity to learn new skills when you ask the right questions and also to learn new German words and phrases that make it easier to live in a German environment.

Even to do the more chill jobs like cutting vegetables or washing dishes is made fun by my coworkers and the hilarious conversations that we have daily. Despite language barriers that sometimes come up we still somehow manage to make fun of each other and constantly roast each other. Sometimes the language difference makes it even funnier when you try to translate something directly and it has a completely different meaning in the other language. It definitely keeps things interesting.

A beautiful sunset we had a few weeks ago!

We (and as “we” I generally mean the other volunteers that I live with) are often able to find different and interesting ways to spend free afternoons and evenings. Sometimes we get the chance to hang out at the houses of the permanent staff, for example, the Bible school principal who invited us over to his house for a “bad taste party.” This just meant that everyone dressed up as crazy as they could, with combinations of pattern and style, to see who could look the most ridiculous.

It was a super fun evening of getting to spend time with each other outside of work. It pretty much just ended up being a big dance party. We played a few games and got to talk with each other but mostly just danced like crazy which is absolutely hilarious when the majority of us are not good dancers. At all.

Do we look ridiculous? Yes. Do we know that? Yes.

Another fun thing that we did this month was have an outing with all of the staff. Unfortunately I don’t have any pictures from it but I’ll describe it anyways and you can use your imagination. What we did together was go ski touring, which I think is also sometimes called back country skiing, (but don’t quote me on that cause I might be wrong) up to a “Hut” in the mountains near where we live. The ski culture here also involves a lot of socializing in the huts which are basically just traditional restaurants that are often found at the top of ski slopes or trails. People generally go there to get traditional Austrian or German foods and usually a beer or schnapps as well, and that’s just a big and normal part of what you do when skiing here.

So with ski touring you take special light weight skis that have a different kind of binding and you can wear them with regular ski boots or special lighter ones. The bindings are special because when you are going up the mountain, the back of your binding isn’t clipped onto the ski. It lifts up so that you can lift your heel and walk normally. You also put “skins” on the bottom of your skis which prevent you from sliding backwards down the mountain which is very important. Then you basically just walk up the mountain with skis on your feet. You don’t really lift your whole foot with the ski, you just slide it along the snow so that you’re not working so hard and so that you can go faster and not lose your balance. It’s pretty exhausting because on the way up, you’re obviously going uphill the whole time. But I really really enjoyed doing it with such a big group of people, because even though it was my first time I had lots of people to give me tips and to chat with along the way.

The evening that we went on was actually beautiful. Cold but not freezing and snowing gently, just enough to be really pretty. None of us were really in a big hurry because the purpose of the activity was allowing us to have time together to socialize as a whole staff and we had a lot of fun and great conversations during the 2ish hours that we were walking. By the time we got to the top I was pretty tired and definitely had some massive blisters on my feet. But it ended up being totally worth it as we had an amazing dinner of spare ribs, potatoes, salad, bread and ice cream. We spent an awesome few hours just hanging out together with all the rest of the staff and their families.

Once we were done with dinner came the most fun part of the night, skiing down the slope that we had walked up earlier. To be honest I had been a bit nervous for this because it was really dark by the time we had to go down and the path was not lit up. We brought head lamps but they weren’t that bright so I was low-key scared of accidentally skiing off a cliff. Thankfully that didn’t happen and it was way less difficult than I expected. As we were with a group there was always someone to follow and some people had some super bright flashlights as well so that was helpful. It was super cool to ski in the dark in the middle of the forest. It was pretty quiet in the snow and generally just a really nice night for it so I enjoyed it so much!

This isn’t from our staff outing but I guess it’s mildly related because it’s still from skiing!

In the last few days and weeks we’ve also gotten the chance to do some really cool walks and spend a whole bunch of time outside. That’s something that I really love about our schedule here, we have most afternoons off so we have lots of opportunity to spend time outside and enjoy the area. I don’t have a ton of pictures but I’ll put in some of the ones I do have so you can see more of the beauty of this area!

The mountains in the beautiful town of Ramsau which is basically on the other side of the valley and up from Schladming. Many of our permanent staff live in Ramsau.

From a walk we took on a warmer, clear day that was absolutely beautiful!

So it’s definitely been an awesome last month, but now comes the changes that I mentioned earlier. It’s been very sudden, but we found out yesterday that due to the Coronavirus going around, Tauernhof, (where I work) will be closing as of today, and that they plan to be closed for 5 weeks. Hopefully we will only be closed for that long and that we can reopen again for the spring school as planned, but at this point we have no idea how this is going to play out. The last group of guests left this morning so now there is only really only full time staff and volunteers left here. But the directors here have asked that if possible, any of the volunteer staff who are able to go home should go home.

Obviously that’s a bit more difficult for those of us who are coming from North America because flights are crazy expensive, limited, and run a high risk of being cancelled. So they are willing to make exceptions for us, but I’ve decided not to stay here anyways. I just don’t think that I would like to be here for 5 weeks with hardly anyone here and not being able to work. So the plan for me is that I will spend 5 weeks in Germany with friends from Tauernhof and from my bible school last year. God has been so faithful in providing many options for places for me to stay for these next weeks and I’m so grateful. The details aren’t planned out completely yet but I know at least where I will be for the first few weeks so that’s awesome.

The big question that remains for me is what will happen after those 5 weeks because no one really knows how this situation is going to play out. If after those weeks, they reopen Tauernhof, then I’ll return to work here for the rest of the year. If things haven’t settled out in those 5 weeks and they decide not to reopen, then the most likely thing for me would be to return home to Canada. It just wouldn’t super reasonable for me to continue to stay in Europe after that point unless I’m working or end up with a different reason to stay.

In the staff and with our guests this week we’ve talked this week about being able to let go of our fear because we know that God is in control. In the Bible it says “do not fear,” 365 times. Once for every day of the year and that includes this year even in the middle of so much panic. I have a lot of peace in knowing that God is in control of this situation and that we are doing everything that we can to be safe and sensible.

So I guess that’s all from me for now. I’ll do my best try to keep you in the loop of whats happening and how things are going for me. I’d also definitely love to hear from you so feel free to send me a text or email or even just comment on this post to get in touch with me:)

A picture from our last water fight in the kitchen yesterday. You can’t really see it, but we are soaked!

World Cup Night Race

This month has been really busy and fun and I can’t believe that it’s already been almost 2 months since I started work in Austria! I feel like it’s gone by so fast already and we are already almost a quarter of the way through the winter season.

This month we had some really interesting events in and around Schladming and did some fun things with the other staff. One of the main events that we got to see was the World cup night race for skiing that was held at the hill where we live. The race was on a Tuesday and the entire weekend leading up to it was absolutely crazy with people everywhere setting up stands and security and extra fences everywhere. The worst though was the day of the race because the streets were crowded and to get onto every different street or into any store you had to go through a security checkpoint. It was kinda a fun atmosphere because everyone was so excited but it was also sometimes really overwhelming. We live literally across the street from the base of the ski lift so it’s a VIP area and you needed a special pass you get in. This meant that every time we left the “zone” that we lived in, we had to bring passes with us so that we could get in and out of our street.

The snow before the race before it was really full

We didn’t have to work in the evening because many of the guests would want to watch the race from the side of the slope. We were welcome to join because we had the right pass for it. About an hour before the race we took a very circular route through a lot of security to climb right up to the side of the slopes. We had such a good view of the racers because we were pretty much at the highest point that you could watch the end of the race from. We watched the whole area fill up with people and the whole mood was so exciting and anticipating. It was also snowing pretty hard right before the race so it looked really beautiful under the stadium lights and everything was sparkly and lit up.

By the time the race started the area that we were standing was pretty full but thankfully not to crowded and it was so loud. People were cheering all the time so we couldn’t really hear the names or countries of the competitors. Luckily some of the people in our group had the roster on their phones so we could follow along and cheer for the appropriate countries, (basically including Germany, Austria and for me, Canada.) Of course most of the people in the crowd were supporting Austria so it got really loud when an Austrian competitor came down, but there was also some pretty good cheers for Germany and Switzerland as well. To be honest I couldn’t always understand what was happening because to me every competitor looked really similar but it was interesting to watch it with some of the ski instructors from Tauernhof because they were able to see differences in form and technique and explain it to me. Occasionally competitors would fall and it always looks so bad to me because they are going so crazy fast, but to be honest it also always looks kinda funny.

I was originally with a big group of the other staff from Tauernhof but only a few of us stayed right till the end of the first half of the race, so maybe about an hour and a half. The finals wouldn’t be until an hour later so we decided to go back home and watch the finals from the roof of Tauernhof which also has an amazing view of the slope. The other benefit of watching from the roof is that we could also see the start of the race on the screen and then watch the end out the window, all while staying warm. The TV was a few seconds behind the live race and we often could see the end of the race before the TV or hear the cheers before it came onto the screen.

There were 2 pretty crazy things that happened in the second half of the race which were really entertaining. The first was that a girl ran out of the crowd and across the finish line seconds before on of the competitors finished and set off the sensor for his finishing time. So when they put up his time (which was not legit because of the lady) he was so excited because the time that they had recorded would have put him in first. Once they figured out his actual time it was like third or something, but not first. The second thing was that there was a big upset for first place. The competitor from Austria who was ranked first in the first half was the one who was expected to win, and everyone was so hype to watch him. Because of his position he had the last run of the night, but really close to the start of the race he had a big fall and was disqualified. The Austrians were rioting. It was insane. We could here people shouting on the slopes and in the streets and people were being totally crazy. This meant that a guy from Norway won, which was a bit unexpected even though he was a strong competitor.

Totally unrelated picture but this is a picture of our kitchen volunteers:)

I went to bed pretty soon after the race but didn’t sleep very well because there is a club across from our campus that was really loud and busy that night. One big downside of the race was that there were tons and tons of drunk people everywhere so we kinda had to be careful of where we went in the evening and also had to be aware of making sure all the doors on our campus were locked and that our guests were aware of keeping their doors closed and not leaving out any ski equipment or anything. Things didn’t really start to calm down until about 6 in the morning and even then there was still people out in the streets and new crews of people who were there to help clean things up. By the end of the next day however, they had everything taken down and the city was really empty. It was almost a bit weird how fast it went from crazy to quiet but it was nice to not have to go through all that security.

I feel like the race came and went so fast but it was really cool to get to be a part of it. It’s something that I think will probably be a once in a lifetime thing for me because I’m not that interested in the ski races but it’s a really cool experience that feels very unique to this mountain area in Austria.

The next two weeks here I’m really excited for and one of the main reasons is that they are both being held in English. This week is a very international group and after meeting a few of them I think it’s going to be really fun and different from all of the other normal weeks.