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!
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!
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!
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!
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!
Kelsi's Travel Times 