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Grunau, my home away from home and my restful holiday amongst the busy city adventures. It began with a scenic drive through the mountains and valleys which I tried desperately to stay awake (it had been a BIG last night in Vienna and I got very little sleep). Followed by a home cooked lunch of lasagne for lunch! Nevef again will I underestimate the importance and joy that home cooking brings! Our next guide and busdriver had days off so we headed uo the road to check out the archery. We made two teams and I was with Andy (an Aussie from Australia who worked at the hostel), Nathan the kiwi bus driver and Kieron, a fellow passenger. I managed to lose my arrow on the first official target and it ended up across the river stuck in a tree on the other side. Luckily it was Nathan to the rescue and only ended up with one very wet shoe for his efforts. My shots improved and our targets, which were styrofoam animal statues, began to feel the wrath of our arrows. Rabbit stew with bear dumplings was then on the dinner menu! :-)
I came back to the hostel
to revel in my single bedroom with ensuitd and balcony all to myself! So heavenly after 6 weeks of travelling in dorms. Not to mention that the view of the snow covered alps, lush green forests and bubbling glacial brook did wonders to my relaxation levels. That evening we sat down to another delicious home cooked meal and then I had to pay up. The second last round of archery we had a competition where the winner had to do 2 shots of apricot schnapps and the loser had to do 1. As I unfortunately lost and Nathan won, the boys all decided to reverse the original terms so I had to do 2 shots....haha luckily the apricot schnapps was rather nice if very powerful. We all headed down to the river to sit around the bonfire Nathan built and eat toasted mashmellows, yum!
The next morning we went for a horse ride along the river in the local town and around the chalets. The water was completely clear and very beautiful, but insanely cold as it comes from the glaciers off the mountains. The ride was enjoyable but mostly uneventful and afterwards we walked through town to see the shops, sample the icecream and we even looked through the local church and graveyard. Not something that would normally be amazing but Austrians know how to celebrate and decorate a graveyard. It was the prettiest graveyard I have ever seen. Each headstone or cross was made of black curly iron, decorated in an artistic way and then each grave had its own plot of flowers in front. Each grave was different but they were all full of flowers in full bloom, it was very beautiful. It felt like the lives of the people who had passed were celebrated by their well tended flower patch. Then began our long walk home, so to pass the time I collected a big bouquet of wild flowers. They are in full bloom everywhere in Grunau it is so amazing and looks like a post-card. We also saw a snake and a skydiver on the way back, so it was quite eventful.
Day three was a lazy morning spent gorging myself on vegemite for breakfast (provided by the hostel!), reading my book and drinking in the scenery, we met the new recruits off the bus and then Kat, Ben, Jedda and Ebony and I headed off on a big 36km bike ride to lake Almsee. After a few photo stops and bike and traffic misadvdntures Jedda and I arrived at the lake and had an icecream. Zfter a couple of minutes we reallised the others must have stopped earlier somewhere and we went back to find them. They had stopped just short of where the lake opens out so we sat around the bridge and waterway for a while to drink in the scenery and relax. The others opted for staying but I chose to go back to the end of the lake and do the walk around the otherside which got me better views of the mountains. It was a narrow track filled with bridges over clear streams and bright river rocks. There were a lot of elderly people walking the tracks around the lake and when it opened up, there was family picnics and lovers canoodling. It was a beautiful part of Grunau and I am glad I went back to further investigate the area. However it was then quite a long and tiring bike ride back to the hostel but I was rewarded with another home cooked meal.
My last full day I read another book (how relaxed is my life!) and then went off for a 3 hour trek to the waterfalls. I tried to ford the waterway but was mostly unsuccessful so I ended up taking off my shoes and wading across the absolutely freezing temperatures to the other side. It was quite refreshing! In the evening Jeddah, Ebony and I hung out with George and Aus-ti-an from the UK. That was how he introduced himself, but his name was really Austin, then began the banter back and forth between UK vs AUS. As we didn't settle our debates we decided to take it out to the tennis court outside and play it out. We played with more enthusism than skill but were somewhat happered by the fact we were then playing in the dark. :-)
We called it a tie when none of us could see the ball anymore and were aimlessly swinging the racket at bugs and headed in for a game of spoons (card game, slightly violent, but no one lost an eye this time). Then followed by jenga which turned into house building block competitions with only a few tears from the UK boys when their structure fell down by 'accident'. Haha I thoroughly enjoyed my 4 nights at Gerhards treehouse hostel and can see myself going back in the winter for some skiing and snow fun.
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