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I suppose you want to know how Zurich has been for the last week?
It would probably be best to look it up on the Internet beacause I have no idea. And you are not a very good friend for falsely thinking we were in Zurich when we were really in Salzburg, Austria. For the record Salzburg was great.
Salzburg is right near the alps and is at an altitude of 425 metres, ensuring we had a few cold nights. Unfortuneately it rained for a lot of our four night stay, but that did not stop our fun. That could be because we tend to spend our time playing snakes and ladders in our room. But this hostel had no ladders.....
We stayed in the Yoho International Youth Hostel, which was the best hostel yet. Our dormitory had huge lockers which were great because they held all our stuff, and 2 monitor lizards, 3 blue tongue lizards and a seas turtle. Our roommates were a bit of a mixed bag with some nice ones, funny ones, friendly ones and some downright annoying ones. The worst were the two girls with bulb haircuts who woke me up this morning. They obviously misheard "shut up before I kill you" for " please bang your locker closed five times in a minute. The joke is on them now though because the hotel staff believe they are hiding 100 grams of cocaine in their luggage. All jokes aside we did meet some great people both from the dorm and from the rest of the hostel.
Salzburg has an enormous river, the Salzach, that runs through the centre of the city. It is the coolest colour, a milky blue, think the colour of your girlfriends tears when you ran over her dog, only blue and milky. The river runs at an unbelievable pace, much to our amusement we watched a boat try and go upstream with about as much success as a watermelon being a pilot.
Salzburg was a great opportunity to try a few different activities as we were out of the big smoke. We made the most of it, signing up for a day tour of the biggest ice caves in the world and also a day white water rafting along the salzach.
To get to the ice caves we were on a bus for an hour, but it was probably the most enjoyable bus trip of our lives. The whole trip was along the alps and the Salzach and finally up some of the mountain. As it was an overcast day we even drove through clouds. After we got out of the bus we had to walk for 20 minutes before getting a cable car up another 700 metres. We then walked for another 20 minutes to reach the ice caves (1750 above sea level). The caves were nothing short of spectacular and they stretch for 42 kilometres, the biggest in the world. The tours only take you 1 km in but that didn't stop us from being overawed by the sheer beauty of the ice. Some of the ice was 25m thick, or 50 half metres for those of you who don't understand that. It was an amazing experience for us, and worth every cent.
White water rafting is one of those activities that everyone seems to be interested in but not many people actually do. In this regard it is similar to your mates sister. Couple this with an unbelieveably fast running river through the mountains and it was always going to be a good day. After getting geared up we took the van about an hour out of Salzburg to the starting point. We were in a raft with 4 Austrians and a guide, and there were three boats all together. When we felt the water temperature (10C) we were less than impressed but our excitement kept us warm initially. The guide told us all the commands and that there would be swimming spots along the way. However shortly after we got going Mat must have decided he couldn't wait for a swimming spot. He was the first and only man overboard, although everyone swam. The highlights of the trip were rafting past a huge waterfall and swimming, as you could feel the raw power of the water. All the boats stopped at a big rock to give everyone the chance to jump off, which was heaps of fun. The whole day was a great activity, maybe even the best yet.
A great discovery was made in Salzburg when we found "My Indigo". It is a restaurant that serves curries, noodles and salad on the spot. The most remarkable part of this was the salad bar. There were about 25 different salads and you loaded your bowl up, before paying according to how much it weighs. It is thought that I could have broken the all time record with 700 grams. I am glad the same pay for weight principle has not been used for girls though as I would be broke.
Another day was spent at Mondsee, a lakeside town that is a 50min bus ride away from Salzburg. It has to be close to the most beatiful place we have visited. There is a huge lake surrounded by mountains, with sailing boats everywhere. The water is very warm (25C) but we didn't swim as it was a cold day. It was so relaxing just chilling out by the water, feeding the swans and ducks. We haven't been that relaxed since our "rub n tug" massage with a happy ending.
We also visited the fortress on top of a hill in the middle of town which was very cool. It was a cable car ride (mat) or walk (Luke) up the slope. Inside were a lot of very interesting medieval items including guns, swords, cannons, torture equipment and armour. It also gave us some great views of Salzburg. They were almost as good as when the receptionist had a low cut top on.
Next stop is Munich, where we hope to get some better weather, and hopefully a girly or two. (But if I get 6 I won't complain).
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