Spring has Sprung in Switzerland! :)

SPRING!!! :)

Sorry, I just HAD to start with this picture. It was too beautiful to hold in any longer!
Mmm, what a wonderful week it has been! Switzerland is soo beautiful... 
Haha, but let me catch up with myself first. :) 


So, yes, the morning of the the 18th, we went to Braunau. And what a beautiful town that is!! The purpose of the trip was for Frank to do some income tax things, but that took him about 3 minutes in total, so we spent the rest of the time looking at this beautiful little city. :) Frank parked kind of far away from the main part of town, so we would have to walka ways to get to where we needed to go. ..I was wondering why he would do that, until we got nearer to the middle of the town. ..So cool! The town was first mentioned around 810 and received the city statute in 1260, which makes it one of the oldest cities in Austria! It is right on the border between Germany and Austria, with the border on the River Inn, which is right on the edge of town. The old part of town, the original, was at one point all walled in, and you had to come through a gate to get into the town. They would close the gate at night so people could not come in, but also so people could not get out..! :) So, we walked through this old gate, and saw the walled in part of the city. Oh, it was beautiful. :) After we walked through the gate, but before we reached the Stadtplatz (Town Square), we were walking past all these little shops, when Frank stopped us, and pointed to a plain yellow building, looking like any of the other shops in the area, just.. there was nothing being sold inside.. 

The house Hitler was born and raised in.. Hm.. :)

This was Hitler's birth house. It was very interesting to see, but I definately had mixed emotions seeing it! The town doesn't know what to do with it either. It is still privately owned, but I think Frank said that the people don't want to live there anymore, because it is right in the middle of part of town with shops, and such. But the town wouldn't know what to do with it! They don't want to make it into a museum or anything, they don't want to draw attention to it. But would they want to make it into a store, either? Frank said it was a pretty major predicament in the town right now. Huh. In front of the house, there is a stone that was taken from one of the concentration camps, with writing on it, remembering the people who died. In German, it says, "für frieden freiheit und demokrate nie wieder faschismus millionen tote mahnen". And literally translated, (using Google Translator..) that means, "for freedom and democratic peace never again fascism millions of dead admonish". ..Which doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but thats because I don't speak German at all. I'm sure it would make more sense if you didn't translate it quite that literally. :) But you get the idea. Anyways, we moved on from there, and walked through the stadtplatz, to the edge of town. Here we reached the bridge over the River Inn! We looked across the river, and at a town in Germany. Then we walked across the bridge into Germany! 

Uh.. This yellow line is the border between Germany and Austria. :) Fairly extensive, eh?  

Such a cool idea. So, we were in Germany for about 4 minutes in total. :) It had stopped raining by this time, but it was still cold, so we didn't spend too much time in one palce. :) But we stopped in the middle of the bridge, where the little dividing line was, and hopped back and forth between Germany and Austria. Fun! We came back to Austria, :) and continued our tour of the little town. We saw the main theater of town, a school of music for children and an OLD hospital/church (built in 1417) that was now made into a public library. We also saw a public bath fro LONG ago. :)

The public bath of Braunau. :) I don't know, you'd think bathing in public would be awkward, but.. ..? Crazy Austrians. :)

 This is one of the very few, well-preserved public baths that was actually used when the city was first built!! It was so cool to wander around in a town where much of it is in the same condition it was in hundreds of years ago. It still blows my mind.. :) So incredibly different from Canada! :) We headed back to Mattighofen, and by this time, Elizabeth was home from school. We had lunch with the family, and then Elizabeth took us to Salzburg! Also, quite a beautiful city. :) First, we went to see the Royal Palace, and the gardens around it. The Palace was kind of just like any of the other Palaces we have seen on this trip, :) but the gardens were so nice!! Definately the nicest gardens I have ever seen. I felt like I was in a movie.

Dancing in Salzburg, at the Royal Palace.. Julia Roberts style..? "The hills are alive with the sound of music.. AaaAahhh..." and so on. :)

 Elizabeth said it would have been much better in the summer, and thats probably true, but it was so lovely  now, too! We'll just have to come back in the summer. :) Then, we walked past the Mozart University. MMmm, I would LOVE to study music there. :) Also, from just about anywhere you are, you can see the castle on the hill. The magnificent Hohensalzburg Fortress, apparently the "mightiest fortress in all central Europe", and I don't doubt it! It was incredible, and HUGE. Then, kind of right beside it on the same hill, was a little tiny castle..! We couldn't figure out what that was supposed to be.. But it was cute! :) And we walked down  Getreidegasse, to Getreidegasse 9, the address of the house where we saw the house where the Mozart's (as in, Wolfgang's family.. :)) lived between 1747 and 1773,  and here, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, was born on the 27th of January 1756. Cool, eh?

Mozart's haus..! Cool! :)

 It was fun to see. Apparently, there is a great museum inside, too, but.. it cost money.. :) We are being as frugal as absolutely possible! (..What good children we are, right parents? :) We spend our money very wisely.) We continued on from there, just walked some of the streets. We came upon this huge church, and right in front of the church was a souvenier shop, and we got looking at some Sound of Music books. No, we did not buy them, but it did give us an idea to ask the shopkeeper if the locations where they shot the movie were, indeed, in Salzburg. He said, "Well.. the cemetary is right over there..!" :) For all you who have seen that wonderful movie, :) do you remember the part when they are hiding in the cemetary, right at the end of the movie, before they leave to run over the mountain? Well, we possibly saw that cemetary!! It looked a little different, but I think you could tell it was the same one!! Very cool.

..Look familiar, anyone..?? :D

 I would have loved to go and see all the locations it was shot in, because it was shot in Salzburg after all. But, alas, we didn't have the time, energy, or, most importantly, money. :) We were soon done our day/afternoon in Salzburg, and headed back to the car for the ride back to Mattighofen. It was a beautiful day, so, Schlessmann family, if you are reading this, thank you so much!! It was wonderful. :) We got home, and watched three episodes of How I Met Your Mother with Elizabeth. She loves that show!! Apparently, it helps her with her English. Which really does make a lot of sense, because then you learn a lot of the every-day language people talk, instead of only what you learn in school. :) At about 7:30, we went upstairs to have supper, and met a family from Belarus that were going to be staying there as well! :) They were very nice.. but didn't speak English at all. So that was a very interesting, and fun, dynamic. :) The mom was just learning German, I think, so there were three different language groups represented, all of which were not quite fluent in each others languages. :) 

Our Austrian family, plus the Belarusian family that visited. :)

It was fun! We visited, signed the guestbook, and prepared for our last night in Austria. :( The next morning, I went upstairs, and found a surprise! Sometime during the day before, while we were walking around Salzburg, we had mentioned to Elizabeth that we had really wanted to try wiener schnitzel while we were in Austria, because it is an Austrian speciality. ..But we were very quickly running out of time, so it didn't look like we were going to get some. :( Oh, well. But then, unbenownst to us, Elizabeth called her Mom sometime during the day, and so Johanna brought home some meat for making the schnitzels! And so, I helped Johanna make schnitzels, and we had them for breakfast. We were always calling them "weiner schnitzels", and soon found out that "wiener" means "from Wien", (meaning, Vienna) and thats where they originally come from. And those were typically made out of "baby cow"... or, veal, as we call it. ..Baby cow just sounds so ..sad. :) The ones we made, we made with pork meat. It was good! And now I know how to made schnitzels. 

WIENER SCHNITZEL!!!!!! SO good. :)  ..  :D

They are SO good. They even made us take some for our lunch on the train, as a sandwich. (It was not very hard to convince us..) We left shortly after that, and Elizabeth offered to drive us down to the train station. :) So, we said a sad goodbye to Frank and Johanna, :) then went to the station. She dropped us off, promising to be Facebook and CouchSurfing friends, and then we were off for our next adventure. 
..To SWITZERLAND! :) MMmm, I can't say enough about it, really. Maybe its because I have three good friends from here, and so I feel sort of patriotic to this country. :) And we were going to be staying with the family of two of those good friends! For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, :) I went to school, CLBI in Camrose, with two sisters, Esther and Obeth. And so, when they learned were might be coming to Switzerland, they volunteered their family's house as a place to stay! They would not be able to be here, Obeth still at CLBI and Esther working abroad, but their family was very willing to take in some weary travellers for a few nights. :) And we are SO grateful they did! We became friends with their Mom, Käthi, on facebook, and then communicated about when to come and how to get here, to the ltitle town of Ilanz, Switzerland. So, we left on the train from Austria with some idea of how to get to her house, but not really sure.. :) We arrived in Ilanz, and took a post auto bus, like Käthi had told us to. It took us up the side of a mountain, and up to their farm. We were told to tell the driver to let us off at "Albertushof".. ..ok.. :) When the bus let us off at what apprently was Albertushof, there was Käthi, waiting for us! She took us up to meet Ernest, who was working in the garden. :) Then she gave us a choice of where we wanted to sleep: the loft in the barn, which had been made into a spacious bedroom, but would probably be quite cold at night, or the living room couch, which was a hide-a-bed, and folded out into a bed, which would be warmer and we wouldn't have to walk so far to get to a bathroom. :) ..You guess which one we chose. ..Of course!! The loft. 

Our room for a week.. SO SWEET. We loved it. :)

The sitting area of our room. Note the footstool..! So awesome. The two best countries in the world. (Maybe excluding Norway..) :)

I LOVE lofts, and we both love sleeping in rooms that are a bit cooler. So it was perfect!! I was SO excited to go to bed. Not because I was tired, but because we got to sleep in a LOFT! :) 
Also at home with Ernest and Käthi were their two youngest children, Erigao, 18 and Samuel, almost 16. :) They have been SO much fun, too!! Samuel decided on the first evening we were here that we needed to have fondue, done the Swiss way. He even made it himself! He is quite good in the kitchen, we have found out. :) So we had cheese fondue!! It was a beautiful first Swiss meal. The next morning, we went with Käthi and Ernest to a neighboring town, Landqart, for church. They normally have church in Ilanz, but this weekend, and for the next 4 weekends, there is a big Evangelical Event going on, with all the Free Evangelical churches in the area! SO, it was quite a big congregation this Sunday, compared to their normal size. :) It was fun to be a part of, though. God is going to work in a big way, here in Switzerland. I can feel it! :) The service was in Swiss, but Ernest and Käthi sat Anna and I in between them and translated most of it for us. :) Many of the songs we recognized, however. And it was fun to add another language to the singing. (..English.)  :) Some of the songs were even in Romansch, the language of the people who live higher up in the mountains. Käthi speaks it a bit, she is actually taking lessons to learn the language, but most people don't speak it. But it was interesting to see most other people in the congregation struggling to pronounce words, with us! :) After church, they took us sightseeing around the area, and hiking. 

Hikin' the mountains first day in Switzerland. Awesome! :)

We even had a wonderful picnic on the side of a mounatin! We drove up to a town that was really high up in the mountains, and then walked up a little bit more. It was soo fun. And so beautiful!!! Seriously. Why can't the prairies look more like this..? Haha, nah, just kidding, I love my prairies the way they are!! But the mountains are SO beautiful. ..I do miss walking on flat ground though. :)

Our picnic on the mountain-side, first day in Switzerland. Awesome. :)

 They took us back to Ilanz a way that is actually shorter, as the crow flies, but longer because it went over and around a mountain, and through a valley.. :) Ah, it was so lovely. Maybe when I retire, I can have a summer home in Switzerland.. Its wonderful here. :)

Ahh.... :)

Suisse = amazing? :) I think SO!

Up in the mountains first day in Switzerland. :) ..We did a lot on the first day in Switzerland! :)

The next day, Erigao was working, and Samuel had school, so we didn't see much of them until the evening. That afternoon, Anna and I went on a spectacular hike across the side of the mountain to a village a little farther east on the mountain, called Falera. It was possibly the most wonderful hike I have ever been on. There wasn't much uphill, which I liked, :) and the scenery was BEAUTIFUL. Don't worry, I took lots of pictures. 

On our hike, we wanted to leave a environmentally friendly Canadian  souvenir in Switzerland. So.. this was our attempt at an Inukshuk. :)

As good a spot as any to sit and view the beautiful Swiss Alps, I suppose. :) ..Are you kidding?! The  view from here was absolutely, breathtakingly, stunningly, beautiful.  ..No joke.:)

Celtic stones on the side of the hill. (See paragraph below for explanation)

This is the beautiful church in the mountain village of Falera. It is built on the site of an old ancient Celt worship site. I believe they worshipped the Sun.. or something. Churches in Switzerland, at least in this part of Switzerland, are almost always set on top of a hill, in a prominent place. On the sides of this particular hill, there are stone pillars arranged geometrically all around the church on the hill  that are said to date around 1500 B.C. Wow!! Much later, around 840 AD the town decided to put a Catholic church there, to redeem the place.  (I know, right.. 840 AD. Its practically new in comparison..) However, now there are mixed emotions about the older church. Many people go there to worship, because they believe that there are good 'vibes', good spirits there.. Not a great reason to go and worship.. It was very interesting to look around, though. SO much history. :) We decided we were done with our day in the sun, and caught the post auto bus back to Ilanz. Have I told you about the post auto's? (I don't think so. If I repeat myself, pardon me.) :) The post auto's are almost an icon here in Switzerland. I am told they are called "post autos" because they used to be used also for the postal system. But now they are just a form of transportation, like a bus. Its a school bus, a handicapped bus, a "Greyhound" bus.. all in one. :) They always have the right-of-way on the mountain roads, they have a special horn, a "three-tone horn", that if you hear it, you MOVE. :) Its funny! They are so respected, and revered. :) Anyways, we got back to Ilanz, but there were no buses at that time going up to Albertushof, so we decided to walk up. Whew.. :) Haha, just kidding. It wasn't too bad a walk! The road you would use to drive up to their house is all twisty, and full of shwitchbacks. The one you walk up is just.. straight up. :) This road leads almost directly to their house, because the Haab's house used to belong to the monastery. And the old road that led right to the monastery. Did I tell you about their house belonging to the monastery before it belonged to the Haab family? :) Sorry.. this is going to get really long again, I just want to tell you every little detail!! The farm was owned and worked by the monastery that is right across the road from their house. The nuns used to live in the house where Käthi and Ernest and family now live, and would work the farm. In 2003, I believe, (Erigao just filled me in on some of the details. :)) Erigao's aunt rented the farm from them, and then the nuns didn't work here anymore. Now, they just live and work in the monestary. So, the house that Käthi and Ernest and family live in is a 3 floor building, kind of like an apartment building, each floor having different renters. And it is rented from the monastery. Anyways, enough about that side story.. :)

Monday night was filled with more family time, and good food. :) Anna skyped home, and I.. I dunno, did something else. :) Tuesday, Anna and I took a day trip to Liechtenstein! :) 

..Very self-explanitory. :)

It was so fun. ..Basically, its very similar to Switzerland. :) They use the Swiss Franc, they sell Swiss chocolate, its located in the Alps.. Its very beautiful! :) We went, primarily, to Vaduz, the capital. When we got there, we saw on an tourist information stand that there was a castle that was apparently quite beautiful. Naturally, we wanted to get a better view of it, so we followed a sign that said "Schloss Vaduz", thinking it would lead us to the castle, because we know that castle is "schloss" in German.. Well, we followed the road for a while, then happened to glance over our shoulders, and there it was.. in the complete  opposite direction, on the side of the mountain behind us. :) It WAS a beautiful view of it, but it did NOT lead us closer to it. :) But we were ok with that. After about an hour of walking around, observing the scenery of Liechtenstein, :) we came across a park, and so we played on the playground equipment for a while. One of our favorite activities. :) Then, there was grass in the park.. and so we laid on that for a while. :) ..Which is another of our favorite activities. :)

Lazy-ing in Liechtenstein.. :) MMmm...

(Note: the castle on the hill behind.. SO beautiful.)

 It was lovely. A nap in Liechtenstein. :) Haha, I just love that word. Liechtenstein. So fun to say! Try it. ;) (remember, the 's' is more like a 'sh' sound.) :) Its fun! ..Annnyways, then we started our search for a bracelet/necklace. ..As it turns out, Liechtenstein-ers don't like jewelry..?? We couldn't find anything (within our price range..) anywhere!! Seriously. I think we searched for about an hour and a half, and pretty much covered all of Vaduz, and couldn't find anything. ..sigh.. So, finally, I suggested that we go into this store that looked sort of like a hardware/kitchenware store, and see if we can find anything that we can MAKE into a bracelet/necklace. We looked, and looked... then in the basement of the store, we found some chains! Score! :) We fashioned them around our wrists/necks, and VOILA! Haha, I actually really like them. Not the most fashionable, but they have the best story behind them!! After confusing the sales-ladies with our antics, we headed back to catch the bus into Switerland, and then the train home. (Because although there are train stations, it is a very irregular train service, and trains passing through just don't often stop in Liechtenstein.. Cause, I mean, c'mon.. who really wants to go to Liechtenstein..? .. Me!! :) ) On the way back to Ilanz, we were sitting on the train right across from a nun! 

Can you spot the nun..? :) She was cute.  

..Really, we shouldn't be too amazed or surprised, because they live right beside a monestary that has about 130 or so nuns living there. :) But I am just really not used to it.. But its fun to see them, and to share train rides with them. :) We got home around 5:00 pm, and we had a barbeque outside with the family. :)

Ernest making a fire. :) It was a beautiful evening.

 They insisted that we HAD to try this Swiss special kind of hot dog/sausage. :) We did not protest at all! They were good! Also, while we have been here, Käthi has made us Dandylion salad and Stinging Nettle soup. :) You would be surprised at how good these funny-sounding dishes are!! Actually very tasty. :) She's a good cook! 

Dandylion Salad..! So good! ..Samuel thinks differently. But he's a boy. :)

Stinging nettle soup.. actually, QUITE delicious! :)

On Wednesday, Anna, Erigao and I took a mini-tour of Switzerland. It was beautiful! We went up and over a mountain on a special train. And at the highest point, Oberalppass (yes, there are actually two p's. :) Anna had a fun time trying to pronounce that. It ended up being just a big stutter.) we were at 2048 meters. Wow. :) And it was WHITE. And it made me really want to go skiing!! And the brilliant sun made looking out at the beautiful scenery SO difficult, with all the white snow!

Oberalppass! SO STINKIN' BEAUTIFUL. :)

 Then, we headed to Luzern, and looked around the city for a while. We saw the old wooden bridge it is famous for, the " Kapellbrücke", which is the oldest convered bridge in Europe (constructed in 1409). 

The wooden bridge in Luzern. So neat!

We also saw "Bertel Thorvaldsen's famous carving of a dying lion (the Lion Monument, or Löwendenkmal), found in a small park just off Lowenplatz. The carving commemorates the hundreds of Swiss Guards who were massacred in 1792 during the French Revolution, when the mob stormed theTuileries Palace in Paris." ..And yes, I got that all from Wikipedia.. I wanted to let you know exactly what it was that we saw! :) 

The cool carving of the Lion in the Stone. Intense. :)

So, we found a deal on chocolate.. Anna found a deal on a sweet car! ..Just kidding, but she was wishin'. :)

Then, while we were walking around the city, Anna spotted a special sale in a store. ..10 Swiss Chocolate bars for 10 euros! :) I'D say thats a good deal. We could not pass that up.  So.. we both gave in to the temptation. (MMMM...) :) Soon after, it was time to head back to the train station, and continue our journey up to Zürich! Thats a beautiful city as well. Wow. We caught a tram to the lake, Lake Zürich, as its aptly called. Then, we discovered that a boat ride was included in our Eurail passes, and also in Erigao's student train pass! Yay! :) So, we hopped on a boat. :) After a while we hopped off the boat again, and walked along the shore of Lake Zürich for a while.

Rock Stacking! An art, really. :) And we were inspired by the best: Ralph Shareski.

 While we walked along the shore, we stopped to dip our feet in the water (it was warm. ..the air was, anyways. The water was freezing.), and to build some rock formations! We just wanted to add to the collection already started on the shoreline. :) We also happened upon Erigao's Grandma! She actaully lives in Ilanz, in the same building we are staying in, just on the 3rd floor. :) What are odds?! (Yes, Anna. Yes, Jordan, I know. 50/50..) It was fun to meet up with her there. :) We found a store where we could buy some jewelry for cheap-ish, then headed back to the train station, ready to head home after a full day of sight-seeing. On the train ride home, who did we meet up with again, but Grandma! So, we accompanied her home. :) During the day, Anna and I had told Erigao about a cup-game song we used to sing at our camp (for all those who know our camp, Camp Simmie, its the song that goes, "On a Sunday, Monday, Tuesday Wednesday..etc".. that one.), and so we wanted to teach it to her and Samuel! So, we did. It was so much fun. And then we played Pit, which was also so much fun.. Ahhh... I haven't laughed that much in a LONG time. :) It was so fun. They are wonderful people! I wish we could stay here longer.. :( We also got to "help" Samuel with his homework! :) Haha.. yes, "help". ..We did it for him. :)

Look at Samuel.. looking pleased as punch. He just gets to write down the answers. Lucky dude. :)

And that brings us to this morning, Thursday, our last full day in Switzerland. This morning was spent doing last minute preparation things for our next two weeks for adventure, and then we ate lunch outside. Oh... it was HOT! It was 18° C! (..beating the record for March 24, which was set in 
2001, according to the weather website I am on.) In the afternoon, we finally 
got time to take a tour around the farm! We saw their horses, pigs, sheep, cows 

and chickens! Its a lovely farm. 

 Käthi took us on the hike up to where they keep their sheep, up (farther up) on the mountainside.

The view from the sheep barn. So awesome. I LOVE SWITZERLAND. :)

..and on the hill there, thats their dog, Nala, running towards us. :)

Cows! :) Anna.. LOVED the cows. Obviously she does, she's going to be a farmer someday.. soon. Or, rather, she's gonna marry a farmer. :)

Haha, I didn't want to put a million pictures of animals on here, so I camde a collage!

SO, on thair farm, they had:

(top, left to right, if you can't see them:

Calves! (so cute!), two horses (so BEAUTIFUL), dairy cows (yes, bell included!), pigs!! (also SO cute!).

(bottom, left to right: :)

chickens (some laid green eggs.. cool!), sheep (with some little lambs! adorable.), and Nala, their friendly, trusty, throw-a-stick-and-I'll-bring-it-right-back-to-your-feet dog. :)

They were so fun to meet! It was a beautiful farm. One of the best I've seen, for sure! And made even better because it was on the side of a Swiss mountain. :) 

CHEESE! So good, and so MUCH of it. Apparently, this is the cheese cellar when its "empty". :) 

She also has bees, but we haven't seen them yet. 
Maybe tomorrow morning. :) Then, we went to a friend's house. This girl's name 
is Anja Janki, and she came to CLBI once, when Esther and Obeth's youth group 
came to visit them. It was so fun to see her, and we had a nice chat at her place. 
Then, we went to see a castle/fortress that was built into the side of a cliff..

The fortress built into the cliff.. AH! Crazy. :)

 It was incredible. I took pictures, but I really don't think they will do it any justice at all. :) 
Then we hiked to on top of the cliff, and that was an incredible view. MMmm, I 
am going to miss Switzlerand! We came back home, and had some supper. The 
rest of the evening has been spent writing on this blog. :) Wow, it takes me a LONG 
time! I love writing on it, though, and so I hope you don't mind reading it! :) ..You just 
need to sit down with a cup of coffee, cause I tend to be a tad long-winded at 
times.. :)
Well, y'all, thats about it until next time. :) We are off tomorrow morning to tour Spain 
and France for two weeks! Yippee! :)
God Bless, :)
Demara