Sooo this is probably the most exciting leg of my journey thus far. Now that I have got you all excited I am going to start with the more uneventful parts of my adventures. After the last message I got on the train to Venice and got to go to my accomodations at the campsite. First of all, I ended up getting upgraded to my own little cabin where I had 3 beds, but no roommates!! yay! Anyways so I ended up meeting some crazy Finnish guys that seemed to think that drinking was a sport or something. haha. anyways i managed to survive unscathed and ready to go the next morning to discover Venice by myself. It was really amazing spending the whole day by myself because I got to do all the things that I wanted to do - get lost down all the random little streets, go shopping on Murano island (where they blow glass by hand), go into all the carnaval mask shops, hang out in San Marcos square and hang around watching all the gondolas go by. My favorite part of the day was when I went into a mask shop and starting talking to the guy that ran the shop. He showed me how they made the masks, what he used to decorate them and even let me try on a carnaval costume! Because he was soo nice I ended up buying a cool mask from him. The next day in Venice was very similar except for I got to meet up with Aussies for the roadtrip!!
So, for phase one of the road trip we were going back to where they were staying in a small town outside of Venice with the one guy's Italian family. After much stress and confusion to whether I could stay in the house we decided to just sneak me in and deal with it in the morning. Luckily, all turned out to be okay and this family was wonderful! The aunt didnt speak a word of English, but liked to give all of us orders on what we were to do in Italian and the uncle showed me all of his pics of when he went to Canada. I got to see their farm where they were self-sufficient for almost everything - chickens, garden, wine, rabbits, and pickeled goodies. They ended up making a HUGE bbq feast for us and we ate lunch underneath a cherry tree. The food was amazing, and everyone had a good time drinking the wine they made themselves and everyone managing to communicate between Italian English and sharades. Anyways, we left his family and it made me love the Italian people anymore.
After this amazing meal it was time for the roadtrip to begin!! We ended up having to drive through the Alps in a huge rainstorm, where during parts of it we were wondering if the car could make it through the huge puddles. We ended up surviving and even had to put the car on a train for the last stop to make it all the way to Bad Gastein in Austria to do some sports in the alps. After plans falling through, first to go canyoning and then to go rafting I finally ended up going Paragliding!! This was amazing! I went down 1200 metres, and because the wind was so strong we were able to go up higher first!! I loved being in the air soo much and would do it again in an instant. The view was amazing and being up in the air was such a freeing feeling. I did end up getting motion sickness at the end, but I made it through! Anyways, right now I am still recovering from being up in the air, my body feels off balance still. So I hope all is going well with you guys! I am not sure where I am going next so I guess it will be a surprise for everyone, including me.
Wow it sounds like you are having an amazing time. When I was over in Europe, Venice was my favourite spot out of the whole trip. Thanks for keeping us updated.