Maddy’s May Report

EuroTour-

I thought writing this month monthly report would be easy considering how I drove around Europe for 2 weeks, but it is so hard to narrow all of my adventures into this one page. On the 29th April 2010 with my HUGE bag in my hand I joined half of my district on the bus for our 2 week adventure. One hour into the trip a boy from America had brought his guitar and was playing songs we all knew so we all sung along, from that moment on I knew I was going to have an awesome time. Our first stop was France and we were all extremely excited to finally reach our destination having been in a bus for 10 hours, it was day break and one image that I will remember was that the hotel went in a square so in the middle was a court yard and all of the exchange students rooms spread out and at some point we were all sticking our heads outside our own windows talking to each other. Strasburg, the city we were staying in was an amazing city and I loved every moment I had there. Our next stop was Switzerland and when we arrived in the little town surrounded by beautiful mountains it was impossible to have not had your breath taken away. We only stayed in Switzerland for one night because the next week we would be staying in ITALY!!! Italy has to be one of my favourite places I’ve been to, it is so beautiful and unique and mind blowing and I already plan to go back there and explore what I couldn’t. Portofino in Italy is a VERY beautiful city, we all took a ferry across to the island and were all in shock to the beauty of the place, it was a perfect summers day, the sun was out, only a few clouds in the sky, the water a striking aqua blue, it was amazing! On our way to Florence we stopped in Piza and saw the Leaning Tower of Piza, it was one of the places I’d really heard of and dreamt of in Australia due to it’s popularity and for me to be there was a complete shock. It was there that I thought about all my friends in Australia who were in probably in school at that moment learning about Europe while I was climbing The Leaning Tower of Pisa and travelling Europe. I was witnessing and experiencing more that I can explain at the age of 15 years old while some 40 year olds hadn’t travelled outside their city, I was incredibly proud of myself for achieving this. Florence was a city that really surprised me, it wasn’t what I expected at all, and I loved it. I found that the whole town was created around the Big Dome, it was magnificent, we walked exactly 463 steps, my friend and I at the time believed that to be not so much until we got to the half way mark, that was when it got steeper, and when I say steeper I mean we were starting to walk up close to ladders, but when we got to the top I realized that I would walk 1000 more steps just to see the glorious view we saw up there. I don’t know how long we stayed up there, but I know I would have liked to have stayed there forever.  From Florence we drove to a adorable little town called Lido de Jesolo, this was where EVERYONE was starting to get restless because the next day we indeed would be driving then taking a ferry to VENICE!! Not one person in our group had been to Venice before so the excitement between us all could sometime be a little overwhelming. It was 7th May 2010 at 11am when we all arrived in Venice, it was spectacular, to see all the Gondola’s and the old buildings and to be standing in St. Mark’s Square and to see all the birds and old artifacts was an image that will never erase from my memory. Venice was extraordinary. We stayed 4 nights and 2 full days and we were now heading ourselves to Vienna in Austria, I don’t know why but Austria was one of favourite countries, the city Vienna was nice but what I love the most was when we took the tour of the Palace Schonbrunn, I love history, so to take a tour around such a gorgeous palace and learning about the old occupants that lived here and about there lives was a dream come true for me. After we left Vienna we started driving to Prague in Czech Republic and on the stopped in Bratislava in Slovakia, which was interesting and old, but we could only stay there for 3 hours. When we arrived in Prague we did the usual, wait outside for 30 minutes waiting to be assigned our rooms, unpack and then chill for the first night. The next morning was when the fun began, the bus took us into the main city Prague and when we got there we were free to explore wherever we liked as long as we found our way back to the hotel by 7pm, I could never I believe become sick of Prague because it was so beautiful, but I will remember Prague as the city with the most exquisite sky in the whole world, the sky that day was the best I had ever in my whole life seen and I could hardly tear my eyes away for a second. Our last stop was Dresden in Germany, it was the night we all reflected on because it was our last stop being together, and tomorrow we’d be back home. It was a very emotional time for some because in just a month they were flying back to their country and we’d all become such great friends during this time.