March 31: Bolzano and Vipiteno, Italy

It has been another full, fantastic day here in Europe!

I drove down to Italy early in the morning for the 9 a.m. game (it's normally a three hour drive); it was a difficult drive because it was snowing hard and I (and about a hundred other motorists) got stuck behind two snow plows. We've been told that they have had lower temperatures and more snow this March in the Bavarian area than they've had in the past 110 years.  So, there has been snow flying every time we've been driving in this area, including this morning. I'm not sure why they don't plow one lane at a time so that traffic can continue moving because we were all stuck behind them for about an hour.  Because of that delay, I missed almost all of the Explorers first game.  Even worse than that, our team lost the game: 5 - 1 to Mannheim. The second game was in a different arena, an outdoor arena up in the mountains, so the team got on the bus right after their first game to travel there (I followed in the rental car).  The outcome of that game was much better (the whole day got better and better and I had a super time); it was a nail-biter but they pulled off a 5 - 4 win.

After their two games, the team had an uncharacteristic but very welcome free evening.  This worked out perfectly for us because I was able to spend several hours with Matthias and Brad.  That's the first time we've said more than just a quick hello since getting to Europe so that was really wonderful.  It was a gorgeous day in northern Italy - sunny and 18 degrees Celsius - we were in such a beautiful area, too, with mountains, vineyards, castles, waterfalls - the scenery is breathtaking.  The boys loved the drive up the mountain to the outdoor arena and we stopped a few times for some photos. Since I can't load any of my photos here, I searched on YouTube for a video of the area; here is a link to one (if you feel like scanning through it to see what the area looks like):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlCV-F8vSxI.
I think the soundtrack is a local Bolzano group so you will hear some Italian music as well.  It has been a lot of fun listening to different languages (mostly German and Italian) on the radio while we drive.  They play a lot of current English songs as well; it's great having the music for the long drives.

It seems that everyone on the team is having a super time, except maybe Cameron (our goalie who has been sick with a stomach flu) but there is good news there - he is starting to feel better and ate a bit of food today and dressed for the games and did the warm-ups.  He might be able to play tomorrow; we're not sure yet but he will soon be back in net which is great.  The team has only one game tomorrow - the 3rd/4th place game in the Igor Loro Cup. The two teams they lost to will be playing in the gold medal game (Austrian Selects and Mannheim). I'll be driving to Frankfurt to pick up Katarina so I won't be going to our game but I am really hoping they can get the win and end this tournament with a bronze medal (not a bad follow-up to the gold medal win in the Vipiteno tournament).

Katarina is having a fabulous time in Frankfurt and will tell you about it (and post some pictures from her time there) in the next day or two.

Happy Easter, everyone!

March 30: Frankfurt, Germany

Today, we checked out of our hotel in Bad Gastein and then drove and drove and drove.  This is Katarina's mom filling in for Katarina because she is staying in Frankfurt for two nights with her friend Judi.  Judi was on exchange living in Courtenay and going to Isfeld Secondary during first semester of this year and she and Katarina became friends during that time.  It is terrific that it has worked out for them to spend some time together while we are here in Europe.  Judi lives in a small town just outside of Frankfurt so Katarina and I drove from Bad Gastein, Austria to Frankfurt, Germany today.  It took about six hours to get there.  Katarina experienced her first Stau (this translates to 'traffic jam' but somehow it seems worse than that).  Just outside of Munich, we were sitting bumper-to-bumper in traffic for about half an hour - not fun!  Fortunately, the GPS in the rental car re-routed us and that took us through some nice villages and, when we got back onto the Autobahn, the Stau was gone and we drove without any problems the rest of the way (we really like the GPS!).

After I dropped Katarina off at Judi's place, I headed straight for the hotel where we will be staying during our second week here.  It is in Bavaria in a small town called Oberstaufen.  I knew that I had to be here before reception closes at 10 p.m. so I drove straight through at average speeds for the Autobahn, approximately 120 - 150 km. per hour the whole way (well, until the last 50 km. when the snow hit).  Of course, lots of BMWs, Mercedes, Porsches, Audis and other vehicles went flying by me!  Driving on the Autobahn is great, though; what a fantastic highway system!  During our travels today, I was on the following: A1, A3, A5, A6, A7 and A8 as well as a few Bundesstrassen.  Other than the Stau outside of Munich, the driving was super (although I'm feeling a bit dizzy from ten hours of it).  It's fun to check the license plates, too; we saw vehicles from all over Europe, including Estonia, Serbia, Slovenia, Slovakia, Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic and the closer central European countries.  It is Spring Break here and it seems that people do a lot of travelling.  That includes us; we have put more than 4,000 kilometres on the car since we got here a week ago (today's 1,000+ kilometres really bumped up the total).

Katarina has her camera with her so there aren't any photos today but she will write about her time in Frankfurt and post some photos when she is back here and I'll try to write a bit each day while she's gone.  She asked me to continue with the hockey updates so here's the news on that for today...

Hockey update:  The Canadian AAA Explorers won all three of their games today so they have four wins and one loss in the round-robin play of the Igor Loro Cup; here is a link to the website: http://www.igorloro.net/.  They played in an outdoor arena up in the Italian Alps today which sounded really neat. Matthias played all three games; they won 7 - 3 against a really good team from Hungary; Brad said that the boys played their best game yet against them (after a good night's sleep); the score of the second game was 8 - 0 and the third game was 3 - 2 (Brad said that they should have won about 7 - 2 but the other team's goalie 'stood on his head').  They play tomorrow at 9 a.m. against Mannheim; Mannheim and the Austrian Selects (we had our one loss against them) both have 5 - 0 records so it will be a tough game.  They play against Hungary again at noon and I don't know what happens after that.  I will be driving down to watch both games.  We are not sure yet if Cameron will be able to play.  He has a terrible stomach flu and we feel so sorry for him and his mom Lori.  We know how we would feel if Matthias were here in Europe and had to stay in the hotel room and mostly in the WC at that :(.  Cameron is getting better and is holding down liquids now so we are really hoping that he will be able to join the team soon and at least have a good second week here.

March 29: Vipiteno and Bolzano, Italy

Today was a hockey day! First we drove to Vipiteno, Italy to watch the Canadian Explorers WIN the tournament there. They won all five of their games in two days in that tournament and, as our other goalie is sick - which is so sad for Cameron :( - Matthias played seven games in two days.

They won the final 5-0 and it was very exciting and I was so happy to be there to see them win! At the tournaments, they have a very official closing ceremonies where all of the teams come out onto the ice and medals are given to all of the participating teams, not just the first to third place teams. The players from the different teams and countries talk to one another and exchange pins (from their respective countries) which is really neat to see.  After the exciting win of the tournament, the team (and Mom and I following in our car) headed an hour down the road for the next tournament in Bolzano.

They had already played two games of hockey (the semi-final game which they won 7 - 1 and then the finals of the Vipiteno tournament) and they had two more to go in their next tournament. Their first game of the Igor Loro Cup ended with a 20 - 0 win! The high score made it a boring game to watch, but we were very happy to see them play so well. Although Matthias had barely any action in that game (I think we counted five shots), that made for his fifth shut-out since arriving, which is pretty great!

The second game unfortunately did not go as well, with the Austrian Selects (top players selected from all over Austria) being a very good team and beating us 7 - 3. You could certainly see how tired the Explorers were and I hope we get to play Austria again when more rested and see how it turns out. The tournament will continue until Sunday.

We arrived back at our hotel quite late (it is currently 1:25 a.m.) after the four hour drive and we will check out and say goodbye to Bad Gastein tomorrow morning. Then I am going to Frankfurt to stay with my friend who was on exchange in Courtenay first semester (Judi, for anyone who is wondering) for two days and Mom will go to Oberstaufen and check into our next hotel.  The first week in Europe has been fantastic and I am really excited about the second week!

Here are some photos from today's hockey games...

March 28: Bad Gastein, Austria

We spent the day continuing to explore Bad Gastein.  Although it looks like a small place, there is really a lot to see and it is a very charming town and area. The sun came out today and the snow is mostly melted! We decided that we wanted to visit Burg Klammstein today, a castle that was used to protect all of the Gastein Valley. We arrived at the castle and walked up to it. There was a small restaurant, a shed with some adorable cats and the large castle tower. The Burg Klammstein originally had five towers but they were all  destroyed at one point or another. What made this tour so special was our tour guide, having lived here his whole life, the now owner and operator decided to restore it himself. He now owns it and runs the restaurant and gives tours. He was so kind and sweet and had so much to share with us about the castle and all of the different artifacts he had on display inside of it. He did the whole tour in German so I didn't understand much, but I enjoyed looking around and got a good sense of the history of the castle.

After the castle tour, we headed into town where we went to the Spar (grocery store) and then to a small bakery - yum! After this, we went to the waterfall which is known to have amazing healing powers and to be very healthy for anyone around it because of the naturally negatively ionized air that is present in this area. Bad Gastein is thought to be a relaxing and thermal town because of the waters that flow through it. 

We returned to our hotel for a little while after this and then walked to a restaurant to have dinner. Now we are back at the hotel and Mom is listening to the live music in the lobby and I am planning to go to bed soon to prepare for the long day in Italy tomorrow!

Hockey update: The team is now in Vipiteno, Italy playing in a tournament there that will end tomorrow afternoon and then they will play in another tournament further south in Italy. Today, the Canadian Explorers won all three of their games in their pool and so will play in the semi-finals tomorrow morning. They won one of their games 13-0; now that they are rested and have played a few games together and have adjusted to the larger ice surface here, they are playing well!

March 27: Venice, Italy

Venice was so amazing! I loved leaving the mountains of Austria and northern Italy and arriving in this beautiful city full of canals, culture and amazing architecture.

We began our journey at 8 a.m., and it was not a boring one. We arrived at what we thought to be a toll booth within 15 minutes of starting our drive. It ended up not being a toll booth, though, but a car shuttle train, much like a ferry. Wondering what was going on, the workers assured us that this would take us to Italy and showed us where to drive onto the car shuttle. We rode up in the front passenger area of the train and the trip was about 10 minutes long.

Our car sitting on the car shuttle, there were about 6 other cars in front of us. 

After the crazy start to our trip, the rest of the drive was quite easy, and we stayed on nice main highways
(for once!). The tolls in Italy are numerous and very expensive, which is quite frustrating.  Despite this, upon reaching the long bridge that brings you into Venice, I could not only see but feel the differences between Italy and Austria, only 2 hours away. The bridge gave us breathtaking views of the Adriatic Sea. 

Once we got off the bridge, we were right in Venice. We entered this large, 2 lane traffic circle where there were tons of buses and cars, and no one was really following the rules. We saw a parkade sign and thought, seems good enough! After waiting in a line of cars to get into the parkade, we were directed to the 8th (the top) floor. So we drove around and around the narrow connecting roads until we reached the 8th floor. The view from this floor was breathtaking! 

The view in the morning when it was still cloudy. 

The view before we left in the evening; the sun was just starting to set. 

Our parking garage, Garage San Marco. At this garage, they ask you to leave your keys in the car and the car unlocked so that they can move it to allow the people parked directly behind you to get out. When the parking attendant first asked us to do this, we were quite nervous. We moved our belongings into the trunk of the car, although still accessible, it was certainly less noticeable; we also made sure to take all of our valuables with us. Happily, at the end of the day, all was where it had been left and there were no problems!

 Finally, after getting parked and organized, we departed for the real part of our visit to Venice, walking around the alleyways and the canals that are Venice. Crossing the large bridge over into this part of Venice was really magical. There were lots of people out looking around! Among the cobblestone paths, there were so many vendors and little shops, it is impossible to choose where to purchase whatever you are looking for. 

We walked around these streets just looking and admiring everything for about an hour before we decided it was time to eat lunch. I knew that I had to have pasta, being in Italy and all. We went to a cute restaurant and both Mom and I really enjoyed our meals! 

After this we decided to head toward San Marco Plaza, one of the most famous parts of Venice. Inside there is a large (and beautiful) cathedral. We followed the mostly spray painted on direction arrows toward the centre. Upon arriving, you step out of a small and dark alley and you are inside this huge square. It is amazing! I couldn't get over how grand, magnificent and stunning it was. There were so many people and there was a band playing Italian music. The sun was shining and the atmosphere was perfect.

After San Marco Square, we decided to start to find our way back to the parking garage through the streets, which proved to be a challenge. But we did eventually get there! On our way back, we also got some delicious gelato, and a huge slice of pizza! 

Here are some more pictures from the day...

I loved the day in Venice; it is such an amazing place!

Hockey update: In the first game, the Canadian Explorers lost to Switzerland 5-2. In the second game, the Canadian Explorers won against Germany 7-2.