Austria & Slovenia

Apparently I get to decide the itinerary after we leave Reece’s family behind in Hamburg 😀  This is a great deal because so far Reece has been the one to book flights and look up places to stay – he can carry on doing that and I get the fun part!

So after we spend some time with Simone in Switzerland, I’ve decided I want to head across via Innsbruck to Salzburg, and then down to Ljubljana (see if you can work out how to pronounce that!).  My current flatmate, Kim, says she loved Salzburg and has friends who went to Ljubljana and really liked it too, so it sounds like I’ve made some good choices.Haven’t figured out exactly what I want to do there, but aside from general wandering around looking at architecture and castles etc, Innsbruck has the Swarovski Crystal World; a “Christmas and Easter” shop; and a funicular and cable car up to Seegrube/Nordpark which has a great view, an Alpenzoo with all sorts of animals from the region, hiking and mountain biking trails, a restaurant and flying fox etc.  Apparently the Tyrolean honey is famous so I might be able to get some and take it back for Mum and Dad seeing as I can’t bring it to NZ.  David and Melanie (random people I found with an interesting travel website and photos) seemed to have a good time there just wandering round for the day and I don’t even know if we’ll be there for that long, might just be a few hours on our way to Salzburg.

Innsbruck, Austria

Ljubljana (LUB-li-ana) is also famous for its honey and there’s even a shop called the Honey House which is definitely on my list of things to do.  There is the Dragon Bridge guarded by four dragon statues, which have become the symbol of the city.  Also various other buildings and monuments, and a “House of Experiments” which sounds a bit like Science Alive here in Christchurch.  Aside from the Honey House I haven’t really seen anything else that majorly stood out so I think it’ll be one of those places where we just wander round and soak up the atmosphere and see what we find or what we like the look of.  Last year when I went to Melbourne with Mum I had done lots of research but there were still things I didn’t know about until I got there and found brochures so I’m expecting that to happen as well.

Dragon guarding the bridge at Ljubljana, Slovenia

Started getting quotes for travel insurance today and I can say it pays (or saves?) to shop around – prices range from $205 to $340, and the cheapest was still a reputable company.  Tower had a pretty good price and as I already have a contents policy with them (and they were easy to deal with and were fair with my recent claim) I’ll give them a call and check out the conditions and what it covers.

Too

much

to

organise

*sigh*