Venice to Prague in 10 days

Well as you all can tell from the title I have spent the last 10 days traveling from Venice to Prague...and am lucky enough to continue onto Berlin tomorrow for the next 3 days. I have been traveling with a student tour group through Topdeck. There are 36 of us on the tour and believe it or not...I am the only person from the States! Most are from Australia or New Zealand...needless to say a much different crew than the Tauernhof group. It has been a lot of fun and have seen lots and LOTS of Europe. This post will be mostly a picture account as I am short on time and words never do me justice (not that the pictures will...). We spent the first day in Venice where the leader gave us simple advice for the day: "just get lost", well, I definitely succeeded in that and spent most of the day wandering the 2000+alley ways and 1000 bridges that cover the 150 islands which compose Venice...and definitely had to have some gelato in between that and chilling in St. Mark's Square. We also got to see a glass blowing demonstration which was awesome.
View from the Rialto Bridge:

St. Mark's Square:
Gelato...
Next we made the drive to Croatia stopping first in Slovenia at the Postojna Caves. Now after Tauerhof cave experience I wasn't sure I would be stepping back into a cave so soon...but this cave was much much different and even had its own lighting (no headlamps required...). The caves were beautiful: made from limestone and one of the largest in central Europe. No crawling or 'getting creative' (as Heli said) necessary.

The next 2 days we spent on the beautiful Pag Island of Croatia. Absolutely gorgeous stone beaches and sunsets and a very fun and vibrant night market/boardwalk life. The second day a few of us hopped on an hour and a half ferry over to Rab Island which has such a rich history and over 100 churches on the small island!
View of Novjava (where we stayed) just after sunset:
The second day I thought it would be a good idea to walk along the beach for a bit...8 hours later I decided it would be an even better idea to take a bus back to the hotel...one of the many gorgeous deserted beaches we came across:
Rab Island:Next we crossed back across the EU border into Slovenia once again spending the night in the capital city-Llubljana (pronounced Loo-blee-on-a). Slovenia was definitely a highlight for me (as if there could possibly be a lowlight on this trip!!). Absolutely beautiful countryside-super green and rolling hills with quaint country style houses. Llubljana was stunning as well, unfortunately we had only that one night to explore the city and all the history and culture is has to offer. We hiked up to the castle giving great views of the old city as well as explored around the famous Triple Bridge and Dragon Bridge...both of which are way older than the US (built long before Columbus even dreamt of sailing the ocean blue in 1492).
On top of the castle walls with Llubljana behind me:
Dragon Bridge:The next morning we drove on to Kirchdorf in the Tirol Region of Austria, stopping first at Lake Bled, Slovenia. Wow...I don't even know how to describe the beauty of this place. Imagine the most beautiful blue and peaceful lake you can think of...now surround it with green forestry and mountains with a castle overlooking on one of the cliffs...ok now place a simple yet stunning church on an island in the middle of the lake...yep thats it. Most of us rented legit row boats and rowed to the island church to ring the bell in the tower as it is legended to bring good luck. I rang it though I already feel like the luckiest girl in the world having the opportunity to have been there and all the other places in the world I have seen.
View from our row boat of the island with the church:Ringing the bell:
Being back in Austria, even if only for the day, was amazing! Many of the group went skydiving or canyoning...so I took the opportunity to spend the day exploring the Austrian Alps once again, with a smile on my face the whole time :)
Happy to be back on in the Alps:
An amazing waterfall that I came across:
The next stop on our itinerary was an emotional and somber morning of remembrance at the Nazi concentration camp in Mauthausen, Austria which has since been turned into an amazing memorial for all who lost their lives there.

On a much lighter note...we continued on from there to my current location: Prague in the Czech Republic (aka Praha). That night Julia (the tour leader...not to be confused with Julie my Upward Bound leader...) took us on a short walking tour of the city just to get us acquainted with the layout giving us all day today to explore the city on our own. Wow. I just walked around almost all day with my jaw ajar in awe of this gorgeous city. Almost every building is over 500 years old (most much older) as fortunately WWII did not affect the city's skyline as dramatically as it has in many other major European cities. A few of us hopped on a free 3 hour walking tour of the city to get the most out of the sites and learn quite a bit of the history. To say it was amazing would be an understatement. We also went up to the castle which overlooks the entire city and also took a trip to the top of the famous Astrological Clock in the Old Square-a long and amazing day to say the least.
The Old Square:

Castle in the background:
Changing of the guard at the castle:
Just to give you a idea why Praha is called "A City of a Thousand Spires":
Tomorrow we head off to Berlin, Germany stopping in Dresden first for a few hours. I am very excited to see the city as I have never been outside of an airport in Germany... but I am even more excited to be meeting up with a friend I met at Tauernhof-Aka, in the city for a few nights before heading off Sunday morning to meet Katelyn and the rest of the Romania FISH/UCLA team in Budapest, Hungary! Needless to say I have countless blessings and things to be excited for each and every day.

Blessings! Ajor!



Colossians 1:16-17