Home on time!

Our trip home was an "adventure" which started when we arrived at Berlin airport on Wednesday afternoon to find our flight to Amsterdam had been cancelled.


Frau Zimmer negotiated long and hard while we all waited in anticipation. We finally left Berlin in two separate groups in two different directions - Frau Zimmer was off to Vienna and Herr Black to Frankfurt.


The two groups eventually met up again on Thursday evening in Kuala Lumpur just in time to get on our schduled flight back to Auckland ... home at last!!

Danke und Auf Wiedersehen!

It's time to say thank you and good bye to our new friends and host families. We have had a wonderful time in Germany and look forward to seeing the students and teachers from the EHG in Auckland next year.
Our group will meet at Berlin Tegel airport at 3pm. Take off is at 5.40pm (Amsterdam - Kuala Lumpur - Auckland). We will arrive in Auckland on Friday at 10.50am. See you there.

Today was our first day back at school in Werder and we had one period with our hosts. We then all met up and walked to the train station to catch the train to berlin. We walked to the "Story of Berlin" exhibition and looked at what it was like to live back in the days of the World Wars and things. It is very very different to our lifestyles now, whereas back then they mostly only lived and survived in one room. We then went on a short tour through a bunker where 3600 people couldve lived throughout the cold wars if they ever got bombed. It was very cramped with beds all around and only a few toilets and only enough oxygen to last them a short period of time.

We then went shopping for like 2 hours!! we walked along the Kudamm and went to The "Ka De We" (biggest department stor in europe) and did some shopping. It was also one of the days that hadnt rained in aages, which was toll!!

Back at Werder

We all arrived back in Werder safely last night after another loooong bus ride. However it was made all the more pleasant along the way with the help of Frau Zimmer´s "Great German Bus Quiz" (aided by Herr Black as the official scorekeeper!).

Samstag was a very wet day - in Berlin anyway. I met Gemma and Alicia on the train into Berlin and saw Chris and Jack on the train home from Berlin - so who else was in Berlin?

My destination was the museum für naturkunde - just as well I am a Biology teacher because I found it really interesting!! The world´s largest dinosaur is on dispaly in the entrance hall - meet Jurascopes ....

After the museum visit we were trapped by the rollerblading marathon skating through the city ... it rivals round the bays!!

I trust your weekend has gone well - there will be more information about our weekend activities in the next post.

SALZBURG

Hello!


Today we were off to different country: Salzburg, Austria.
After a big "all you can eat" Breakfast we set off.
Once we arrived we had a 1 ½ hour long walking tour through Salzburg. We were shown Famous and old historic buildings and were told about there history.







We were also shown some places in which scenes from the musical "Sound of Music" were film.
After our interesting tour we got a few minutes free time to get some lunch, and then we were off to Fortress Hohensalzburg. It is a massive fortress situated on the top of a very large mountain. It was defiantly an impressive building with an amazing view from the top tower.

After the tour we had some more free time for shopping before we had to get back on the bus to go back to the Youth Hostel.


We were very lucky with the weather as it never rained but unfortunately because of the cloud we were unable to see the Bavarian Alps clearly.
Tomorrow we set back off for the long journey back to Werder.
Until later.
Bye Bye

Alicia

Todays Report 26 sep

Today !

first of all we had cerial and giant pretzels for breakfast, and after that we were ready to go - to munich!

First of all we had a guided tour through munich, we saw all the sights of munich had to offer, including a huge church, the city, visual art and the local malls. the picture you saw was of the old town hall, the ´rathaus.´

after we saw that, we enjoyed some authentic delicious german 'weißwurst' (or white saussage) at the hofbräuhaus in central munich.

after that was the best part - we saw the oktoberfest! there are many big rides - i went on a rollercoaster that completly outdid anything at rainbows end !! there was also alot of german dancing in the beer tents which was fun to watch, its an awesome event!

This is a photo of one of that hats that i got, and alot of the others also got similar hats too.

bis später - Chris.

p.s This is gordan cleaning up his mess in our room

Tuesday's activities

Our hostel is set in a beautiful valley - we have seen it from the top of the gondola ride as well as when we walked from Aschau village - about 15 minutes down the road. The houses and shops in the village are very photogenic!