Salzburg - a pretty cool school excursion!

Hallo! 

Today we went on an excursion to Salzburg, Austria, the home of Mozart, the Sound of Music and the most incredible scenery I’ve ever seen. It was yet another beautiful warm day, which made the day even more amazing.

We drove by bus along the Autobahn to Salzburg, which took about one and half hours. It’s funny to think that in an hour and a half in Australia, we can drive to another state, and here they can drive to another country in the same amount of time.

We passed some of the huge, incredible mountains on the way. I was in absolute awe! The mountains were so steep and tall, so different to our mountains in every way possible! There were bright blue, crystal clear rivers curving through towns and flowing under bridges. The houses were very traditional with their balconies dotted with brightly coloured flowers.

Our first stop was at a 500 year old salt mine just out of Salzburg. There, we went on a tour of the salt mines, which are still used today. We rode on a small train into the mountain and then slid down a huge wooden slide. It was so fun! We were shown around and told all about the history of the mine.

Afterwards, we made our way to Salzburg. It was fantastic. The buildings are so magnificent and have so much history. I couldn’t quite comprehend how old everything really was. Salzburg wasn't bombed during World War 2, which is why there are still so many original buildings and the city still has its original layout.

The Salzburg Cathedral was built in 1181! In Australia, the oldest buildings are around 200 years old. Buildings here are over 800 years old!  The city is overlooked by Hohensalzburg Castle, which is over 900 years old.  We walked through the city and saw water fountains, busy markets' and beautiful gardens. We saw the house where Mozart was born and the gardens at Mirabell Palace.

I loved every minute of being in Salzburg. It is the most beautiful and intriguing place I’ve ever been to. It was like nothing I’ve ever seen before. I hope to go back there one day so I can explore even more of the city!

Elly

The Best Time!

Hey everyone. It has been a big week for all if us this week. Full of fun and excitement. I am having the best time.

Today we had a normal school day with no interruptions. Unfortunately I have to get up at 6:00 every morning and it is not the best thing but I am sure I'll get used to it. Kilian and I walk to the bus stop where we get picked up and taken to the train station. It is a 20-30 minute trip to Bad Aibling where we only stop once to change trains. My train ride is pretty good. I mostly listen to music and try pick up some of the language that Kilian and his friends speak, it is German but it's like German with super speed added to it. Lots of them speak so fast it sounds like they are just saying random things. 

School is so good here. Apart from getting up early, and classes starting at 7:55am you get to finish at the way earlier time of 12:50pm. It is awesome. After school you can go and see things and do things and not worry about, let's say, getting your homework done in time. The classes are pretty good too. Each goes for 45 minutes and they are run very well. The teachers are good too. They are nice and explain everything clearly. My class is funny sometimes, but they all get the work done. 

The school is so big here, they actually have more than one school. The Wirtschaftsschule is part of a school precinct.  There is a grammar school which is the highest level of education and ours is in the middle of three. But this one is different to other German schools because it is a business school. Unlike us back in Bright, they learn, accounting, economics, operational economics and so on. It is a really nice school. 

My time in Germany just keeps on getting better and better. I am getting used to how the people live here and how their days pan out. I feel like it is becoming normal. 

Tonight I am going to a festival which is like the Oktoberfest but is it much smaller, less expensive and less crowded. It seems like they have a festival on everywhere week after week. Some of them go for months. On Saturday I'm going to the Oktoberfest in München. It will be very crowded and very expensive but I am looking forward to it a lot.  

I am having a great time her among these people and their culture. (Don't worry mum and dad I am coming home). 

Daniel

We had a meeting with the mayor - Herr Schwaller

Walking through the Kurpark in Bad Aibling

Delicious ice-cream from the local 'Eisdiele'

The Salt mines

Think of the longest word you know, now multiply it by 3 or so, and you get the German word,  Donaudampfschifffahrtselektrizitätenhauptbetriebswerkbauunterbeamtengesellschaft. This mouthful means: ". Association for subordinate Officials of the head office management of the Danube steamboat electrical services"

"Why?" You may ask, the reason for the length of some German words is simply you can compound various German words into one long word. So, a trip to Germany (a Germany travel) becomes Germany travel. 

Here's a short video that shows how to do this, HOWEVER it is in German, but you might be able to get the gist of it.  Https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gG62zay3kck

Today, we spent some time in Salzburg, Austria, and at the Salzbergwerk salt mine, also known as the Salt Mine Berchtesgarden. To get down into the mines, we rode a small train, similar to a roller coaster, through a series of tunnels not wide enough to stretch your arms out in. Down the bottom, we were given an audioguide which (thankfully) was in English.  This mine has been in operation for 500 years.  They can now mine a distance in 3 days that previously took 1 whole year.

After listening to the first section, we went down a big wooden slide, and made our way to the lowest, publicly accessible floor, over 130 meters below the ground! Once there, we took a boat ride across "Mirror Lake" where the lights dimmed and a light show reflected off the surface of the water to light up the cabin, while classical music played in the background, I found it quite emotional! On the other side of the lake, we were given some very salty water to try, which when poured on your hand and left to dry, created salt crystals on you skin!  It was 28% salt.  The water in the ocean is about 4%.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed it


Ethan Murphy.

Mirror Lake, 130 meters below ground

The roof of a beautiful Austrian church

Hello everyone, 

Today was my first full day at Wirtschaftsschule Alpenland. It is so different to our school back in Bright.  Firstly there are the school finishing times: we finish school at 3.20 whereas the Wirtschaftsschule finishes at 12.50 . They have a lot of business oriented classes for example: accounting, social science and economics - which is the special focus of the school. Their classes go for 45 minutes each and they have one break of 25 minutes after period three. 

It is sometimes very hard to understand what the teachers say and what the students say because they talk so fast but hopefully I will understand more further in my exchange. All the people here are very nice and they always say hello to you. Today was my exchange partners Opa's Geburstag so we went after school to my host family's Omas and Opas house and celebrated his birthday 

Here is a picture of the cake. It was very good. followed by a Barvarian meat platter. 

I  went to Andrea's Judo class. We don’t have this in Bright, it's like karate though.  

Danke Schön, 

Matilda Manning 

Wow, what a day! Today was the first day of school. One of the things I noticed that was different was that my exchange partner told me to set my alarm for 6:00 AM. For me that was very hard to do. When I went down for breakfast the sun hadn't even risen yet! Breakfast was interesting. They had all sorts of bread and rolls and cereal.

I arrived at school and it was amazing. The construction of the building was flawless and inside the windows let the sunlight in and it was so clean. The school has Three parts to it: The Gymnasium, Economics school and the High school. The whole school was spread out and it was split into Three.

It was quite daunting because there wasn't many familiar faces but everyone greeted me with a smile and a "hallo". Sophia (My host Partner) introduced me to all of her friends. I said "Servus"because I was about to get a tour of the school from Frau Kreplin. The school was big. Not so much spread out but tall. It was 4 stories tall. I asked how many classrooms there were and the response: 100! Our school has 24 and they have 100. I was shocked. The tour had finished.

We headed over to the sport hall. Sport was so much fun! We started off with dodge-ball but then I had to quickly run back to the change-rooms to get changed into my exchange T-shirt for the assembly speech.

Whew, was I nervous! I kept running my speech over and over in my head and making sure it was correct and then re-checking it again. The principal introduced us to the school and the speeches commenced. I was second. My speech contained my name, age, some of my hobbies, some of my favorite food and my favorite animal. Afterwards I realized that there was nothing to be worried about because they all appreciated our speeches. Sophia and me went back to sport class and we did 15 minutes of running. (It felt like half a day!)

Break / Pause was short, (about 25 minutes.)

I had another lessen :TV (Pronounced Teh-Vau) In this, we worked on computers. The first thing I noticed was the keyboard. It wasn't majorly different but the "Y" and "Z" are swapped around and a couple of the commas and signs above the numbers were swapped around too. Also, they have "ü" on the keyboard. This lesson was like "IT" (Information Technology)

Now, bowling time! We walked from the Wirtschaftsschule to the Bowling Platz. I had no idea what to expect because we walked about 2 or 3 kilometers through farms and barn yards. But we got there eventually. The bowling sight was on a telecommunications sight with big white buildings that looked like Golf Balls. When we got to the place it was this typical German building that you would not expect there to be a bowling alley in there. Inside, it was so cute and retro with this big, long bar. We all gave our shoe sizes and got sorted into teams. In my team was Sophia Kloss, Sophia Wagner, Ellie Jenkins and me. Ellie was a Super-Star bowler. I hadn't bowled in a while so I was a bit rusty. I started to get the hang of it after a while.

We played two rounds and I ended up 3rd in our team.

Once everyone was done we got Pommes (Chips) with "Ketchup" or "Weiss" (mayonnaise). They were really nice to eat after a good few rounds of bowling.

It was such a great day and I am looking forward to many more!

Tessa Williams

First Day in Germany

I don’t mind plane trips but a 24 hour trip is hard for anyone. Leaving at 3:15 on Friday afternoon was a sad and exciting occasion. Saying goodbye to our families and hello to an adventure. The plane trip was long and boring but we made it!

Germany! Where do I begin?! My first impression of the airport in Germany was that the lines were long and slow, but after we finally made it through we had a welcome party waiting for us! After wearing the same clothes for 24 hours it was great to arrive and still have people wanting to hug you. It was lovely to see all our German friends and meet their families.

My first day in Germany was one full of excitement. The Oktoberfest, home to beer drinking and Lederhosen. It was a little bit overwhelming to walk through masses of people, many of whom had already started drinking at 11 o’clock in the morning. It was a great experience, lots of beer, people and entertainment, although not something you could stay at for long periods of time.

One of the many things we did was to go to a beer garden. Yes, the name suggests beer but that is not all. We went for lunch and had an amazing meal, a lot bigger than some of us expected, in a beautiful garden.

I had a lovely day and enjoyed every minute, but one of my favourite times was the drive to the Wichmanns. The first part that stood out was driving on the opposite side of the road, meaning that everything is backwards.

The Autobahn was a little bit scary but really amazing at the same time! Driving down the highway with no speed limits. My favourite part of the whole drive was the views. Germany is beautiful. Driving along the Autobahn with a view of the Alps in the distance; so different to Australian mountains, these are shaped, they look like they have meaning rather than just being round. The whole drive I had been in awe over how beautiful the countryside was, driving through green paddocks before coming into a little forest for a few minutes before more paddocks, traditional houses and mountains in the background; we stopped at a little lookout just before getting to the Wichmann’s house; for a view of the Chiemsee. Hot air balloons flying over it, yachts sailing on it, the stunning islands with their castles and of course, the Alps.

It seemed like a good idea to go on the Olympic Rings Rollercoaster at Oktoberfest but it was really scary!

The view from the lookout near the Wichmann’s house.

Teagan.

Gegenbesuch

After much planning, preparation and excitement the Bright P-12 College Exchange group departed Tullamarine airport on Friday 23 September to complete the German part of the 2016 reciprocal exchange program. We were all very excited to meet up again with the friends we made during the exchange visit in Bright earlier this year.  For a number of students in the group, this was their first time to be visiting another country.

The flights were long and no one was really able to sleep much.  We were all grateful for the in-flight entertainment that helped pass the hours.  

The final farewell at Tullamarine

'Frequent flyers'

Another very relaxed traveller

The stopover in Bangkok was challenging.  We were all feeling very tired and just wanted to sleep.  Some of us found a spot to lie down and rest while we waited. 

The sign and the smiles say it all...We made it!

We were all happy and relieved to find each and every suitcase had arrived in Munich with us.

We have now spent a beautifully warm and sunny weekend in Bad Aibling and surrounds with host families  Tomorrow the next part of the adventure will begin, with students attending their first day of school at the Wirtschaftsschule Alpenland.

Stay tuned for more blog entries, as each student writes about their experiences and impressions of their time on exchange.

Servues, Katrina Ciolli