Venice, Italy
6 hours from Thun and we were in Venice. Easy enough with our rail passes in hand and a few days free during the week. Stepping out of the train station, we were right in there in the real Venice! The only Venice we’ve ever known has been the Venetian hotel in both Las Vegas and Maccau! We booked a bed and breakfast and upon crossing the first bridge over one of the canals and taking a turn at the first small street , I knew this would be a town where a map is absolutely necessary! We zig zagged our way through the tiny streets and eventually found our B&B called ‘Happy Venice’. It was overlooking a canal just over a bridge.
that's me in the window of our room!
When we arrived the lady answered the door, a old Italian women with absolutely NO English, yet she’s been doing this with her daughter (I assume she speaks English) for years. In Italian, and only Italian she explained everything we needed to know and more or less understood as she showed us the house. The place had only 3 rooms, 2 of which over looked the canal and one of them was ours! The gondolas would come rowing by our window and people stopped to take pictures on the bridge. It was a great location and we definitely chose a winner!
We stayed in Venice for 2 nights and while we walked a ton and crossed a thousand bridges, we also ate and drank a ton as well. We visited the beautiful churches and a couple museums and in the evening enjoyed real Italian food including gelato with plenty of wine. While we didn’t get to Stand Up Paddle in the canals, the highlight of the trip was learning to row a gondola. Instead of taking a quick 20 minute gondola ride for way too much money, we saved the romance and opted to learn how drive one instead. Jane from Row in Venice, taught us how to for a 2 hour session on a canal. While we weren’t on the Grand Canal, a smaller less busy one was much better suited to us first timers. Before we headed out, as we watched the Gondoliers the day before, they make it look effortless. Motorboats and water taxis zip in and out of the gondolas and they have no problems not running into each other. While they make it look effortless, for us it definitely wasn’t a walk in the park.
Jane showed us the basic stroke on her 2 man gondola and then we set off for a couple hours of rowing. The front man was obviously easier then the back one who was in charge of steering. It’s amazing how they can actually steer this around the tight corners of the canals and boat traffic without hitting anyone else or tipping over. We can’t say we became experts after our 2 hour less, but did manage to get a little better at the technique and helping row this big boat back to the marina safely. It was great, but both Nick and I think we’ll stick to SUP.
We stayed in Venice for 2 nights and while we walked a ton and crossed a thousand bridges, we also ate and drank a ton as well. We visited the beautiful churches and a couple museums and in the evening enjoyed real Italian food including gelato with plenty of wine. While we didn’t get to Stand Up Paddle in the canals, the highlight of the trip was learning to row a gondola. Instead of taking a quick 20 minute gondola ride for way too much money, we saved the romance and opted to learn how drive one instead. Jane from Row in Venice, taught us how to for a 2 hour session on a canal. While we weren’t on the Grand Canal, a smaller less busy one was much better suited to us first timers. Before we headed out, as we watched the Gondoliers the day before, they make it look effortless. Motorboats and water taxis zip in and out of the gondolas and they have no problems not running into each other. While they make it look effortless, for us it definitely wasn’t a walk in the park.
Jane showed us the basic stroke on her 2 man gondola and then we set off for a couple hours of rowing. The front man was obviously easier then the back one who was in charge of steering. It’s amazing how they can actually steer this around the tight corners of the canals and boat traffic without hitting anyone else or tipping over. We can’t say we became experts after our 2 hour less, but did manage to get a little better at the technique and helping row this big boat back to the marina safely. It was great, but both Nick and I think we’ll stick to SUP.
St. Marks Square
Lausanne, Switzerland
Suzanne and I and the view!
We checked out the city of Lausanne and Lutry on Lake Geneva before heading to the Swiss SUP championship race. We met, fellow paddler, Susanne at the International Surfing Day a couple weeks before and she invited us to stay with her for the weekend! It’s always great to have locals to show you around town. There was a big gymnastic competition going on, so the small town Lutry where she lived was housing the Australian team and had all sorts of Australian flags up around town, a warm welcome for Nick! The area is absolutely beautiful with the vineyards lining the surrounding hills.
walking in the village of Lutry
welcome Nick!
having some Swiss raclette
Basel
One of the great advantages of buying an unlimited Eurail pass is being able to just jump on a train for the day and discover a new city. This past week we went to Basel for a few hours. We walked around the historic old town, visited a few churches, ate lunch on the river and did some shopping. It’s a much bigger town then Thun, but still small enough to walk around and see most of the sights of the old area in an afternoon.
SUP White Water Camping Swiss Grand Canyon
Nick, Neil and I took a white water SUP camping trip to the Swiss Grand Canyon for 2 nights. It was July 4th and Nick remembered everything to help celebrate even if it was in Switzerland and with an Aussie and a Englishman! Earlier in the day he surprised me with a an piece of apple pie and when we got to the campground after a beautiful 3 hour drive through the mountains, he had brought not only ingredients for smores, but also sparklers to celebrate. We set up camp including, Neil’s huge luxury 3 room tent and cooked dinner. These were followed by smores and a few attempts to spell out USA in sparklers. I think it was the 6th try and we finally got it. I said that we weren’t going to bed until we did it successfully!
Happy July 4th from Switzerland
making s'mores
a beautiful church in the mountains
These cows blocked the road for a while during our drive
In the morning we woke up and drove down to the river to start our paddling adventure. The bottom half was easier and was good to get some practice. These rivers are not deep here unlike the US and prove to be more technical then what I would imagine on others. Add to it the lack of rain and the water levels were quite shallow with plenty of rocks popping up. I think my thoughts were just don’t get hurt and it will be a success. The scenery around was amazing and the coolest part about it was around 3 hours later after having paddled and surfed a few stationary waves we got out walked up to the train station which lines the river and took it back to where we began in about 5 minutes. We took a break and had a great lunch by the river and then did another run in the afternoon. A combination of having a little more confidence and switching to Neils 12’6 river runner board made the 2nd go much easier for me.
on a standing wave
Nick powering through the rapids
I made it through as well!
Me in a riverbug
after the first day, us 3 waiting for the train
that's the river we paddled down below
Wake Up in Gunten
We helped Neil with a C4 isup demo at a wakeboard event nearby on Lake Thun. Lots of people tried out paddleboards and even had a small race that my race partner, Maru and I won. We scored new belts that had the event logo on it, which were made by a company Street Belts (www.streetbelt.ch) and pretty cool looking. These belts seem to be quite popular here. They originally started by using old fire hydrants and taking the numbers, which look like buckles and putting them on belts. In addition to paddling, Nick also did some wakeboarding for the first time. The skies were clear for the weekend and perfect scenery with the snowcapped mountains in the background.
Nick racing
and he's up wakeboarding!
what a view!
International Surfing Day: Rolle, Switzerland
We got off the plane in Geneva and jumped on a train to Rolle, where Neil had arranged us to stay with a fellow paddler, Pascal, until we met the next day in Rolle for the International Surfing Day SUP event. Pascal was organizing the event and we were put straight to work. Well, sort of. The first stop was to the local winery where the grapes on their property are made into wine. We traveled up from the lake in to the vineyards to do some wine tasting at 10 in the morning! What a great way to start our trip, this place is beautiful. The rest of the day was spent helping set up for the event and organize things from the event ‘base’ which was Pascal’s mom’s house. It was a beautiful house overlooking their vineyards and Lake Geneva. In the evening we visited a small village with Pascal and had some delicious perch straight from the lake and local wine.
The next day we spent at the event helping out Neil and Rita, who are the distributors for the brand C4, teach people to SUP on their boards. There were 6 other brands present and was a big test day with lots of people trying out SUP in front of the Rolle Castle. What a backdrop and even despite the clouds and colder temps over 150 people got out on the water. I even did a couple 20 minute SUP Fit classes for people to join in.
Lake Geneva
exercises on the SUP
Nick doing a demo
C4 Switzerland set up
SUP Fit in front of the Castle
Our summer in Switzerland begins!
out on our friend Steve's boat
Last year we met Neil and Rita who live in Thun, Swtizerland through a guide in France that used to work with Neil. We were looking for a place to SUP while in Switzerland and he had told us to get in touch with him. Well we did and we are thankful we did because that’s how we’ve ended back in Switzerland for the summer! We had told Neil last year that if there was a chance that we could come back next summer and help him out with SUP or tubing (he has a tubing business as well), then we’d come back in a heartbeat. Throughout the year we’d stayed in touch and in March we made it official that we’d come back. He found us room to rent in an apartment just across from Lake Thun and we were super excited to experience Switzerland as well as travel Europe again for another summer.
While Neil had said that we were less then 100 meters to the lake from our new home in Switzerland on Lake Thun, I don’t think we believed or realized how close that was. When we showed up, we were stoked, our room even has lake and mountain views. The apartment belongs to Masa and Sabrina and Sabrina works for Neil during the summer. Masa runs the local lake pool that is directly across the street and besides the 2 cats that they have (Nick's allergic), it’s a absolutely perfect location. They have let us use their shopping bikes for the summer and it takes only about 10 minute ride along the lake to get to the town. Here are a few pics from our new lake house!
While Neil had said that we were less then 100 meters to the lake from our new home in Switzerland on Lake Thun, I don’t think we believed or realized how close that was. When we showed up, we were stoked, our room even has lake and mountain views. The apartment belongs to Masa and Sabrina and Sabrina works for Neil during the summer. Masa runs the local lake pool that is directly across the street and besides the 2 cats that they have (Nick's allergic), it’s a absolutely perfect location. They have let us use their shopping bikes for the summer and it takes only about 10 minute ride along the lake to get to the town. Here are a few pics from our new lake house!
view from our apartment and a storm coming
lake jump event at the local lake pool
out on a the lake
beautiful!
jumping in the clouds
wake surfing
wake sup'ing
Cable Park in Abu Dhabi
A couple months ago a wakeboarding cable park opened in Abu Dhabi adding a bit more excitement to ‘things to do’ in Abu Dhabi. I got a chance to check this out with some friends and spent a couple hours wakeboarding.
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