Ten Year Anniversary Trip

This past March we celebrated our 10 year Anniversary and also hit the 5 year mark in Switzerland. We knew that we wanted to go on some sort of special trip for our anniversary and after much discussion and an almost bike tour around Scotland we settled on a bike tour from Salzburg, Austria to Ljubjana, Slovenia. We knew the Austrian countryside and mountain were beautiful and we always wanted to go back to Slovenia after a 3 day stay a few years ago. So we settled on the route from Salzburg to Ljubljana including a few mountain passes. We still want to go visit Scotland on bike but the costs were getting too high and we needed a few extra days to tour around the Island of Skye, Scotland.
John used a great app called Komoot, which was really helpful in planning the route of our tour. It really did a good job at using bike paths and less heavily traveled roads when possible.  Thankfully Austria and Slovenia happen to have a lot of less traveled roads and or biking roads/paths.

After a 7 hour drive that was supposed to be 5.5(there are always traffic jams in Europe) we are ready to bike 60 km to Hallstatt, Austria. 

The added effort it takes to ride with the extra weight of the packs was a bit more than I anticipated.

One of the short sections of gravel path that we had to ride on in Austria.

Day one completed, outside of Hallstatt, Austria where we slept at a hostel.

The river behind the hostel.

Breakfast number one at the hostel. It is a rule of thumb to sleep somewhere that also has a breakfast in the morning. The European breakfasts have grown on us: Muesli, fresh cheese, salami, bread, and fruit.

After breakfast we loaded up the bikes and got ready to hit the road. The second morning we moved a bit slowly in hopes that the rain would move out.

Hallstatt in the background. 

Foggy slightly rainy selfie before the start of day 2.

John had to frequently stop to check the route which he had downloaded to his phone... No one wants  get lost!!

Random Austrian town on day 2. The little towns are so quaint and pretty!

The Austrian towns are just so pretty!

This was our lunch spot on day 2. We kept it simple and picked up sandwiches and snacks from a gas station .

Pretty flowers in the Sölktal, where we spent night 2 halfway up a mountain pass in the middle of Nowhere.

The flower filled bus stop!

This was a lake we saw on the way up the Sölkpass on day 2.

Agnes' guesthouse was our accommodations for night two. It was just us and another bike tour group.

Beers on Agnes' porch while enjoying the view and the quiet. This valley is named the valley of Erholung (recuperation). The name is very fitting.

Agnes' homecooking, delicious.

Day 3 at the top of the Sölkpass, 1790 meters but sadly no view. It was actually quite cold and windy.

Lunch in the valley after coming down the Sölkpass.

Our next Guest house in Austria was 1.5 km outside of Sankt Veit an der Glan. It was a beautiful walk into town for dinner.  

Sankt Veit an der Glan Old town.

Beautiful walk home after dinner with mountains in the background.

Another wonderful breakfast at the guesthouse, this time with farm fresh eggs.

Day 4 took us to Slovenia and up the Loiblpass.  It was a beautiful climb, without too many cars.  

We made it to the top and into Slovenia... I was out of breath during that climb!!

So happy to have made it to Slovenia. It is such a beautiful country!

Our guesthouse outside of Lake Bled, Slovenia.

Selfie at the popular Lake Bled. It is truly a stunning area.

The castle up on the hill overlooking Lake Bled.

Sunset at Bled.

The last day we decided to do a beautiful loop through the national park outside of Bled. The Guesthouse owners let us leave our packs there (yes!!). Then after the ride we caught the train to Ljubiana. The loop included a significant climb which was steeper than we expected!

Lake Bohinj

After 5 days on the bike, we fully enjoyed the huge continental breakfast at our hotel in Ljubiana.

Another picture of Lake Bohinj. Slovenia is truly of beautiful place.

Old town Ljubiana has such a fun vibe.

And lastly a picture from Villach, Austria. This is where I got to spend  5 hours waiting for John to take the train  (our bikes weren't allowed on this specific train and we had missed our reserved train) to get our car, pick me up, and then drive through the night to get home. It wasn't how we had hoped to end the trip, but all in all it was a Wonderful week!!

Livigno, Italy

During the Fasnacht school holiday (2 week break for the winter carnival) we headed to Livigno for a week of snow fun!  John and I had spent two days in Livigno last summer, during our 5 day, no children vacation. We noticed that they had a wonderful looking kids club with ski school right in the center of the village. After looking into prices of various things (ski lessons, housing, kids club) we pretty much decided last summer that we would be taking a ski vacation to Livingo.

The valley

The trip there is about 4 hours, which includes driving over a pass or using a car train. This is a bit far by Swiss standards for a week vacation, but for us it was doable.  After driving through a one way tunnel you enter the valley where Livigno is. There are ski slopes on both sides of the valley and about 30 km of cross country ski trails and 30 km of groomed walking paths.  There is really something for everyone to do here. We ended up renting a apartment, but there are a lot of family friendly hotels with suites and kids play areas. Another benefit is that the bus system is amazing and free of charge. We got away with not needing a stroller at all.
We arrived in Living on Saturday and had some time to get settled and take a walk around town. Then Sunday to Friday the kids had kids club/ski school and John and I had time to ski, do a fat bike tour, cross country ski, and take a few lessons. Elliott was a bit sick with a stomach bug which led to him not really wanting to ski and he stayed home with us 1.5 days. We still got to do all the activities we wanted to do and Elliott had fun playing in the snow at the kids club.

Doing some walking and shopping on day 1

So much snow! The mountains in the background are in the direction of Switzerland (Engadin).

Livigno is down in the valley and the other ski area on the other side.

Enjoying some Cappuccinos- also very important in Italy!

Snowshoe walk with bear

Elliott's sick day with mom and dad...

... was tiring.

Skiing selfie

Downhill portion on the Fat Bike tour... a bit scary.

Hannah finishing her race! She was one of the youngest in her group and she had no problem keeping up! 

Hannah with her Italian ski instructor.

We loved Livigno and would recommend to any family. It is also a great summer destination and is very popular for its downhill mountain biking. The kids club is also open in the summer and your kids can work on mountain biking skills.