Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Austria: Innsbruck and Swarovski Crystal

This week IBI was in Innsbruck, Austria! We actually got to stay at an Olympic practice facility where athletes stayed and practiced before they go off to the Olympics. The stadium was right next to us and we even played ultimate frisbee and soccer on their turf fields! There was an Austrian team there while we were and I think we figured out that one of them was a three time gold winner for skiing. We never got a chance to talk to them though.

Innsbruck is just beautiful with the Alps mountains on all sides of us, some with snow still on the top. It was actually close to 90 degrees all week too! This is rare for Austria, our hotel didn't even have a/c! On Sunday, we made an excursion to a mountain lake. The water was really cold but that didn't keep us from jumping off the diving boards and water trampoline. The water was green and fairly pure as well. We played volleyball and wandered around for the remainder of the day until we went back to our hot hotel.

We had classes most of the week with a test on Monday and presentation throughout the week. On Wednesday, we visited Swarovski Crystal, the most popular manufacturer of crystals in the world. The company is still family owned and operated except on a very large scale now. The tour was great and we had the opportunity to experience the Crystal World exhibit (pictured left). Outside were some tents and other pieces of artwork scattered about. A fashion show practice run was taking place in a tent to the left also. The actual exhibit though starts just underneath the face with the waterfall. The entire thing was underground and featured many different crystal works and other forms of "art." Some of it was extremely odd but most was very creatively featured with lights and lasers bouncing off of large crystal sculptures. Then, at the end of the exhibit, we were dumped into the gift shop where every body had to buy something.

Austria was a beautiful country, but tomorrow we leave for Switzerland!


Austria