Ali- Thursday/Friday before last weekend marked the second to last school holiday of the year: Auffahrt. Now for those with no German skills this sounds like a holiday for flatulence but actually translates to Ascension, when Jesus went back up to Heaven to hang out with dad after a rather rough time on Earth. The Abrahams decided to ausfahrt Switzerland for Auffahrt and head to Austria, which we had yet to tour despite it being right next door.
Thursday morning we headed out in our rented Mercedes.
Just over the Austrian border, we picked up a Swiss kid- Eileen- who is the daughter of our friends from the AirBnB boat rental back in one of our September posts. On the road 
again we headed over the mountains to the Tyrol region, which is well known for its skiing, hiking and river sports. We had rented a little AirBnB in Haiming, a sleepy little town with nothing to offer but it’s proximity to everything.
After settling in I rousted the troops for an evening hike around Piburger See, which apparently is well known as the warmest lake in Tirol, or at least that’s what everyone said to us when we told them we hiked there. It’s a popular swimming spot so hard to say if it’s warmed by sun or urine. There was a nice 2 mile loop around the lake and a restaurant on the water’s edge where we could reward ourselves with beer and hot chocolate. 
Besides the beautiful view, the restaurant also served a pretty good Gulaschsuppe, which is a popular soup in both Austria and Switzerland. I was pretty excited to see that the serving bowls had the recipe printed on them (special translation note: mohre is the Austrian term for carrot.)
The big event of the weekend was a rafting trip that I had booked for us through Area 47, this crazy outdoor aventure park that I had read about in the region. So Friday morning we show up at Area 47 
and make our way to the gathering point, ogling all the crazy adrenaline junkie activities going on. In case you are wondering, the pictures below are indeed of an obstacle ropes course under a bridge, a giant rope swing, and a huge climbing wall
Unfortunately I don’t have any pictures of the rafting trip, which was labeled ‘kiddie rafting’, because water and phone cameras don’t mix. But despite the ‘kiddie’ label, we were all fully outfitted in wet suites and there were enough rapids on the Inn River to make it fun. 
The tour was well done, with two boats and lots of games, water fights and kidnapping of passengers to keep us busy. The water was far from warm – 4C – and the kids were all blue and freezing by the time we got out. Here are the kids sucking down hot chocolates after the trip.
We got entry to the water park with our rafting tickets and spent the rest of the afternoon playing on water slides and slack lines. 
The place has some amazing stuff for thrill seekers age 16 or so and older. You can see the sled and ski launches and this giant airbag thingy as well as the water slides in the back of the picture above. There was less for 11 year olds unfortunately but still well worth the visit.
Saturday morning I once again force marched the kids to a hike. This time my destination was the Stuibenfall, the tallest waterfall in Tyrol at 159 meters. The supercool thing here was the Stuibenfall Erlebnis hike or adventure hike, which is a big suspension bridge and crazy staircase that follows the waterfall up to the top.
It’s only about 3 miles of hiking but a lot of climbing. Of course, as is typical around here, there was a restaurant or Stübli at the top. We rewarded ourselves again with beer and ice cream.
The descent was quick and scenic and a good test of one’s comfort with heights.
Back at the car we headed back to Eileen’s house on the border where Gary and Miriam were cooking up a BBQ feast for us. They had just moved from Switzerland to a beautiful spot in Austria looking out at the mountains. 
They also have a new AirBnB venture: the Bubble. This is a big ….well….bubble that sits on their roof and you can rent it to sleep out in the stars. Joe, Maya and Eileen took it for a test drive Saturday night.
I opted for a mattress inside the house. Don’t get me wrong; I would love sleeping in the bubble…I just wasn’t sure I wanted to sleep in a bubble with 3 other people after a full day of hiking. The bubble doesn’t come with a shower 😉