April

   So this is the last day of the month and of course I procrastinated until today to finish this blog post. This April has been absolutely crazy and not just because of the weather. I switched host families for the last time, which means I have less than three months of exchange left. It has been a crazy month here; we had a two week break for Easter, I spent my birthday in Italy, traveled to three new cantons, visited Europa Park in Germany, and celebrated my eight months in Switzerland.

   One of the two new cantons I visited this month was canton Jura, a french-speaking canton in the Northwest of Switzerland. It's the newest canton to be added to the Swiss Confederation. It was beautiful place to visit with my Canadian friend. We started in Delemont, the capitol of canton Jura where we walked through the town taking tons of pictures of the beautiful french buildings. We then set off to a small town called St. Ursanne, which caught both of us by surprise. It was like something out of a fairy tale. The town is secluded in a valley in the middle of the Swiss hills, to get into town we had to walk down from the train station. It was absolutely magical and we spent the time wandering the town and taking tons of pictures.

St. Ursanne, some pictures of the beautiful buildings.

In St. Ursanne, one of the many random doors we found. 

     During the second week of Easter Break, my host family took me to Lake Garda in the Northern section of Italy. We woke up extremely early on Wednesday to drive around four hours to Verona, a beautiful typical Italian city. Thankfully the weather held out as we explored the city and historic Roman Colosseum. We grabbed a quick bite of delicious Italian pizza and of course gelato. We then headed off to Bardolino, on Lake Garda where we found our bed and breakfast and took a nice long break before running through a rainstorm to find some pasta for dinner.

   On my birthday, we were in Bardolino and spent the entire morning on the goods market shopping and looking at all the items on sale. I bought myself five pairs of shoes, a wallet, two dresses, a few necklaces, and lots of postcards. We had perfect weather as we were shopping through the market and after we got back to the bed and breakfast it started raining again. For dinner we sent off to Garda, another small town on Lake Garda, for more Italian pasta.

  The last day of our Italian vacation was spent in Sermione, a half island on Lake Garda complete with a beautiful castle. We spent a few hours exploring the town and seeing the castle, before grabbing lunch and driving home.

My host mom and I on Lake Garda.

Five pairs of shoes, I love Italy. 

Me and my host brother in Verona, on top of the Colosseum.

   Last weekend, I set off to Shaffhausen, a small canton wedged between Austria and Germany to see the Rhine Falls with my friend Ana. The Rhine Falls is the biggest waterfall in Europe and thankfully we had perfect weather to watch the falls. It was beautiful, but from what I have heard from Niagara Falls this was in no comparison. We then headed off to Luzern to enjoy dinner outside in the great weather on the lake shore.

   I had great April and its so hard to believe that I have less than three months left here. Time seems to be flying by so much faster than I would like. I can't believe its almost over, I have so many more things that I have to do before I go home.

At the Rhine Falls, in Shaffhausen.

Found Subway in Zurich!