Tuesday, September 2, 2014

Kranjska Gora

Random fact of the day: Austria is a small country.

When I open Google Maps and search "Sweden", the scale of the map is 1:200 km. When I change the country to Austria, the scale changes to 1:20 km. Of course, this is partly because of the shape of countries, but the fact is that Sweden is about 5 times bigger than Austria.

For us who are used to driving 300 km in one way for a climbing trip, the difference is huge. We once drew a circle around Vienna with a 320 km radius (the distance from Umeå to Niemisel), to understand better what we have for weekend destinations. Within the circle, there are climbing destinations in Austria, Germany, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia and Slovenia. (A bit bigger circle and Italy is also inside.) There are also six capitals within the circle.


And climbing is not the only thing you can do around here. When Jouni and Janne went to Slovenia for downhill biking, they didn't have to ask me twice to come along.



Kranjska Gora


Åbo-boys getting psyched


Slovenian style to attach knee pads


 A lift and some Slovenian mountains


Yes, we are too fat to "earn our turns"


Here we go!!


 Me on a track


Janne in the woods. He was the only guy who actually knew how to ride.


Jouni and Janne enjoying Slovenian tracks. It's pretty damn fun even if you are a beginner.


Janne dropping from a ramp


Me taking some huuuge air


It's funny how little these drops feel until you are at the very end of the ramp and have no time to chicken out.


Some guys play it harder



It was quite warm with all protections



Jouni cooling down


It was not a bad day


Especially as there was a beach volleyball world tour in Klagenfurt. Somehow we ended up at the party...