Tscheppaschlucht Canyon

The international team organized a visit to "The famous (unbeknown to me) Tscheppaschlucht Canyon". This area is about 20 minutes from Klagenfurt and offered a lovely landscape. We spent all afternoon hiking it's rugged terrain and climbing innumerable stairs, but the views were worth the effort.

It reminded me of Tahlequah-the water, trees, and even a steep hill with white rocks. Can't wait to get back to the cabin, the tubs, all my little cousins making me s'mores, etc.

There was a part of the trail that didn't allow shoes...in the middle of a hike through the wilderness. We all had to take our shoes off and walk through wood chips, then gravel, followed by big stones that really hurt, then through the moss-covered rocks in the water, a bit in dirt, then a section of logs. I'm not sure what the point of this was (maybe they explained in German?!), but it led us to this 'magic circle'. Needless to say, our sore and dirty feet were not happy by this point. They made us walk along the magic path, so we followed directions begrudgingly. At least we got this cool snapshot as we delicately balanced on a small stump. (ignore my psychotic looking eyes)

Lovely French friends above, reppin France

Lovely Aussie friend below

You can take the girl out of the biology department, but you can't take the

 biology department out of the girl...

After warning everyone about the creek water they were drinking, explaining about snakes and their cold blood situation, I discovered this little guy.

I'm callin common field Vole. Microtus arvalis pallus. Dad?