Saying Goodbye!

The day has finally arrived. It’s time to go home. Our day got off to a stressful start, though. We had to quickly pack everything into our suitcases, weigh them, and eat breakfast, because we were supposed to meet at 8:45 a.m. to walk to Central Park.

 After a walk of about 30 minutes, we arrived. We had some time to look around. Of course, we couldn’t miss the chance to take some photos. 

After that, we headed to the Museum of Modern Art. We had an hour to look at the many beautiful paintings. Then it was time for one last lunch and some free time. My friends and I went to a Bowl restaurant, and on the way we passed the famous Louis Vuitton suitcase building. At 1:00 p.m., we set off back toward the hotel—unfortunately while it was raining.

From there, we took the bus to Newark Airport. Our flight home departed at 6:00 p.m. After a long 7 hours, we finally arrived in Frankfurt, completely exhausted. From there, we finally made our way to Salzburg. Around 10 a.m., we were warmly welcomed by all our parents—they even had a sign and a red carpet waiting for us! And so this great adventure comes to an end. It was an incredibly wonderful time filled with so many new people, experiences, and memories!

Leonie Hoffmann

Our last evening in Nyc!

We spent our second day in New York with another packed schedule. After a small breakfast at the hotel, we set off with the class at 9:00 a.m. First, we took a quick look at the aircraft carrier Intrepid, then continued to the Vessel and from there along the High Line toward Chelsea Market. After a short stroll through, we made our way to Little Island, a man-made green oasis on the Hudson.

Around 12:00 p.m., we reached the Westfield shopping center. We had time there to grab lunch and take a short break. At 1:30 p.m., we visited the 9/11 Memorial Museum. We spent about an hour there learning a great deal about the tragic events of September 11.

Afterwards, we visited more famous landmarks: Wall Street, the New York Stock Exchange, and the Charging Bull. While we had previously taken the subway from Little Island to the World Trade Center, we explored these sights on foot. Then we took the subway to Grand Central Station, which we toured briefly. From there, we strolled past the Chrysler Building and the Empire State Building to Fifth Avenue.

Our free time began there at around 4:30 p.m. and lasted until 7:00 p.m. My friends and I used it to browse through some stores, and we even ran into the rapper Lil baby. We ended the day at a sushi restaurant. At 7:00 p.m., we met up with the whole group at Times Square and headed back to the hotel.

Now it's time to pack our suitcases, because tonight is already our last night in New York!

-Philip H.

Hello New York!!!

In New York. Concrete jungle where dreams are made of. There is nothing you can‘t do.

Now you are in New York…-(Empire state of mind)

After a long bus ride we started to see the skylines of New York. The skyscrapers, the Hudson river and the huge bridges. Everything was mind-blowing! Shortly after we checked into the hotel and made our way to time square. Even from far away you could see the huge ads, they were everywhere! In the center was the famous red staircase with a looot of people. We walked to the Grand central station where we took the subway to the world trade center. When we got there we took the elevator to the 102th floor. Our group arrived at the perfect time to see the sunset. The views from up there were breathtaking, just WOW! After the sun went down we went to the state island ferry. From the ferry could see the statue of liberty. Then Luca led us to the Rockefeller center. You already could have go ice skating at the beautiful rink for 25$. The day coming to an end everyone wanted to get something to fill their tummy. So we made our way back to time square were we seperated into groups and went shopping, saw performances and got food. This day was sure full of attractions and sightseeings!

Lenki

Exploring the City! - Boston Day 2

Our second day in Boston was full of views, exciting discoveries and a lot of walking!

After getting up and having breakfast we headed to the Prudential Tower. From the top we had a view of Boston. We took some pictures with our class and everyone was having a lot of fun. After that we had some time at the Prudential Center, where I enjoyed a delicious wrap at a café.
Next we visited the Mapparium, a glass globe that we could actually walk inside! We watched a short light show. Learned more about the world. It was a unique experience and definitely something you don’t see every day.

Later we explored Boston on foot. Started walking towards the famous Freedom Trail. Unfortunately we didn’t finish the trail because our legs were already giving up on us! We had walked much that day. Still we managed to see Boston Common and the beautiful Holocaust Memorial.

After that we made our way to Little Italy, where we explored the streets looked around in some shops and enjoyed the atmosphere. Finally we arrived at Quincy Market, where we had dinner and enjoyed another two hours of time.

In the evening we headed home exhausted but happy. We packed our suitcases. Got ready, for our next adventure which is New York City!

Letícia Maria Schauer

Our first day in Boston!

Our day started pretty early! At 7 a.m., we met in front of the school and said goodbye to our host families. It was a little sad, but we were also excited for the next part of our trip. After that, we got on the bus and headed to Boston. We arrived at around 10:30 a.m.!

Once we had checked in at our hotel, we made our way to Harvard University by subway. Before our tour, we had some free time to go shopping and explore the city a little bit.

One of the highlights of the day was definitely our tour of Harvard. We learned a lot about the American school system, the university’s history and some famous people who studied there. We also got to explore the beautiful campus and see its impressive buildings. It was really interesting to experience the atmosphere of such a famous university in person!

Afterwards we enjoyed the view of the harbour and took a bunch of pictures. We also learned more about the famous Boston Tea Party and why it played such an important role in American history.

To end the day, we spent some free time in Chinatown. We walked around, explored the area and enjoyed different food spots. It was a great opportunity to discover another part of Boston.

After such a long and exciting day, we headed back to our hotel. We were definitely tired, but also happy about all the things we had experienced.

Our first day in Boston was a great start to this part of our trip, and we can’t wait to see what else this city has to offer!

Elena Kutic

Final Day in Peterborough

Today was our last day with our host family in Peterborough before we travel to Boston. Since we had a Halloween party yesterday, I decided to sleep in a little longer. I woke up at around 9 a.m., got ready and enjoyed a really delicious breakfast. We had a kind of bagel with Canadian ham, eggs and cheese, which was a great way to start the day.

After breakfast, Philip and I started packing our suitcases because we had to get ready for our trip to Boston. We also put our dirty clothes into the washing machine so that everything would be clean before we left. Once we had finished packing, we decided to enjoy the rest of the day.

We spent about two and a half to three hours playing basketball. It was really fun, and we had a great time together. After playing for such a long time, we decided to take a break, get something to drink and relax a little. Afterwards, we tried another activity and played pool. We played around four or five rounds, which was also a lot of fun.

In the evening, our host family prepared an early Thanksgiving dinner for us. We had many different traditional dishes, including pumpkin squash, vegetables, turkey, bread stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy. Everything tasted absolutely delicious, and I would definitely recommend trying a Thanksgiving dinner!

After dinner, we enjoyed our last evening with our host family. Then we took showers, got ready for bed and went to sleep.

Overall, it was a really enjoyable and relaxing last day in Peterborough. I am looking forward to our next adventure in Boston!

-Hugo 

From waffles to trick or treating

It’s finally Halloween and it’s also Saturween! Elea and I got to sleep in and started the day with a typical American breakfast: waffles with maple syrup, a cookie and a Diet Coke.

After we got ready, we jumped into my host sister’s car and drove to Spirit Halloween to get some final Halloween costume accessories. We were overwhelmed by this big store and all of the different kinds of costumes, some of them were frightening.

Then we headed to the best part of the day. We went to Goodwill, a second-hand shop. All three of us went crazy and spent hours searching for clothes and having fun with finding new things. In the end, we all got a lot of cool things and maybe spent a bit too much money, but Stephen, the cashier, had a wonderful sense of humour and even thanked us in German for coming to the store and wished us a lot of fun on our journey.

After spending too much time in the store, we had to get home quickly to get ready for Halloween. Nearly all the Austrians and their hosts came to my host family’s house to have a snack and fun before going trick-or-treating. We went out in groups and experienced our first American trick-or-treating. We were all amazed by the lovely old people who decorated their houses and had a lot of fun with giving kids and us candy. Everyone was so cold that we went home and spent some time in the living room. It was an amazing first American Halloween.

-Valerie

Friday before Halloween

On Friday the 30th, i woke up early since i had to prepare a presentation for the upcoming lessons, in which i was gonna talk about famous austrian actors. I held it a total of 3 times, each in a different german class and it went pretty well overall thanks to enough preperation beforehand.

When i got back home from school at around 3pm, i decided to just go for a quick walk and a workout because i did not have as much time since i was gonna watch a football game later that day which i had to integrate into my schedule. 

I arrived in school at 7, where the football game was held. It was overall pretty fun, even though i gotta admit that it is more about the atmosphere, people etc than about the actual game itself, from my perspective at least. There were many things happening that game, for example one guy appearently got knocked unconcious and a cheerleader hurt her ankle when missing a move. Unfortunately our school lost the game, though it was still pretty fun.

I arrived back home later that night and just went for a quick night hike with my host at a small hill. I got back at around 11:30 and went to bed right after. 

-Maximilian Hetz