Ich Bin We Love Austria!!!

Can we start by saying that this installment of the blog catalogues pretty much the BEST 4 DAYS EVER!!! Ahh! We had SUCH a fantastic time! Completely unforgettable and beautiful in so many ways! 

We flew to Munich and picked up the rental car without a hitch - we quickly developed a very immature love of the German language..

The drive to Lech was a picture perfect, absolutely stunning sojourn through the German/Austrian countryside in - classic Germany - a very comfortable Mercedes Benz. We got to the Hotel Kristiania a couple hours later (which maybe should've been a few hours but Q was driving on the Autobahn so we made great time!) and it was the COOLEST hotel ever!!! We were in a gorgeous suite in a kind of vintage meets Game of Thrones style and we loved it! The hotel was the one that Ehren and Nadine met whilst working at, so it seemed very poetic that their family and friends should stay there in the lead up to the wedding! So glad they had such great taste in their choice of work place! 

We put down our bags and freshened up a bit before heading out to dinner at an authentic local place with the whole group of wedding guests that had already arrived in Lech.

Dinner was delicious and walking around the town was lovely! It was unlike anything we've ever seen before and we were feeling so, so lucky to be there. 

We slept like logs that night (well, until Han woke up around 4 and watched the sun rise.. The view of the Austrian Alps was a definite silver lining to that jetlag!) and were granted the most glorious sunny day to go exploring!

We took a gondola ride up one of the higher mountains for an incredible view and yummy hot choccies!

We were so impressed with all the tiny little Austrian kids skiing fearlessly down the mountain - especially when we were struggling to just walk! Resisting the urge to yodel, we felt very family Vontrapp in this unique and wonderful landscape.

After we'd gone back down the mountain (in the gondola) we rested up for the craziness of the night to come! That is: the joint Hens/Bucks night for Ehren and Nadine!

Ohh, and we tried our first schnapps...

We swore we wouldn't do it again, as it tasted verrryyy much like nail polish remover, buuut the next few days didn't exactly pan out that way haha.

We kicked off the night in the bar at the hotel - drinking champagne, not schnapps - then walked en masse for a huge roast dinner in town.

It ended up being dinner and a show! Will, Ehren's groomsman, came up with various challenges to do throughout the night. First off, Ehren and his friend Ash had to do the YMCA every half hour, no matter where they were. There was also a selfie challenge for Nadine and Crystal - the best man's wife and also the loveliest person ever! She came up the mountain with us earlier in the day and is so, so sweet! - and then came our challenge... The Ryan women (us as honoraries) and Annie, a close family friend, were tasked with singing "So long, Farewell" to everyone after dinner! It was hilarious!! Hahaha SO much fun! And, though a little embarrassing, we were secretly excited for the opportunity to sing a Sound of Music song in Austria.

With everyone giggling, we took a group photo and moved on to a pub down the road!

With the booze flowing freely - including a vodka-and-schnapps challenge for Dasha and Nadine! - we were all getting along great! It was great to get to know Ehren's friends better, they're such a fun group of lads! The next challenge was for Rob and Ehren. They had to say "ich bin" at the start of every sentence and if either of them forgot it was a shot of jäger for them both! Quite possibly the most hilarious challenge of the night, they probably forgot 6 or 7 times! Eeek! Limes were also introduced (if someone puts one in your glass you have to skull the whole thing) causing much chaos! Luce made a miraculous save on Russ's drink (later dubbed a blockenspiel, but that's another story..) but poor Han got limed by Will with a FULL glass of cider!!! To chants of "Here's to Hannah, she's true blue, she's a pisspot through and through, she's a bastard so they say, she tried to go to heaven but she went the other way! Drink it down, down, down..." Han (with only one very brief pause in the middle. Brief because it was met with a chorus of "boo"s that compelled her to keep going) skulled the whole thing! 

Next up for entertainment challenges was a shockingly convincing rendition of the Backstreet Boys' "I Want it That Way" by Brendan and the rest of the guys! Hahaha SO funny! They did a great job, particularly nailed the slide.

There was more merriment at the pub, we tried our first Jagerbombs and actually quite enjoyed them, then most of the group (sensibly) headed back to the hotel.

The two of us, Rob, Russ, Will, Jamie, and Ash, though, all continued on in search of a club to have a dance in! We stumbled upon Rufi Passage... Perfect.

(Will and Russ hahah)

After having a drink from what we swore was a water fountain (which Luce has absolutely no memory of), we went into da club!

We had a great time dancing! Luce "salsa"d aka box stepped with Russ for well over an hour (although she swears in hindsight that it was only about 20 minutes), Han learned Will's signature knee wobble move and ran towards Rob with a "you ready" and (quite successfully if memory serves, which it might not) jumped into a, ahem, graceful lift! Haha also, Russ showed off his prowess at Kozachok? (the Russian dance with the leg kick thing) and, we learned the next day, completely split his jeans in the process!! We all managed to add a few more Jäger bottles to the collection in the ceiling! 

There was a serious time warp and what felt like an hour or two ended up taking us through to about 3:00 at the club! The only way to mark the passage of time was from the 500+ photos Rob took on Han's phone! Hahah there are some, uhh, gems in there.. A rainbow of Rob selfies, about 200 of the side of Ash's face and some of Han dancing and looking like a total spaz hahaha so great! 

We walked back to the hotel arm in arm - well, actually we think Russ was carrying Ash, we were walking with Will, and Rob and Jamie were behind, although actually it's all a bit of a blur... Regardless, we made it back at 3:30 and had one last drink at the bar downstairs, taking some prime selfies while we were at it.

Then, taking us into the danger zone of about 5:00am, we had a series of idiotic misplacings of items (both of our phones and Will's sunnies) that resulted in Luce getting locked out of the room and Han too zonked out to hear her knocking on the door!! Yiiikes! She couldn't get in until morning - which was really only a couple hours later - but Han felt awful about it the next day! Nonetheless, it was a fun, hilarious, amazing night quite unlike any other! Completely unforgettable except for the parts we don't remember..! 

We were in total recovery mode the next day... We gingerly accepted coffee and breakfast from Dominik (the gorgeous 22 year old restaurant manager haha how embarrassing) and went back up to the room to sleep it off. Too much caffeine, though, kept Han wide awake so she decided to get up and go for a walk. After 45 minutes or so she ran into Russ and the short walk turned into a really nice, 2 hour long chat and great exploration of the town and surrounding area, so lovely! 

Great hangover cure too, as it turned out! Highlights: found a place advertising PitPat golf, Russ got a bit of a fright when he tried to introduce himself to a Shetland pony and it nearly bit his finger off, a trip down a muddy, icy path that resulted in muddy boots and a dysfunctional attempt to clean them with a 5 foot long stick, and, as always with Russ, lots of stories and lots of laughs! 

We got back to the hotel and had lunch with the fam before actually going and sleeping off the night before, in preparation for the night to come.

Dinner that night was a traditional Austrian fondue and it was amaaazinggg!! There were three different types, Thai, meats/broth, and cheeeese! Ahh the cheese one stole the show for us! Well, food wise. What really stole the show was when Dominik came down later on in lederhosen - and then Jamie put them on and stole the show all over again! We'd promised ourselves we wouldn't drink buuut suddenly there were speeches so we had wine, then schnapps, then jäger.. Oops. To our credit, though, we did a lot better than some of the guys on the hangover front and we actually felt totally fine the next day! (Which was lucky, because it was the wedding day!) It was a really great night, eating with Mum, Sharon, and Annie, then chatting with Brendan and Ehren later on, and Will, Russ, Rob, and Jamie too. Lotsa fun and very laid back!

Then came the day we'd all been waiting for!!! AHH!! It was SO surreal! We slept in, had brekkie, took our time getting ready, then all met downstairs at 2:00 (took some pics) and walked to the gondola in town to catch it up to Oberlech. 

We walked through a series of (quite steep) tunnels after the gondola ride, then popped out at the most picturesque spot with a breathtaking with of the mountains!

After much picture-taking, everyone took their seats and waited with bated breath for the beautiful bride to arrive... 

And she was beautiful!! Stunning dress, but besides that, she was absolutely glowing! We'll never forget the look on Ehren's face when he first saw her - there wasn't a dry eye around (well, certainly not on our family's bench anyway). Such a perfect couple in such a perfect place! The ceremony was lovely, heartfelt and simple. They lit a candle together, had poems read in English and German, exchanged rings, and, of course kissed! Surprisingly, one of the most moving moments for us was when Nadine signed her name as Nadine Ryan - it was official! Ahh!! So exciting to be able to call her our cousin and welcome her into the fam that welcomed us in too!

We had yummy nibbles outside, cold cuts and cheese, very Austrian (as was the weather! It was a tad cold..!) and then on to the reception! The two of us felt quite honored to've been sat at the table with the bridal party! Dinner was delicious - so much so that when it came time for dessert we could barely fit in another bite! We didn't even try the wedding cake!!! Biggest regret of the night... Han did have a very yummy cake pop though, so maybe that counts? Haha we danced the night away, came close to catching the bouquet, watched Ehren and Nadine play some very funny trivia about each other and newlywed games, cheered when Dominik showed up after work in his lederhosen, and had a crack at "the nail game" (which almost definitely had a better name in German..). The premise was, basically, that you stand in a circle and take turns hitting a nail into a block of wood with the wrong end of the hammer. You're supposed to take a shot of schnapps if you miss buuut we were all far gone enough that that didn't seem like a great idea.. 

The last gondola left at 1:00, so we, with our gifts of bottles of Nadine's dad's schnapps in each hand, left it until about 12:52 to race back through the tunnels - taking a wrong turn along the way - and make it into the gondola just in the nick of time!

We thought we'd be able to kick on afterwards, but after about 20 minutes in another bar in town we thought it was probably time to call it a night. A small group of us traipsed back to the Kristiania and went to bed, all loved up and happy after such an extraordinary day! An extraordinary few days, really! Spending time with family, making new friends, celebrating such a wonderful occasion, aaand having some very cute lads around all made for a few of the most fun days ever!!! It truly couldn't have been better!