Month: January 2025

With one picture… you know you’re in Austria and not Australia when… you can drive to Europe’s No. 1 Bordershop in half an hour

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bordershop

Since I’ve been driving every week to swim in Slovenia (which is another key way I know I’m in Austria and not Australia), I’ve been regularly going back and forth across the border. And the slogan of the shop next to the border caught my eye. Not just any old Bordershop… but Europe’s NUMBER 1!

So what did I do? I stopped and went in. And I took a photo… which the random people in the car park thought I was mad for doing but I did it anyway. I wanted to see what was inside. And what did I find? Well… embarrassingly, exactly what I should have assumed. It’s simply a smaller duty-free section of the airport… just not in the airport.

Turns out it’s not trying to claim to be the single number one shop in Europe, but is simply using the slogan of the chain of bordershops. Which are, apparently, the number one in Europe. So, I guess the marketing got me on this one. But hey, all I can say is, I’ve been there… have you?

Emergency pack in my car – what’s in it

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Survival pack for overnight in car

The other day when I was trying to fit everything in the boot of my car I came across my emergency kit. And it made me laugh. Because in retrospect it seems stupid that I thought I’d need it. But back then, the panic was real.

Driving to work takes me about 50 minutes, over a mountain range that is notorious for heavy snow in the winter. And when I first moved to Austria I had no idea what that meant. I was sure I’d heard stories of people being trapped on Autobahns overnight during particularly bad weather, and I was sure it would happen to poor, inexperienced, always-cold Debbie.

So, I created my own emergency pack. Here’s what’s in it:

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