A few of us decided to go and check out some of Europe this past month. It was really awesome to have been in so many places and seen so many things. Here's a little run down of the trip.
Our flight left from LA, so we drove down to St George on Monday the 5Th. Spent the night hanging in the hot tub and bleaching my hair blond.
We got up early the next morning, stopped in at Denny's for breakfast, and took off for California. We had a couple bathroom breaks on the way...
Later in the afternoon we got to California and headed for the beach. It wasn't very warm, the air or the water, but it was nice to be there anyways.
The next morning we got up even earlier and headed for LAX. As we were waiting we saw Kevin from The Office and Diamond Dallas Paige (former Pro Wrestler). We later came to discover that DDP was following us around and trying to ruin our vacation...anyways, we got on our plane and headed for Atlanta. We weren't in Atlanta very long (just long enough for me to remember how hot and humid the south is) before we left for Madrid. That was an 8 1/2 hour flight and we got no sleep.
81/2 hours later we came down through the clouds and saw beautiful Spain. That would be the last time I enjoyed Spain. After landing and getting through the airport, we saw that it is a downpour outside (later coming to find out it hadn't rained in Spain for weeks before our arrival). We drop our luggage off at some lockers and wait in the rain for a tour bus to take us around Madrid. It finally arrives and we pay 16 Euros for the tour (that's $24). It's taking us around and it wasn't too bad of a tour, but when we switch buses we get the tour guide who would rather flirt with the driver than hit the button to start the audio at the different sites. Not to mention half the time we were up top because there was no room in the closed section of the bus. It was cold and wet. Not that fun. Apparently the driver of the bus didn't like traffic because we hit some gridlock and he decided the tour was over.
We decided to get out of Madrid and head for Paris. So we got on a 17 hour train. Before we did though, we had to wait 3 hours in the train station. Now by this time we hadn't slept for almost 30 hours. Those 3 hours didn't seem too long to us...
We only got to sleep on chairs that reclined on the way to Paris, but we slept really well for most of the train ride. Paris was a breath of fresh air! It wasn't raining, and it wasn't Madrid. We found our Hostel and started seeing the sights. That day we saw most of Paris.
Notre Dame
The Eiffel Tower
Arc De Triomphe
These were the more well known places we saw. We also got to stop and see the Moulin Rouge the next day (for those who are fans of the movie).
I really enjoyed Paris. It's a good place to go and stay for a couple days.
At this point me and Rhett stayed in Paris most of the day and earlier in the morning Josh and Tommy headed off to Brussels and Amsterdam and had some interesting encounters. I'll leave it to them to explain. Rhett and I just walked around the city a bit more that day and then in the evening got on a train heading overnight to Venice. We slept through most of the night and woke up to Italy. We were only up a couple hours before we arrived in Venice. Unfortunately we only had about 10 minutes to catch another train to Udine, where my family lives, so we didn't see the canals that day.
Whenever I arrive in Udine I always feel a little like coming home. It's a familiar place to me now and having my family there makes it a second home. Being with my family is especially sweet since I don't see them too often. It was a really nice break for Rhett and I to have a constant place to stay with a good bed. Not to mention how much my Nonno (grandpa) fed us every day. Tommy and Josh caught up to us a couple days after we arrived.
Since Venice is only an hour and a half by train from Udine we took a day to check it out. It's always a little surreal to see the narrow alleyways and canals in Venice. Although there are so many tourists and shops that it loses a bit of it's romance, it is still quite amazing.
Having a couple days before we needed to go to Rome, we took off one morning and went to Trieste, a beach down on the Northern side of the Adriatic Sea. Rocky beaches, but pretty water with some jelly fish that we played with.
Our next stop was Rome. We arrived and after taking the most ghetto above-ground metro and a dirty old bus, we arrived at our campground. Luckily for us we didn't have to bring a tent. They provided us with these luxurious campers.
Rome was amazing! I loved Rome. St Peter's Basilica is HUGE and amazing. The Sistine Chapel was incredible. Going around and seeing all the old ruins and the coliseum was so incredible.
After Rome, we headed North into Tuscany to a town called Lucca. We would stay there for four days while we toured that area of the country.
While the other three went to Florence, I went and hung out with my Uncle Marco
We went to the beach (which, btw, is where we beat some swedes in beach volleyball)
Stopped in and saw some leaning tower
Oh and we heard about this amazing Hike on the coast of the Mediterranean from someone who had been there before.
We were now done with the things we had set out to do. We traveled the next day back to Udine and it was good to be back and rest a bit. We would need it for our LONG journey home.
It started Monday morning at 8:15am when we left for Milan. Got to Milan and our train to Barcelona was full. After much deliberation, dilemmas, and 9 hours we got on an over night train back to Paris. From Paris we went to Barcelona and once there missed the night train going to Madrid. Our plane left the next day at 11:30am. There was a train the next morning at 6:00, but we would have to stay outside of the train station all night. We did so with the company of some other Americans and our friend Borris from Latvia.
Again, Spain was out to get us. Well, a combination of Spain and Diamond Dallas Paige. But we did make it to Madrid and to our plane the next day. Oh how great it was to come back into the States. Of course we had a 2 hour delay in Atlanta, but we finally made it to LA. We left LA at around 9:00 PM and arrived in St George Thursday at 5:00am. I think now after a couple weeks of being home my body is finally done recovering from all that we did.
This was missing a lot of some of the details and stories that we had. I thought I would share this general overview so people could know where we went and what we did. If you have any questions you can ask any of us.
