Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Last Couple Days in London!

The last couple days have been awesome. We made it back to London and are loving being back with the family.  It's nice to have people around (and not eat out for every meal!!!) I don't have much to blog about now, so I though I'd upload some more pics from Paris, and our night last night :)

This lovely picture is from right before we climbed it.  Lines were super long throughout the entire day, so we just sucked it up and got in line.  It was a lot of fun, with the exception of WAY too many people.  But it was worth it.  It was even better since we got a discount because we're under 25!! (we also got a discount at the Vatican City Museum because the guy thought we were under 20.  I may or may not have just said yes to his question....).  It was fun to just sit in front of the Eiffel Tower during the afternoon.  People watching was pretty fun too.


This was taken just as the tower was lighting up.  The sky turned pink and purple (as seen in a previous post) and was beautiful.  So here's our "it's almost dark, but the tower is lighting up and it's pretty so we should take a picture" picture.

Tony also has taken approximately 700 pictures.  On his iPod... We also have two cameras worth of pictures as well.... I have a feeling I'll be uploading the good ones once we return to the states.
Of course we had a Harry Potter photo op.  When we returned from Paris, we got off at King's Cross.  For those of you who don't follow Harry Potter as much as I do, It's the train station that he has to use to get to Hogwarts.  His train leaves from platform 9 3/4.  So, naturally, we had to take a picture of it!!

(It was a slight let-down, since they were doing construction by the real platform, so they moved the photo op to somewhere else..)



Last night was date night.  We had seen that two of Tony's favorite actors were in a play in London.  I scoured the web to find tickets, but it was a sold out show until July/August.  Until I stumbled across a last minute ticket site.  We decided to be big spenders, and went to Much Ado About Nothing at the Wyndham Theater.  It was so good.  I read the play in my Humanities class last semester (the only one I payed attention to....) so it was fun to see a real play version.  Tony enjoyed it as well.  They put a modern twist onto it, so it was much much better than the boring Shakespeare version....




Here's the poster for the play we went to.  Like I said before, it was excellent.  We're both glad we found those last minute tickets and decided to go.  It was fun to see a real play in the West End.

Sadly, we couldn't take pictures inside, so no cool pictures of the play :(



Today we're going to church (at Westminster) and going to check out Parliament and Big Ben.  Fun day ahead :)   These are the last two full days here in London, and it's a little bittersweet.  But we plan to enjoy every minute!  Hope everything is good back home!

Sunday, May 29, 2011

Eiffel Tower, Last day in Paris, Chunnel

Yesterday, we climbed 1,004 steps in two monuments alone.

First, we went to the Arc du Triomphe. Something that Napoleon had built for something or other. Anyways, we climbed to the top and had a great view of Paris, including the Eiffel Tower in the distance. We then walked down the Champs-Élysées which is one grand boulevard. We obviously had to go in the Louis Vuitton store (Tony wouldn't buy me anything.. It was sad). We wandered around Paris until we reached the Eiffel Tower. On the way, we got some more baguette sandwiches (in Rome we ate pasta and pizza, in Paris we ate baguette sandwiches). We waited in the ridiculously long line to climb the stairs up to the second level, and waited in another line to get to the top, and waited in yet another line to come back down. Lots of lines, but worth the wait. At the top, we were almost 1,000 feet up. Since it was such a beautiful day, we could see for miles.

Once we were back on the ground, we found a spot on the grass in front of the tower and sat there for close to six hours. True story. We had a lot to do and there were some people promoting the city of Lyon who put on some breakdancing shows. At dusk, the tower lit up. So pretty. After it lit up, a sparkling light show was put on.

I couldn't believe it. Yesterday was just awesome. We had great weather durin our time in Paris. Today we went to the sacre coeur and sat on the hill for a while until it was time to catch our train to London. We went in the Chunnel, which was cool, but a little anti climactic. It would have been cooler if they had windows. Now that would have been a cool train ride.

We're back in London and have a few things left to check off our list before we end our European extravaganza. Hopefully I'll have more pictures to show you since I can upload from a real computer!!

We get back to the cities on Thursday! Hope everyone is having a good memorial weekend!!

Saturday, May 28, 2011

Eiffel Tower


I just want to summarize our day by this picture. The best. We're having the best time.

Friday, May 27, 2011

Bonjour, bonjour!

Today was our first full day in the city of Paris. We started by going to the Louvre Museum. We managed the subway alright and jumped in line behind about ten people. Easy enough. We got inside the museum under the big pyramid and got our tickets. We started our tour with Rick! We got lost for the first half hour but then it was a lot smoother. There were soooooo many people there!! By the time we were done, the line for the security check was wrapped around the pyramid. We're guessing a couple hundred were in line at this point. 

The Louvre is massive. We only got through one wing, but it was the most interesting since we've seen a lot of Egyption, roman, and Greek art so far. This wing held a little more roman art, some French and some Italian. We saw the crown jewels of France including a 104 carat diamond. Not as impressive as the 503 carat, but still pretty big. When we got to the hall wih the Mona Lisa, it was jam packed. I don't like crowds to begin with, so I was pretty cranky. I elbowed my way to the front to get some pictures and dragged Tony up so we could take a picture of the three of us. Then we got the heck out of there!!  It was really interesting and the museum itself used to be royal palace. I need a house like that. 

After the Louve, we walked along the Seine and got a baguette sandwich for lunch. We then made our way to the Notre Dame. My goodness, that is one old church.  Fun fact: they started building in the 1100's. They finished in the 1300's. Inside was magnificent stained glass windows (Dad, I took some pictures so you can recreate them for me :)). It was really dark since they didn't have lights on the ceiling. We read some info from the kindle before venturing outside. The line for the church was huge when we left! We felt pretty lucky about our line picking ability today. The rest of the day we just wandered around. We stopped at some souvenir shops and ventured to Luxembourg Gardens. That was a pretty place where we just sat around and relaxed. I read on the kindle and Tony played iPod games :) 

We've got tomorrow planned out with a trip to the Arc du Triomphe and the famous Eiffel Tower. We plan to climb up both and then hang out in the park afterwards to see it lit up at night. We've done a lot of stair climbing on this trip between the three cities. My calves are in tip top shape!!  Here are some pictures of our fabulous day!





Thursday, May 26, 2011

Ciao Roma & bonjour Paris!!

Today was our last morning in Rome. We went for our usual breakfast and thankfully got cold milk for the second day in a row. I should probably mention that the first dY we went there and asked for milk, we got hot milk. The second day, I was prepared with my Italian to say "cold milk". But I got confused and said "cafe freddo" instead of "Latte freddo"..... My bad. To give two non coffee drinkers some cold coffee was not a good idea... So we fed the plants. Tony told me to do it...

Anyways, we packed up our stuff and went to my favorite gelato shop for one more cone. Soo good!! We wandered around till we found a place to eat before heading to the train. We had a lot of time so we weren't in a hurry which was nice. And yes, we ate either pasta or pizza for every lunch and dinner while in Rome. We're pretty proud :)

So we got to the airport to take a Spanish airline from Italy to France. What a day. Also, we totally didn't have to go through any sort of customs at either airport... Oh well. We made it to the bed and breakfast alright using public transportation. We rock at it! It's absolutely adorable. We have a room in a woman's apartment so it is super low key and what we thought a bed and Breakfast should be.

Sorry we don't have any pictures to share... Nothing really to take pictures off yet. Tomorrow begins our two day whirlwind trip if Paris wish us luck!!!.

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Pompeii

Today we went to Pompeii. 

We got up early to catch a train to Naples ( for only ten euro a piece).  It was a two and a half hour train ride tk Naples. From there, we caught the light rail to the actual city (for another half hour).  Although we spent over six hours traveling, it was well worth it to see the ruins. 

With trusty Rick telling us where to go and what sights were what, we ventured into Pompeii. It was so cool. I don't know how to explain it other than that. Vesuvius was there in the background and everything was just unbelievable. After about an hour and a half, we had to head home to catch our train. The train itself was fun to be on. We rode past the ocean during parts, and through mountains. Way cool. Here's a picture of us with Vesuvius in the background!

Tomorrow we're heading to Paris!!!!!!!!!

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Rome: days three and four

Well hello again! I am going to do the best I can in recapping the last two days here in Rome. Yesterday was a walking day where we walked and saw a lot of the monuments and famous landmarks of Rome. We first saw the Pantheon which was amazing. Some of these sights are so much more than just the pictures we see in books or magazines. Luckily we had Rick to guide is around. Then we wandered to Piazza Navona and hung around there. Rick suggested the best gelato in Rome so obviously we had to go :). It really was good gelato. I am currently keeping up with my goal of having gelato every day. Also, Tony and I are having Italian food for lunch and dinner. It rotates between pizza and pasta. The best part is that we're not even sick of it yet!!

We then continued on and saw the Trevi Fountain and the Spanish Steps. Once again, these sights are so much better in person. We wandered along a big shopping street before it started raining. It was cool to be in the middle of Rome in the middle of a thunderstorm. Yes we had umbrellas but in case you were wondering, my shoes are still wet. After it stopped raining and we took another siesta, we walked back to the Trevi Fountain to see it at night. Beautiful. 

Today, we went and spent the day in Vatican City. We ventured on the metro and made our way to the museum. The tour guides tried to tell us it was a two hour wait, but we only stood in line for about 40 min. The Vatican museum is enormous!! We saw a lot of statues and a lot of beautifully painted ceilings. After the museum, we ended up in the Sistine Chapel. Gorgeous. We sat in there listening to Rick talk about it for about a half hour. Afterwards, we found ourselves in line to climb the dome of St Peters. That dome climb was even higher than St Paul's!! Out of breath at the top, the view was spectacular.  

Because we climbed the dome first, we didn't have to wait in line to get in the church itself. That church is massive and so beautiful. We walked around and listened to Rick talk some more about the church itself before heading out into the square. 

This whole trip has been breathtaking. I can't believe I'm actually in Italy right now!! Tomorrow we're taking a trip to Pompeii to see the ruins there. We're also hoping to grab dinner with one of our friends from the U. 

It's been raining a lot but just usually in the afternoon after we've seen the sights. Hope everyone in MN is okay after the storms this week!

The following pictures are from the Pantheon, the Trevi Fountain (day and night), and my gelato!!! Enjoy!!





Monday, May 23, 2011

Days 1 and 2 in Rome.... Posted on Day 3

For a quick run down of our saturday, we caught an express train to Gatwick airport in the afternoon.  We checked in and went through security and were even patted down!! But we didn't have anything bad on us. We went to find our gate number but it hadn't even been assigned yet, so we sat around for a while. The airline we flew on didn't have assigned seating so it was a mad dash to get seats together. 

Once we got to rome, we caught another express train to the center of Rome. We managed to find our lodging only after walking up five flights of stairs in the wrong wing of the building. Luckily we only have one suitcase :)  their credit card machine wasn't working so we then had to go on a scavenger hunt to find one that would work for Tony's card. (we finally found one today!!!) 

Today we woke up early and went to ancient Rome! We started at Palatine Hill and worked our way through the Forum, and ended at the Colosseum. It was sooo hot after being in London for a week. There was a race for the cure going on around the Colosseum when we arrived, so that paired with it being a Sunday made for lots of crowds. We took a siesta this afternoon and it was grand. For dinner, we both had our first pasta (in Rome) of the trip!! I also had gelato. Soooo good.

Sadly, Internet is sketchy and it's not letting me upload the picture so I'll leave the link so you can go see it later :)

http://a.yfrog.com/img615/6149/ovxmv.jpg

Saturday, May 21, 2011

we have arrived!!

hello! we have arrived in rome. we made the short trip to the bed and breakfast but no official wifi so this post is going to be short since its on the kindle. just to check in and say we have lodging for the night and we are excited!

going out now for food and then calling it a night!

Off to Rome!!

After this blog post, we're heading to Italy for a while :) London has been fabulous, but we're both ready for another city. Below are some more pictures from London. The first is a picture behind St. Paul's Cathedral. We climbed to the top!!



This is one of my favorite pictures :) St. Paul's was so pretty.




I had to pose in front of some centaurs. These were from the Pantheon in Greece. It is so true that the British Museum is just a collection of other civilization's stuff. But still way cool to see.


We will do our best to keep uploading, but we're not sure what the internet situation will be!!!

We arrive in Paris next Thursday for the weekend, and return back to London on Sunday. Busy week ahead of us, but we're ready!! See you soon!

Friday, May 20, 2011

Last Full Day in London



Today was our last full day in London (for the first time around..) We took the double decker bus to Oxford Circus and walked to Picadilly. Lining the streets are lots and lots of stores :) Tony and I stumbled across the biggest toy story in the world.

Tony and I spent close to an hour inside. It was fantastic. It was nice just walking around looking at everything.
We went to Covent Garden which is like one big square that has a ton of shops. We went to the gift store of the London Transport Museum. Feeling like we should go somewhere and see something, we went to the Natural History
Museum. It was pretty boring at first, but we
found a human exhibit that had some cool interactive things to do, like optical illusions, memory tests and so on. Pretty cool :)

We doing some laundry and getting ready to head to Rome tomorrow afternoon. I think there will be a Harrods trip in the morning though :)

Tomorrow night we will be in Rome. Not sure how well the internet access will be, but we'll try to keep connected.
I've finally been able to get some pictures up, and I think I've got the system down, so those of you who have been pestering me can stop :)


Thursday, May 19, 2011

Slacker Day in London

Well hello there!

Today was a needed slacker day. We finally made it out of the house around 10 and headed to Hyde Park. Out of the tube station, we saw Harrods :) what a wonderful (and definitely planned) surprise!! We walked around Harrods for a while but it was evident that Tony was not nearly as impressed and excited as I was. So we went to their version of a food court (basically a supermarket in the store) and got some lunch. We took our picnic fixings to Hyde Park just two blocks away. We literally sat there in the sun for a couple hours since it was such a beautiful day!!! Later, we walked in Kensington Gardens and saw both the Peter Pan statue and the Princess Di memorial fountain.

We made our way back home and have been playing with the girls until they went to bed. This included playing in the backyard, barbies, and Mulan. What a great day :)

Tomorrow we continue our adventures with a trip to Picadilly Circus, Leicester Square, a trip to see Kensington Palace (but not go inside since it's being renovated) and some more shopping :)

AND HARRY POTTER IS ON SO OBVIOUSLY WE HAVE TO WATCH IT :)

Last full day in London tomorrow. Flying to Rome on saturday. Getting excited for part two of European Extravaganza 2011!!

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

London: Day 3 (Finally St. Paul's!)

Much less walking today.

We made our way to St. Paul's today, and were able to get in. We used our "student" status to our advantage today :) Along with our ticket, we got a free "supertour" which we thought everyone would be at! Only about 7 people showed up though. Everyone else was taking the audio guide, which was basically an ipod with an audio tour on it... boring! Our tour guide was way more fun than any audio guide, and we got to go more places that the regular people couldn't. We got to go to a spiral staircase that scenes from Harry Potter and Sherlock Holmes were filmed, which was super cool. (I'm all about Harry Potter fun facts here!!!!). It was so amazing to be inside such an old and large church! After the tour, we climbed up to the dome. 528 steps to the top! Once to the top, we saw all of London! (seriously! I need to figure pictures out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) Very exhausting.

After St. Paul's, we walked across the Millennium Bridge (also featured in Harry Potter), and saw Shakespeare's Globe Theater. We're too cheap, so we didn't go in or get a tour. So back to the tube station we go! We then went to the Victoria and Albert Museum, which had over 4 miles of corridors of stuff. We started with a tour, but the lady was soooooooo slow talking about things for well past what was necessary. So we left that tour a little early and consulted our trusty Rick for suggestions to see. I found some exhibits I want to see, only to find out they're both closed until next year :(

So we found Da Vinci's notebook and a bed for 7. Then we went home. It's amazing how a day of sightseeing can tire you out! I do have to point out that I. Love. London's. Public. Transportation. Seriously, all we have to do is hop on the tube, find a seat (if possible) and read my kindle. So nice. We get off 2 blocks from the house and it's so convenient. Once again, we're tired and probably heading to bed soon. Just watching some more British TV. We can't stop laughing. So funny.

Still planning out tomorrow, but hopefully I'll have figured the picture thing out. Hope all is well!

London: Day 2 (posted a day late)

This was a day full of walking. At least three miles of unintentional walking. We started the day by heading to the British Museum. It was amazing. With trusty Rick guiding us around (Our Rick Steves guidebook and audio tours are so helpful!) we made our way through ancient civilizations.

Then, we decided to head to St. Paul's Cathedral. From the map we had that showed the main attractions, it looked like a couple blocks (TOPS) from the museum.... That was a total lie. It was at least 2 miles away. Definitely regretted not taking the tube. So we get to St. Paul's and find out that there was a special service going on, and we missed the last tour going inside. A little bummed, we decided to put it off and go to the Tower of London instead. Again, from the map we had, it looked like an even shorter distance. So we decided to hike the couple blocks (we thought). Totally wrong. At least another mile and a half. Once we were FINALLY at another sight, we got the (pretty expensive) tickets and waited for the beefeater tour to begin. Let me just say that those beefeaters are the best tour guides we've had so far. They were so funny and full of fun facts about the Tower. After that tour, we got to see the Crown Jewels. With the biggest diamond in the WORLD. 503 carats to be exact. Sadly, we weren't able to take pictures, and there were too many guards around to even try to take an illegal picture. We wandered around a little bit more, this time reading Rick's tour off the Kindle (which was so much more convenient than the book version). Tired and sore, we hopped back on the tube and headed back home for the day.

That night we watched some British TV which was actually really really funny. I have some new shows to find online :)

Sorry for not posting last night, it was pretty exhausting and we were slugs after the girls went to bed.

Monday, May 16, 2011

London: Day 1

'ello.

The first complete day in London is complete! Today, we did the epitome of tourism: a hop-on hop-off bus tour. It was a blast. Our first stop to get off was at Buckingham Palace, where we ate lunch with the queen :) except she wasn't there :( oh well. Back on the bus (after missing two busses..) we stopped again at the Tower of London where we took a boat cruise to Greenwich. Greenwich is where the eastern hemisphere meets the western. We could have seen the bronze statue symbolizing this, but were too cheap to pay 10 pounds.... each. Back on the boat, we went back to the Tower of London and continued on through London. Got off again at Trafalger Square, walked around and got the generic red phone booth picture. We tromped around London a little more until we found a pub we wanted to eat at. And here we are! We took more than enough pictures and lots of facts thrown at us. We're currently trying to plan our day out tomorrow, which should be a little more focused sight seeing at the Tower of London and a couple churches.

So far, we've adjusted to the jet lag alright. Tony fell asleep during tv last night, so we went to bed around 8.

Good day. We're having lots of fun, and the family here is more than helpful. Can't wait for later this week!!!!

Sunday, May 15, 2011

Officially in London!!

Hey All:

Here's the real post from London, instead of a post written on an ipod at 5 in the morning. We flew into London and were greeted by Sarah and Abby. After maneuvering around the airport, we finally made it out alive. Only to be stuck still in traffic for over and hour and half. It was entertaining at least. We got settled into the house and went for a little walk around Chiswick to get our bearings. Our first gelato of the trip was eaten!! Delicious!!! We then met the whole family at a pub down the street and played on iphones and ipods. It was pretty fun keeping Abby entertained. Now we're just hanging out and going to get some chinese food take out. Yes. We're in London and eating chinese takeout. Don't judge :) Hope all is well in MN. We haven't had a good nights rest since Friday night.... we're a little tired. Tomorrow begins the sight-seeing!!

Way beyond tired

Blog: 5/15/11 5:21 Iceland time

I forgot how terrible it is to sleep on planes! I "rested" my eyes for about two hours but that was it. Tony is sleeping next to me, or at least trying.  At least the plane is pretty cool. We had our own entertainment center that had movies, tv shows, games, and the little map that shows where you are. We're currently 288 miles from Reykjavik. I started to watch the Black Swan but didn't get very far because I couldn't hear everything hat was going on. So then I started another movie but quit because I was tired. Tried getting some sleep but no luck. And here we are. Luckily we aren't doing much this first day in London, just getting settled in. We are staying with a pretty awesome family that I knew in high school who are generously letting us crash with them while in town. 

I still can't believe that college is over and we are on a plane to Europe!!  

On another note, my parents dropped us off at the airport around 4 pm today. We were through security, checked in,and at the gate by 4:15. Not bad I think. There weren't a lot of people there. When we went on vacation in January, we waited in lines for over an hour!!! And there was no way I was going to miss this flight for any reason. So we had lots of time to kill in the airport.

Woo hoo!!!! Only 200 miles left and about. Half an hour till we land!!!

(if you couldn't tell, I wrote this on the plane and posted once Internet became available)

Miss you all back home!! ( but not enough to distract from this awesome trip :) )

Ps. We tried to upload some pictures but no luck yet. We will see what we can do :)

Saturday, May 14, 2011

The End of an Era

It's official: We're done with college!

Now the excitement can begin!! I have yet to finish packing, so I should probably do that.

In 2 hours, we're leaving for the airport. Don't know what we're going to do with all that time, but I am NOT missing that flight.

We're flying from MPLS to Iceland and then into London by 11:45 (London time). Can't wait! Better finish packing now!

Sarah

Friday, May 13, 2011

To Study or Not to Study.....

We leave in just over 24 hours for our European Extravaganza trip 2011. In three weeks, we'll hit London, Rome and Paris. Standing between such a trip is the last final of our college career. I have yet to pack and Tony is pretty much packed. I can't seem to decide between packing or continuing studying for this final.......

So I found this blog will be a good procrastination tool (last one of college!!). We'll try to keep it updated with pictures and fun stuff like that, so everyone reading won't be bored out of your minds :)

London is up first! Well, I guess this final is before that.... So studying it is!!

Any tips for places to see or places to avoid are greatly appreciated :)