Two weeks, four cities, ten flights and one wedding later...we're home! I have never been happier to see my bed, my shower, my dog...even my toilet! We had a really great trip--here are some of the 350 or so pictures we took (and a brief trip summary).
First stop: Santorini, Greece. This is the place I have always wanted to visit and it absolutely lived up to every expectation. It was just beautiful beyond words. We had an amazing, relaxing time. If you are ever looking for a place to spend a romantic vacation, I can't recommend Santorini enough. We hung out by the pool, took a really long hike one day (I know, how uncharacteristically active of us!), and rented a four wheeler and drove around the island one day.
So happy to finally be in Greece!
Some of the pretty sights we saw during a hike we took one day.
Sunset from our hotel.
The infinity pool at our hotel.
I used to have a picture like this on my refrigerator because it was such a big dream for me to go to Santorini...I couldn't believe I was finally there.
This was the view from our balcony. Not bad to wake up to this in the morning.
Part two of our trip took us to Venice. Unfortunately, the minute we got off the plane, the chaos began. It started with a lost suitcase (which was actually (shockingly) delivered to us about 24 hours later). The fun continued when we were contacted by the Italian postal service to let us know that the package we had shipped to Tuscany was stuck in Italian customs. (Back story: we decided to ship our wedding clothes to Tuscany because we were going to be gone for so long and had so much to pack. We decided that the wedding clothes would take up too much room in our suitcases, so it would be easier to ship them. We were, it turns out, wrong.)
Sooo...we spent much of our time in Venice arguing with the postal service, arguing with Italian customs (who apparently thought we were trying to smuggle who knows what into their country), and running around looking for places where we could fax and email the ridiculous forms we were asked to fill out by Italian customs (including one that made us declare that our leather shoes were not dyed using oil from whales??).
In between all that madness, we saw some sights:
The Grand Canal
Brian on the Accademia Bridge
The gondolas (no, we didn't ride in one!)
Saint Mark's Cathedral
Venice was really pretty, and I'm glad we got to see it. But I have to say, I think we would have been okay with just spending one day there. It was just very crowded, expensive, hot and actually dirty (graffiti everywhere). Not to sound like a downer, but it wasn't our favorite place of the trip. :) Admittedly, we were not really in the mindset to enjoy it as much as we should have.
Moving on...part three of the trip took us to Tuscany. The main reason for our European vacation was to attend the wedding of our friend Sarah from high school. She got married at an old castle near Siena, and that's where we stayed for three nights.
The view from our room at the castle
The castle grounds
The church at the castle where the wedding was held
The beautiful bride and the Mansfield friends who made the trip to Italy!
Chris, Cristi, Sarah, me and Brian
Brian and I enjoying our champagne during cocktail hour. Aren't we fancy?
So why aren't there more pics of the Tuscan countryside? Well, remember that package that got stuck in Italian customs? Yes, it is probably still there. We had no clothes to wear to the wedding, so we had to set out to buy ourselves some new attire. It was actually really funny: I said to Brian, "Where the heck are we supposed to buy clothes in Tuscany?" Brian said, "I have no idea; it's not like there's going to be a mall nearby." So we go ask the staff at the castle and they hand us a map showing the new outlet mall that has just been built about 15 minutes away! Hilarious...an outlet mall in Tuscany. So the attire you see us wearing in the pics above was purchased at an outlet mall that resembled something you would see here in Texas. We even found a place that would hem Brian's pants in time for the wedding! Shopping at an outlet mall is not how I would have chosen to spend a day in Tuscany, but we found clothes and made it to the wedding, which was a really fun time. We are happy that we got to be there to see Sarah get married.
Modeling our new Tuscan outlet mall attire
Our original plane for the trip had been to drive to Rome late Sunday afternoon and crash at our hotel before flying home early the next morning. Our plans changed for the better when Chris and Cristi asked if they could hitch a ride to Rome with us...we piled our tiny rental car full of our suitcases and the four of us set off, National Lampoon's European Vacation style, for Rome.
We were only in Rome from about 4 p.m. to very early the next morning, but we managed to pack in a lot into one evening. We saw the Colosseum, the Spanish Steps, the Trevi Fountain,the Pantheon and lots of other cool stuff that I admittedly could not identify. We also had a great dinner on the patio of a little restaurant, then drinks on a square overlooking the Pantheon.
Brian and I in front of the Colosseum
And in front of the Spanish Steps
Drinks by the Pantheon
The Trevi FountainI am really happy that we ended up getting to see Rome, if only for one evening. We had a great time and we both absolutely loved the city and would like to go back some day. I never really thought of Rome as someplace I would love to visit, but everywhere you look, there is something fascinating to explore. We had a really fun night.
So now our trip is over and I feel thrilled to be home, but kind of blah...I think it's the feeling some brides get when the wedding is over. It seems like I spent so much time planning the trip and now it's over! But overall we had a great time...now back to the real world!
Big Brax. We sometimes call him Yogi because doesn't it look like if you met him while hiking in a national park, he would probably steal your picnic basket?
Uh oh...looks like Bailey is about to become the latest victim of his tennis ball chasing.
