Kid, you’ll move mountains
My dear sister has been staying with us for a while now. We have been busy trying to help her with a great cause. Talk about leaning into the wound. I honestly don’t know how she does it. Anyone else would curl up, but Amber has literally taken on The Mountain instead. I am so, so proud of her. Oh, how I wish my sweet sister could have her best friend back.
Check it out. Donate if you’d like. Talk about it. Spread the word.
The outpouring of love and support that Amber and our family have received is truly touching and will forever be appreciated.
package retrieval adventure
people have sent us a few packages here on the other side of the planet, but the post office does not deliver them all the way to our house, so we have to go pick them up, usually from the main post office downtown near our house. recently we received a package and for some reason or another, the pick-up slip we got in the mail was different form the usual pick-up slips, and the address on it was for a different post office.
so I looked up the address of the post office, and it was on the other side of town, 3 buses and about an hour away. I get Skye and myself all ready for a little adventure, and head out the door around 2:00p. we catch the first and second buses just fine, it’s a pretty hot day, and we’re both gradually getting sweaty. while we were on the second bus (actually a tram), we get asked to see our tickets… holy crap. in the more than a few months that we’ve been here, I have never once even heard of anybody being asked to see tickets, so we stopped buying them months ago (I know, I know). so of course, I didn’t have one. mr. ticketman informs me there is a fine of €40, payable immediately to him. I suppose it’s a good thing I had it with me, because I’m not sure what he would have done if I hadn’t had it (which I often don’t). so I pay him the fine, and go on with my trip.
Salzburg
Salzburg. Wow, what a breath of fresh air after 2 days of stuffy train rides. The train ride through the Alps helped set the scene and mood of what was to come. So I suppose spending an unexpected night in Milano was a blessing in disguise, because the Alps train ride was definitely a highlight and had we taken the night train, we would have missed the Alps during the day. The steep mountains just surge out of the ground and go straight up. There are no foothills like Utah, it’s just gorgeous, bright green hilly valleys and then rocky mountain. It was so stunning, I couldn’t keep my eyes off of them. At times, I felt like I was in a train model with all of the bridges and charming villages, all centered around an old church steeple. We had a stop in Innsbruck, and it was a scene from the Sound of Music; was green as Hawaii, more exaggerated mountains than Utah, and the small European city. It help our sour mood too to see something worth seeing. This is one of those places where pictures would never do justice.
Tirrenia
Tirrenia is a small, busy, beautiful beach town near Pisa. There was no direct train to the town, so we took a train to Livorno, just a bit south of the beach. This train appeared to drop us off in the middle of podunk nowhere! I was seriously half expecting to see sage brush blow by in the wind. We had to then find a way from the train to the hotel. This part of every city we visited usually turned out to be the most adventurous, since there just wasn’t enough time pre-trip to plan every detail of transportation.
Rome
Rome, Rome, where to begin with Rome. This was one place we definitely wanted to get to while we were in Europe. It had the quintessential European big city vibe, but with a major difference; artifacts and ruins throughout, actually embedded within, the city. We’re talking about huge, show-stopping sights: the Colosseum, the Pantheon, Trevi Fountain, the largest monument I’ve ever seen, Piazza Navona, Arch of Constastine, and more. I can only imagine how much a real history buff would enjoy that place. The presence of the Roman Empire is just staggering and impossible to deny. While we were in Prague, I remember reading that it had been the capital of the Roman Empire in the 14th century. Prague is so far away and to think that the empire’s reach extended to the Czech Republic really says something. And then seeing the Colosseum in true form, it really puts it all into perspective.
italy trip overview
so I’m going to break up this trip into a few posts because the trip spanned several cities (in a couple countries), and if we tried to cram all the pics and info into one post, it would be huge. so this post is a basic overview of the trip as a whole, with the individual city posts linked in this one.