Europe Trip Part 3 . . . . Italy

After the Riviera we started our tour of Italy. Italy was a bucket list thing for me. I have always wanted to go to Italy and it was beautiful! I wish we had more time to go to more of the countryside but time was short so we hit more of the bigger cities - Pisa, Florence, Venice, and Rome.
I think Venice and Rome were my favorites out of the 4 cities. Pisa was my least favorite. The tower was cool but the city was very industrious and not very pretty.



Here's Ty & I trying to hold up the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Corny I know but we had to get the shot. Everyone there was taking similar photos. It was kind of fun to watch.




Next we moved onto Florence. It was a beautiful city. The famous statue of David is housed there as well has the tomb of Michelangelo. Unfortunately, no photos allowed there. Florence 3 does have fabulous gelato. I quick word about gelato - you must have it times a day while in Italy. Trust me you will never get sick of it. It is a fabulous treat!


Here we are in Venice. We had just arrived and got out of our water taxi. It rained for about 2 hours and then cleared up for the rest of our stay in Venice. Venice is an amazing city! No cars at all on Venice. All pedestrian or water taxi. I had heard a lot of mixed reviews about Venice but I loved it. We spent 2.5 days there, which was plenty of time to see what we wanted to. There is no city like Venice.

Here is the famous Grand Canal. Very pretty and crowded at times.

Venice - over looking the Canal.

Grand Canal again.

We decided to roam around back behind the commercial part of Venice. Here is some of the houses that we saw. They had such beautiful bridges and colorful buildings. It would be amazing to live there in the summer.

The last city we went to was Rome. Troy and Marielle had already been to Rome and needed to get back to London so we said goodbye to them and headed to our last city.

Here is a night shot of St. Peter's square. Vatican City was beautiful at night. The next day we toured the Vatican Museum and St. Peter's. It was kind of fun to see the things you've seen a hundred time in the movie. We kept pointing out things that were on the movie Angels and Demons.

Speaking of which, here is St. Angelos - the church where the priests were kept hostage in the movie. This is pretty big inside and actually has a restaurant. It's not abandoned like it appears in the movie.

Next the Colosseum. This was the highlight for Ty. We took 2 different tours of the Colosseum and it was pretty amazing the things that the Roman could do. It also made me a bit sad about all the evil things that happen there as well. Our tour guide said over a million people were killed in this arena - I say more like a million people were murdered. They killed people for sport and they wondered by the Roman Empire fell. Anyway, the building itself was amazing. The tunnels go down several stories to house the animals and people. They also built a drainage system so they could fill up the arena with water and reenact naval battles. The last event was held 592 AD but had been used hundreds of years before that. It was pretty amazing to see all the things that could do and invent 2000 years ago.

Here is another shot of the Colosseum.

The view of the Colosseum from Palatine Hill (the old Roman Palace).

Ty with part of the palace behind him. The Colosseum would be to his right.

Our tour guide of Palatine Hill also did a private tours of the Mysteries of Rome, which we took. It was a 2.5 hour tour of sites that are in the tour books and things most people don't know about. This tour was also one of the highlights.
He took us to a church that housed the funeral services for Michelangelo. He also showed us the original tribute to Michelangelo that was to site above his tomb in Vatican City. Although shortly after they him in his tomb his body was stolen from Vatican City and moved Florence.
The picture above is Ty standing in front of the tribute to Michelangelo from the Catholic church.

This is a Michelangelo sculpture that not very many people know about. It was found after his death in a basement. He started but didn't finish. He sculpted everything but the face, another artist finished that. Our tour guide said Michelangelo sculpted in such a way that the marble would feel as smooth as the actual flesh which it did.

Here is Rome at night above the Spanish Step. It really was beautiful at night.

This is Trevi's Fountain - the fountain of love.

Ty & I in front of Trevi's fountain.

Ty in front of the Pantheon. When the Vatican was being built they took a lot of materials from the old Roman buildings/ruins. They were going to take down the Pantheon to help build the Vatican but Michelangelo couldn't allow them to destroy one of the only Roman buildings that was untouchedso in exchange for not taking material from the Pantheon, Michelangelo painted the Sistine Chapel. This is according to our tour guide. He gave some pretty amazing stories about Roman and Catholic history.

This is inside the Pantheon.

Rome was AMAZING. If you ever get the chance to go you should. I would love to go back someday.

Europe Trip part 2 . . . . The French/Italian Riviera

So the Riviera was one of my most favorite spots of our trip. It was so beautiful and relaxing. We traveled from London to Nice, France then to Monaco, and then to St. Margherita and Portofino, Italy.
The Riviera is right on the Mediterranean Sea and the water is so blue and clear. We had perfect weather and if felt like you were in paradise. It was much different than anyway else I've been - Hawaii, Mexico, California. It was fabulous.
We first started off in Nice, which is not to far from Cannes where the film festival takes place. Troy booked a 5 hour bike tour for us on 2nd day there. I was a bit hesitant to do the bike tour considering I probably haven't ridden a bike for 15 years! I did okay, although I think I was the slowest one there but at lease I made it. It was the best way to see the city and the surrounding areas. Our tour guide showed us some pretty amazing stuff. It was just so beautiful and quaint. I loved it! I have posted a lot of pictures so enjoy! :)



Here is us in Nice, France on the boardwalk not too far from our hotel. This was just before our bike tour.


On our way to go get our bikes. This is a typical street in France/Italy. . . . small roads and colorful buildings. I really loved to just walk down the streets. Everything was just so beautiful!



Here is us with our bikes. Nice is in the background.

Troy & Ty taking a water break.

Ty and I. This was the out skirts of Nice. Could you image living here?

There were lots of small towns surrounding Nice. I am not sure the name of this town but is had beautiful views. Look at all the boats and yachts. Some of those yachts were easily $30-$50 million. It was unbelievable the money people have. All throughout the Riviera and Venice we saw these kind of yachts. It was amazing.

More scenic views. You can see Monaco in the distance.

More views from our bike tour. Talk about paradise.

This is where we stopped and ate lunch and some went swimming.

This was toward the last part of our bike tour. Some of the small towns were so amazing. I told Ty he needs to make it really big so we could have a summer house there. The towns and buildings looked like they were straight out of a movie. The things we saw on the tour was one of the highlights of the trip.

Here we are in Monaco. The front of the Monte Carlo, the same hotel in the James Bond movies. Monaco was beautiful but I thought Nice and Portofino was better. Monaco isn't very wide it is mostly built up a mountain.

Troy and Ty outside of the Monte Carlo. They wore matching outfits most of the trip. It was kind of funny.

This is the view from the hot tub from our hotel in Saint Margherita, Italy. This was also one of my favorite spots.

Again, another view from the hot tub on the roof of our hotel. It was amazing!

Ty and I by the water in Saint Margherita. Ty needs to work on his camera smile. It looks like he's in pain. :)

Here is us on Portofino, Italy. This was about 2-3 miles from Saint Margherita . It was such a small, quaint town. A lot of wealthy people live there. Notice the ladies in the background. Not uncommon to just throw out a towel and sun bathe. We are just lucky they were wearing swimsuits! Most of the ladies and teen age girls we saw only wore bottoms. YIKES, it was NOT pretty!!

Europe Trip Part 1 . . . . . London

Our good friends the Clark's moved to London almost a year ago. They invited us to go with them on a small vacation to France and Italy. Well Italy is on my "buck list" of places and things to see so we jumped at the chance. We went and toured for 2 weeks. As the time drew closure I started to get cold feet. The plan was to drop our sweet Rilynne off at my parents place in Salt Lake. I just didn't know if I could leave her. We waited so long to get her and now I was going on vacation without her?? I didn't know if I could do it. I actually called to see if our flights could be canceled without penalty. Our tickets were non-refundable and my parents/siblings were really looking forward to seeing Rilynne. I knew she would be in good hands, so off we went.

Some of my nieces with Rilynne.

We first went and spent a few day with Ty's sister Sharri and her husband Ryan in Washington DC. They were nice enough to host us for a few day and take us around to a few sits. Ty was born in DC so it was fun for him to go back to the old neighborhood were he grew up. I enjoyed the monuments, as I always do. We went to them at night, which I think is the best time to see them. Here are a few pics for your enjoyment :)

The Hollist crew in front of part of the Vietnam Monument. Pen served in Vietnam.



Next we flew to London to stay with Troy and Marielle and tour the city. London was a fun city and 2 days wasn't long enough to see everything. The highlights were the London Tower (which was the old palace back in the day), Westminster Abby, and the London Eye.

View of London from the bridge.

Picture of inside the London Tower. People still live here - with guards and everything!

Here is a pic for Big Ben and the Parliament building from our water taxi.

In front of Westminster Abby. Inside was amazing!! It was the first of many churches that we toured.

Ty with the Parliament building in the background.

Us in front of Buckingham Palace. It was such a let down. If you have limited time in London don't go to the palace unless you are sure they will let you in for a tour.

i ♥ fall

i love the change of seasons. the air is crisp, the leaves are changing, football season is here and christmas is coming! i am so excited for this fall and christmas because this will be rilynne's first holiday season. i have a lack of motivation to do anything. all i want to do is sit in my house and decorate and make lots of these . . .

happy fall everyone!

yummy . . . .

i snapped a few pics of rilynne last sunday while she was having dinner. she loves to eat! she is always so happy when we put her in her high chair. she loves her rice cereal with pune juice, sweet potatos, squash, bananas, apples, and peaches. i am trying to get her to love green beans and peas but no luck yet. she doesn't like the green stuff . . . yet.

Rugby

a few weekends ago ty played in a touch rugby tournament in portland. they did pretty well and they played teams from virgina, california, and even new zealand. ty got the mvp award for their team and it was the first time he ever played in a tournament. he had a play where he dove to "touch" a guy that was going to score. he ripped the whole side of his arm, stomach, and hip. it was a great play but after 3-4 weeks it is just barely starting to heal! it was really fun to watch ty play again. sometimes i miss his basketball days where i could watch him in action!

here is their team and some of the new zealand players

ty, nate, and rendell

ty in action!

rilynne did so well. she smiled the whole day! she cheered her dad on most of the day!

ahoy . . . .

our good friends don & tina invited us to go sailing with with on the willamette and columbia river. of course we jumped all over the offer. i have always wanted to go sailing and love to be on the water. don had been sailing for years and has is own sail boat and was able to teach/show us some really cool stuff. i thought at one point we might tip over when were were turning and a big gust of wind caught our sail. it was so beautiful to be out on the water and to see the portland area like i have never seen it before. i have been on ski boats on the river but there is just something about sailing and peacefulness of it. i have included a couple of pics of our adventure. thanks don and tina for taking us out. hopefully we can do it again soon :)

this was the scene just after we left the dock. isn't it beautiful. it was the perfect day to go out on the water!

here is ty & i enjoying the ride.

here is a fellow sailor. i just think sail boats are beautiful against the blue water.

here is a huge ship docked for cleaning in the fresh water. apparently the fresh water kills are the stuff that builds up on the bottom of ships while at sea - who knew.

lastly, we came rushing home to see our rilynne!!! we couldn't take rilynne with us on the boat so our good friends ty and cassidy watched her. sailing was fun but we sure missed her.