Here are my top 10 highlights (in no particular order besides the one that I remember them in) from traveling in England, Ireland, Germany, The Netherlands, Italy, Austria, Switzerland, Spain, and Portugal!
10. Kilmainham Gaol: Former prison, now museum: famous for both Irish revolutionary history and the evolution of prisons across the world.
(The main room, meant to bring in sunshine to reform the incarcerated persons)
9. Showing my mom Oxford: We did our own pub crawl, seeing one of my favorite modern pubs, and two exceedingly old ones, one being the haunt of Bill Clinton during his Rhodes scholar days and second as a meeting place for the "Inklings" a group of Oxford professors and writers including J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis.
(Mom at The Eagle and the Child)
8. Spending time with a friend: When I first heard I was coming to England, I knew that visiting Ha Thu, a former exchange student at Chugiak High School, was a must. Mom and I flew to the very cold Berlin and had a great time with our tour guide.
(Ha Thu and I at the Brandenburger Tor, very famous old gate, site of Ronald Reagan's "Tear Down this Wall")
7. Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam: Well, the fake museum at least. The "real" one is closed for renovation, but all of the pieces are held in another museum. Every time I go to any art museum, I'm usually just there for the Van Goghs. And this was a whole museum full of them!
6. The Duomo in Florence. While I saw many, many churches on this trip; and Westminster Abbey or St. Mark's Basillica might be more technically pretty, this church was just so unique; pink and olive colors on the outside, it was like nothing I had seen before.
(Not the greatest picture, but you get the idea)
5. The Market in Barcelona: One of the best and biggest fresh food markets in Europe. And unlike most farmers' markets/fresh food markets that I have been to, this one was not corrupted by touristy junk, it was all food, and really good food.
(One of the many fruit stands in the market, most of them selling large cups/bowls of fresh cut fruit for 1 euro!)
4. Botantical Gardens, Madrid: Unbelievably huge and beautiful tulips and the most amazing bonzai trees I have ever seen.
(There were so many beautiful bonzais, but I loved the color on this one the best)
3. Beaches of Lisbon, Portugal. I wish I had pictures, but I never brought my camera on my beach days. The beaches that we went to were amazing, with cool rock cliffs with flowers growing off of them. Lisbon is somewhat off the beaten track for tourists (especially Americans going to Europe) so it seemed much less touristy than any beach area I have been to.
(Not the beach, but how beautiful is this?)
2. Being a Tourist in London: My mom insisted on doing touristy things in London, Westminster Abbey, The Tower of London, etc (I drew the line at the double decker bus tour) and although it was miserably cold, I really enjoyed these sights that I would never do on my own.
(Big Ben, made me miss my brother Will who loves this tower for some reason)
1. I tried to narrow it down to one more place, but I don't think I could, I'll combine three of my favorite eating experiences: Gelato in Florence (Nutella and Yogurt yum!), these egg tarts in Lisbon which were a cross between crem brulee and quiche (but sweet) in a crust, and the Guinness Factory in Dublin (beer is food, right?)
(Caution: Photo not actually taken a the Guinness Factory)
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