Europe: Josh's Top Ten (2 of 4)

Continuing on with Josh's Top Ten...

6. The Vatican

As we walked into St. Peter’s Square for the first time, we knew that we were in for a grand experience. The vast, curving colonnade really sets the stage for the massive scale and artistic excellence of the entire Vatican. We went on to tour the Vatican Museums and St. Peter’s Basillica, and the splendor of each surpassed the expectations that were established for us.

The normal highlights of the museums, the Sistine Chapel and the Raphael Rooms, were obviously a delight, but it probably won’t surprise anyone that I was most enthralled by the massive Gallery of Maps. This 16th century gallery, longer than a football field, acts as a complete map of the Italian peninsula. After it was painted, it allowed the Pope to get a better idea of the geography of the surrounding countryside without ever having to leave Vatican City.

The scale of the basilica was really a surprise. It is so much bigger even than the other massive cathedrals that I’ve seen (St. Paul’s in London, Notre Dame in Paris, etc.) that it just overpowers the senses. It is an incredible building, and the structure itself is noteworthy in its own right, but even this can’t overshadow the wonderful collection of artwork that is housed inside. From the soaring Baldacchino by Bernini to Michaelangelo’s Pieta, it was incredible to walk through the basilica and see all of these masterpieces.

While it could be argued that the splendor of Vatican City may not be the most effective use of church resources (I’m still not completely sure where I stand on this), as a tourist it was absolutely incredible.

The Map Rooms:

Raphael's Deliverance of St. Peter:


Standing on the spot where Charlemagne was crowned Holy Roman Emperor in St. Peter's Basilica - a little crazy.



The dome was really impressive.


5. The Neighborhoods of Paris

Of the three major cities that we visited, Rome had the best sights, Amsterdam had the nicest neighborhood (more on that later), but Paris was the most consistently beautiful city of the three. From Le Marais (where we stayed) to Montmartre and the Latin Quarter, I was really impressed with the walkability and community feel of all the neighborhoods that we saw.

Although I would have liked to spend more time almost everywhere we went, this would especially apply to Paris. Unfortunately, we were really only able to breeze through these neighborhoods with the amount of time that we were in town, but even in that short amount of time, it was easy to see why so many people seem to like Paris. It would be a fun place to live someday to really gain a better understanding of the city.





4. The Hill Towns of Tuscany

After our time in Rome, we stayed in Florence for two nights before renting a car and exploring the Tuscan countryside on our own. Florence was wonderful (I’m sad that I have to leave it off this list), but the hill towns that we encountered on the road will probably bring us back to Italy for another vacation.

We stopped at three towns in the course of our day on the road. The first, San Gimignano was a fascinating medieval citadel with over a dozen tall towers that overlooked the rolling countryside. Significantly less touristy was the walled city of Volterra that was a bustling city of the Etruscans almost 2500 years ago. Finally, we made our way to Siena, a somewhat bigger, less quaint, but amazingly beautiful city in Central Tuscany.

While they all provided a different view of Tuscany, the real highlights were San Gimignano and Siena. The towers of San Gimignano provide a spectacular backdrop for the quaint twisting streets and storefronts that lie below. In Siena everything revolves around the central square, the Piazza de Campo, and this is truly one of the most spectacular squares I have ever seen. We spent a couple hours just sitting in the square, and it was a great way to end our wonderful exploration of Tuscany.

Our little quasi-automatic car:

Overlooking San Gimignano:



A tower in Volterra:

The square in Siena.  It is hard to tell from this shot, but it is fan shaped and slopes down toward this building.  A perfect place to sit and spend an evening.

Curtains Galore

You've missed hearing about the house, haven't you?

Well, probably not.

But we missed it - just a little bit - while we were away. And now that the jet lag has faded and the laundry is all clean, we felt that we were ready to tackle an itty bitty project.

We have a full 9 windows across the front of our house, and the original window treatments were just short of dreadful. We them all down down, along with their hardware, prior to painting, and have felt a little on display ever since. And really, watching Jeopardy! while the sun hits us right in the face isn't our first choice, either.

We're novices at this homeowner/decorating thing, and choosing window treatments was more difficult than I would have expected. There are so many options! Curtains? Shades? Blinds? (After almost 4 years in apartments, I put my foot down on using vinyl mini blinds, but there are other blind options, as I soon found out.)

Our first order of business? The guest room. With two large street-facing windows, we knew our guests would have zero privacy until we hung something up.

Josh chose the color combination for this room, and we both really like it. We already had the bed/duvet but the wall color and curtains (on sale at West Elm - yay!) are new.



Today we tacked the family room and living room – a row of windows the stretches from one side of the main floor to the other. Since the rooms flow openly from one to the other, we decided to get the same treatments for all four. And after countless trips to the store and many changed minds on what we wanted, we decided to go with a simple look - white curtains.

Before (Family Room):


After:


Before (Living Room):


After:


Josh wanted the type with grommets, and we found these puppies were on sale at J. C. Penny. The rods are all from Target.

(Side note: if you don't care where I purchased these things, just skim over those parts. I know from experience reading other blogs that I always want to where other people got their stuff. I'm consistently inspired by other blogs and websites and get frustrated if they don't share the details.)

We might do something with shades under the curtains (like this) in the future, but at this point we're just thankful for a little privacy. Plus, they just make the place look a bit more homey.

Please disregard the fact that A) our living room is all-but empty, B) there is blue tape in places on the wall (reminding me where I need to do some touching up), and C) our entry mats are dirty/not right for that space. We're a work in progress around here!

Europe: Josh's Top Ten (1 of 4)

We have so many memories and pictures of our much-loved vacation that it has been a little difficult to decide what to share on this here blog. After all, we're confident that you don't want to read about it until kingdom come. And since we don't agree 100% on what we liked best (really, there were simply too many choices!) we've decided to write separate series of brief blog posts on what we liked best about our trip.

Josh is going to give you his overall "Top Ten" while I plan to concentrate on some favorites from the specific countries we visited (France, Holland, and Italy).

So, in his second ever blog post, here is the beginning of Josh's Top Ten:

10. The view from the Arc de Triomphe

This designation is somewhat of a cop-out as I was trying to decide between the Arc, the Champs-Elysees, the Eiffel Tower, and the museums of Paris, and this kind of covers them all. The Eiffel Tower obviously features prominently from this vantage point as do the avenues, gardens, and buildings of the Axe Historique, but the view extends beyond these things to the curve of the Seine, the spires of Notre Dame, the dome of the Pantheon (St. Genevieve), and the elegant Basilica of Sacre Coeur that sits atop Montmartre.

The Arc also sits in the middle of 12 of Paris’s grand avenues, and it allows the perfect perspective to view Baron Haussmann’s grand plan for the city of Paris. Haussmann’s bold initiative in the mid 19th century bulldozed large segments of the city in order to create broad boulevards and grand monuments, and this has paved the way for urban design projects in cities around the world. This “New Paris” is certainly a sight to see from the top of the Arc.








9. Dutch Food

Going into the trip, I knew pretty much what to expect from the culinary offerings of both France and Italy, but the cuisine of the Netherlands offered the potential for more surprises. Fortunatey, the surprises turned out to be positive. From the Dutch pancakes covered with nutella and bananas to the croquettes (even of the McKroket persuasion), everything was excellent.

Everywhere we went, it seemed like there were foods to tempt us. One day, in Alkmaar, we must’ve stopped at about six bakeries and three cheese stands and piled ourselves high with bread, cheese, and waffles that we could enjoy on the train ride to Haarlem. The next day we enjoyed a roadside stand in Drimmelen that served the best bami croquettes and fries.

Those who know me will vouch for the fact that I am not the most adventurous eater (especially with meats), but I really enjoyed sampling the different foods of the Netherlands and I look forward to having them again.

These are croquettes. They're sometimes served with bread, so you can eat them like an open-faced sandwich.
Jessica's mom wasn't too pleased that we chose to eat at McDonalds while in Europe.
You can sometimes find croquettes at these unique vending machine-type restaurants. They make them fresh behind the scenes, then put them in these slots. You come up, put in some change, and open a little door to grab your treat.


8. The Pantheon

The fact that the Pantheon comes in at number eight on this list really speaks to how much I enjoyed this vacation. This is a building that I have been eager to see for years after learning so much about it from my days as an Architecture major in college. Fortunately, it didn’t disappoint.

From the square, this temple dating from the 2nd century AD is certainly imposing, but it is on the inside where the Pantheon really impresses. Upon entering the Pantheon, the expansive coffered dome soars over the circular room that now serves as a church and a shrine (the graves of Raphael and the first two kings of Italy reside in the space). The dome, which was the largest in existence for much of its history, later served as the inspiration for renaissance architects Brunelleschi and Michelangelo as they designed their famous church domes around Italy.






7. Brielle

One of the true highlights of our time in the Netherlands was our day trip to see the places where Jessica’s grandparents lived in the past, and the jewel of that trip was the town of Brielle. Brielle is outstandingly picturesque collection of orange-roofed buildings surrounded by canals. For a small community, it was very lively. There were plenty of shops lining the streets and boat traffic in the canals.

In the few hours that we spent there, we ate on the main canal, walked the streets to the boyhood home of Jessica’s Opa, and climbed the tower of the local church to look out over the surrounding country. Brielle was one of the more charming towns that we saw on the trip, but it was also a wonderful opportunity to learn more about family history.



The view from the top of the church:

Four Years Ago Today

... and an incredible four years it has been.

Ice Ice Baby

We are back. Back to the land of dollars, free bathrooms, pepperoni, traffic laws, and free refills. We are also back to a place where the standard-sized coffee no longer looks like this:



And then there is ice. Glorious ice. Europeans have no caught on to the idea, much to Josh's chagrin.

Weird what you miss, isn't it?

We are also back to our house and our beloved dog, and it feels good.

Our trip was fabulous, but there is truly no place like home.

Our Favorite Travelling Companion

Rick Steves.


In my experience on this trip, having a good travel guide is priceless. It has to have the right amount of all kinds of different information - practical things, history, architecture, where to eat, where to walk, etc. I don't just want summaries of all of the different sights, hotels, and restaurants. That is boring and overwhelming. What I need when I travel is for someone to be very unbiased and tell me what is REALLY important/exciting/interesting about an area. Oh, and lead me to some good eats.

We've decided that Rick's books are excellent take-along guides. We've now used his books in Holland, Rome, and now Florence, and are always whipping it out of our bag to find a restaurant, learn more about a church, or read up on the history of the area.

Also, prior to this trip, Josh downloaded all kinds of free audio guide podcasts to our ipods. We've enjoyed using them in the Lourve, The Pantheon, St. Peter's Basilica, the Sistene Chapel, the Roman Forum, the Colosseum, and today in a walk through Florence. Very informative, not too long, not too short, and only slighly cheesy. It was nice to see all of these things and learn a bit more about what we were seeing without having to pay for audio guides at every stop.

When In Rome

Do as the Romans do, right?

And the second night we were in town we discovered that Romans like to take a night time stroll.

The first night we got there I had an ugly cold and dropped by achy, sniffly, sneezy body into bed as soon as I possibly could. But with the help of an Italian pharmacist who could make out my hand gestures to mean I wanted a nasal decongestant, I was mostly good to go by the second evening.

I've never seen so many people - of all ages and classes - out at all hours of the night. Walking.



So that is what we did, and I'm so thankful. The city is beautiful and interesting by day, but at night it takes on a different sort of glow.

The Forum of Julius Ceasar

Nearby Trajan's Column

Victor Emmanuel II (first king of Italy) Monument, with the worldk's largest equestrian monument there in front.

My favorite, the Trevi Fountain. In general, I loved the fountains we came across all around Rome.