Category Cultural Attractions (Museums, Historical Sites, Etc.)

Europe 2014 – Roma – We Visit A Great Big Museum

Timeline: October 16th – 18th The next two days in Rome would be busy ones, with many sites of interest to be explored. We had purchased our tickets in advance for the Vatican Museum, scheduled to enter it at 2:00pm on Friday the 17th. We left for town on the bus and the metro planning […]

Europe 2014 – Roma Pre – We Bid Arrividerchi to Lyndsay and Prepare for Nicole

Timeline: October 15th – 16th Our ride out to the airport to drop off Lyndsay went a bit smoother than our drive in to camp the night before. Rome’s airport sits about 15 miles west of town towards the sea and we drove against traffic streaming into the city for work. We bade farewell to […]

Europe 2014 – Siena 2 – A Tuscan Day Trip

Timeline: October 11th – 13th Having been to Italy and Siena once before, Lyndsay had a well-defined agenda for her short stay with us; drink wine and eat good food. Our objective for the Monday, plotted out the day before under the influence of a bottle of red wine, would be the two well-known cities […]

Europe 2014 – Siena – We Seek Out the Tuscan Wine and Food Experience

Timeline: October 11th – 13th Lyndsay arrived at the Siena Central Train Station late Saturday afternoon; we picked her up and brought her back the short distance to camp. We’d laid into some wine and snacks and spent an hour or two relaxing and getting caught up on news from home, solidifying plans for the […]

Europe 2014 – Cinque Terre – Hiking is Hard But a Nice Dinner is a Good Reward

Timeline: October 1st – 5th For our last day in Cinque Terre we decided to tackle the toughest of the coastal hikes, the trail from Monterosso to Vernazza, with an option to continue on to Corniglia. We made a beeline for the trail after disembarking from the train, walking up what seemed to be a […]

Europe 2014 – Cinque Terre – The Value of Re-Hydrating

Timeline: October 1st – 5th We’d get in two good hikes during our stay in Cinque Terre. The first took us from Manarola to Corniglia, a rugged and steep walk of about four miles. We made it a little easier on ourselves, cutting out the first two very steep miles (it would have been six […]

Europe 2014 – Cinque Terre – As Good as St. Rick Claims

Timeline: October 1st – 5th We arrived the afternoon of the Wednesday the 1st at Camping La Sfinge (Sphinx in Italian), just outside of the small town of Deiva Marina at the northern end of the Cinque Terre. From this point on during the remainder of our stay in Italy we would be blessed with […]

Europe 2014 – La Gruyère: The Fondue’s and Don’ts of Switzerland

Timeline: September 25th – 26th Editor’s Note: Jessica again graces the blog with an excellent retelling of day or two in cheese and chocolate country. Enjoy. What a day, what a day. It all started with a late checkout from our hotel in Lucerne. We had a snack breakfast in the Mann Parents room and […]

Europe 2014 – Lucerne – Swiss Sticker Shock

Timeline: September 23rd – 24th With a relatively short and easy drive ahead of us to Lucerne Tuesday morning, we decided to spend a couple of hours walking around Fussen, a charming little town in and of itself. After a very good buffet breakfast at the Zum Hechten, we made our way out into the […]

Europe 2014 – Fussen – Buy One Get One Free Castle

Timeline: September 22nd Monday would be a full day with our planned drive a couple of hours into the Bavarian Alps to take in both Hohenschwangau and Neuschwanstein before checking in to our hotel, the Zum Hecten in Fussen. Our departure in the morning was a little complicated as Marty needed to pick up a […]