Europe 2019 - Venice

We arrived in Venice and drove to the Marco Polo airport to drop off the car. Dave drove this car for a total of 1,200km.

Then it was a boat ride to Venice. I guess I really didn't know much about Venice because 1) I didn't realize you had to take a boat to get there and 2) it was a 1.5 hour boat ride!

We got checked into our Airbnb with a VERY thorough tour, and then ended up with this view for dinner.

We had been waiting our entire trip to have gelato in Venice - this was the first night (and actually the worst gelato of the trip).

This was the view that I woke up to on Monday morning.

We walked to the grocery store and cooked eggs for breakfast.

Indiana Jones...(which movie???)

Iced latte - I know you should drink Italian coffee hot but we walked almost a mile to get here and it was warm outside. A cold drink was nice.

Monday we spent the day at Lido beach. This was a different island of Venice so we took a ferry to get there. Also, my first time in the Adriatic Sea.

Walking to the restaurant for dinner Monday night.

Couldn't go to Italy and not eat pizza.

The view from Ponte di Rialto - the most famous bridge in Venice.

This is not a famous bridge, but one that we walked over multiple times since it was near our Airbnb.

Breakfast Tuesday morning.

The Ponte di Rialto during the day.

St. Marks Square - we did not tour this or anything...next time!

The Bridge of Sighs.

More gelato Tuesday afternoon. We walked quite a ways to find this place - it was the number one gelato on Venice. It was good, but didn't stand out to me compared to any of the other places we went (except for the first night of course).

Our final gelato stop of the trip on Tuesday night.

We left Venice early Wednesday morning, flew from Venice to Frankfurt and then Frankfurt to Phoenix.

I had Spargel again in the Frankfurt airport. I was really looking forward to this food so glad I found it at a couple of places.

Traveling makes me want to travel even more. Can't wait to be back in Europe again!

Europe 2019 - Salzburg

We were in Salzburg for 24 hours and it was not nearly enough time. I loved this city and there is so much to see and do there.

We arrived Saturday early afternoon and walked up a hill for this view. This is the River Salzach and it flows through the middle of Salzburg.

Dave bought a huge pretzel at the market.

Hotel Sacher - we didn't stay here on this trip or even eat here, but I did have the famous Sacher Torte with Julie in Vienna. Maybe on our next trip we will stay a night here.

After about an hour or so of walking around, we checked into our Airbnb. It had a roof top deck - Dave and I sat outside until it started raining.

It poured for quite a while so it was a nice afternoon to relax and take a nap. Out of the 4 Airbnb's we stayed on the trip, this one was my favorite. It was the newest and cleanest and it had a nice tub which I took advantage of on Saturday night. It also had lavender lotion that had clean ingredients. Saturday was the first night I saw Spargel on the menu - this was an excellent Spargel soup.

Sunday we decided to do something different and go to the zoo since it was right by our Airbnb. There was nothing special about this zoo, other than it was located right at the edge of a mountain so the views were amazing.

After the zoo we found a little cafe (Café Bazar) and had lunch before making the 5 hour drive to Venice.

Europe 2019 - Munich

We arrived in Munich on Wednesday night, June 19th. This was my second time in Munich - Kyle and I were there in 2005 when we did our 3 week Europe trip. Munich didn't really stand out to me from the 2005 trip, but this time I loved Munich. The food scene was excellent, there is a large park in the middle of Munich, and I enjoyed the city feel. (I think it reminded me of NYC and that is why I liked it so much.)

Thursday morning was breakfast at LAX Eatery. It had a Southern California beach feel - hence the name.

This Thursday was a holiday called Corpus Christi so everyone was out having brunch.

The cathedral in Marienplatz. Since it was Corpus Christi it had Vatican flags flying (usually those flags cannot be flown outside of Vatican City).

I walked to Wagners Juicery for a smoothie on Thursday afternoon.

The place was packed and the smoothie was just ok.

Thursday afternoon we had signed up to do a bike tour around the city. We met for the tour, and shortly thereafter it started pouring. When the rain really hit, we were in Hofbräuhaus so we went upstairs to this room. This is the room where Hitler started the Nazi Party.

This is our tour guide James (from Australia). He did a great job of entertaining us during the rain and then as soon as the rain stopped he got us out on the bikes.

This was a palace that was damaged during WWII - rather than completely fixing it, they just drew some of the lines to make it look like bricks. They even drew some of the windows.

This was interesting to me about the lions. If you zoom in on the picture, you see the lion on the right has his mouth closed and the lion on the left has his mouth open. The lion on the right is facing a church, while the lion on the left is facing a government building. The lion on the right has his mouth closed because you cannot question the authority of God but you can question the authority of government hence the mouth open.

This is the English Garden - such a gorgeous park. And you don't even feel like you are in a city here.

There was also surfing in Munich!?!?!

James the tour guide said this was a popular restaurant so we ate there on Thursday night.

Kyle and I also ate here in 2005.

Friday morning we got up early and went for a walk in the English Garden. So pretty seeing the sun shine through the trees.

Munich in the background from the park - another thing I learned on the tour was the original Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory was filmed in Munich.

Mary's Coffee Club was another restaurant I found that did not disappoint. 

This was probably the best breakfast of the trip.

Friday we started at the BMW Museum.

This was the first BMW car.

328i signage.

1936 BMW 328 - looks a bit different than my 328.

A rainbow as we were leaving the museum.

After the museum, we went to BMW drifting class. This was Dave's favorite part of the trip.

I actually had fun - had never drifted before in my life. It is more difficult than it looks - I did a lot of spinning.

We passed the class and got our certificates.

Saturday morning was breakfast at Bar-Centrale. Their vanilla creme croissants were probably the best I have ever had. I can still taste it now :)

While we were sitting there a film crew came in and filmed a guy standing at the bar and drinking an espresso. Turns out it was David Beckham's son (that is what our waiter told us and when we Googled him he looked similar).

This was our Airbnb in Munich - we were on the first floor (i.e. up one flight of stairs).

We left Munch Saturday morning and drove to Salzburg. Munich is a place I would definitely visit again!