Normandy

We had booked a tour a couple days in advance and were pretty excited to be going to part of World War II history. We were up at 430am and made our way to the bus that was picking up at 645am. We made the 3 hour trip to our first stop, a museum.

Of course we weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but it was amazing. I learned so much as they had detailed descriptions and pictures of history from 1939-1945. They had artifacts and uniforms from the time period, and even sat down for a 30 minute video about the landings on D-Day. We then had lunch (provided for us), and were back on the bus.

Our first site was at Pointe du Hoc, where the Rangers were sent to scale these sheer cliffs to destroy enemy weapons at the top. When they reached the top, they discovere that the Germans had already moved their weaponry to another location. At the top of these cliffs, where we were able to walk around, we found many bunkers, and craters covering the grounds where bombs had hit.

They even still have the barbed wire fence around a lot of the bunkers.

Max standing in the middle of a crater

Next we were off to Omaha beach....we only got a few minutes to take some pictures.

Next was the American Cemetary.....this was one of the hardest places to visit, seeing so many gravestones for those that fought and lost their lives for the freedoms we have today. Also seeing the wall of all the names of those whose bodies were never found. Imprinted about the names it mentions that only God knows where these bodies lie.

Here are a few more pictures of our trip to Normandy

We got to see so many wonderful things on this tour. It was an experience I wouldn't trade for anything. We both got emotional at times, you see these places in movies, but until you see it in person it just isn't the same. What a great way to end our visit to France.

Next stop England!!!

Paris, France....finally!!

I am so sorry that it has taken so long to post anything. We has been super busy, sometimes we couldn't get internet, and even when we did I was just too tired :-( But hooray we made it to Paris!!!!! We left Rome on the morning of Monday September 6th, and we didn't make it into Paris until midnight due to a random stop at the border of Italy and France for the police to come on board. They checked every single persons passports, I passed with flying colors, but they definitely did a double take on Max haha. They did take about 3 people off of the train, but not sure why hmmm, just glad it wasn't us. Well we arrived at the train station, and realized that our hotel was a little bit out of Paris, and because it was so late there were no buses running. Ok, no big deal, we will take a taxi. Oh what is that Max? We have about 10 euros left, and we need to get more money out? Sure, no problem, we will find an ATM. Hmmm no ATM in the train station, and no one to ask you say? AWESOME!!!!!! Ya we ended up walking around, going in and out of hotels hoping to find an ATM, but having no luck. And let's just say my 3 years of French in high school were no help, unless knowing what cheese is in french will solve our problems.....nope!! Well we did eventually find one and were in a taxi and on our way to the hotel in a jiffy.

So we are checking in and we are about to head to the room, when Max decided to ask the best way to get back into the city in the morning would be. "Oh well actually tomorrow there is a strike on all public transportation so you can't go anywhere!!!" Fantastic!! What should we do now that we can't go anywhere? I know.....DISNEYLAND PARIS heck ya!!!!!!!! We turned our downer of a night into excitement for the morning as if we were little kids again, and to make things even better, apparently our hotel was part of a little village, so our room was actually a house!! Yep a 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom, 2 level house. That's right!! Oh and a laundry room, so no more stinky Max and Jackie!!

Living room!!

Our backyard

Best part was that everything was in English, so yay no more translation books!!

Because the fountain pictures were so well liked...........

I think he has some bladder issues

I could not stop laughing...people thought I was crazy!!

No need to rub in Disneyland as I am sure you are all VERY jealous, so on to Paris. Oh but first, that night we did walk to a super market so that we could make dinner, and apparently in France you bring your own bags to put your groceries in. When they were all done scanning our food we just sat there waiting for someone to pack our stuff, and they looked at us like we were stupid. Of course no one spoke English and once again I said fromage, fromage and nothing (that's cheese). We did find bags that we had to purchase at 5 euros a piece, packed our stuff and off we went, ugh!!! Ok, so the next day strikes were over and we were back on schedule. We headed to Paris and saw a few places before we called it a night. Luckily our hotel was right near the arc de triomphe......

The next day was the real site seeing day, despite getting lost a few times we did get to see some wonderful things.

Louvre

This beautiful park by the Louvre....people would sit and have picnics and play around like it was no big deal.

Notre Dame

For some reason they let Max right into Notre Dame, no questions asked...hmm not sure why?!?

 There were soooo many birds in this open area 

So Max decided to give me some bread for the birds, I should have known....

That was just the start of it...there was more to come!!

At night everything was so gorgeous. 5 minutes after every hour the Eiffel Towere would light up with all these sparkly lights, it was so amazing to see.

Lying in the Louvre Park with the Eiffel Tower in the background

We came across this bridge that had all of these locks on them, when we looked closer they had writing on each one. Some with dates on them and others with peoples names. We weren't sure why , but we found it so unique. We were sad that we didn't have any locks to leave behind ourselves.







It started pouring out so Max and I head back to our hostel (which was a couple miles away) to call it a night. We were soaked and tired, but what a good day. Did I mention our room had bunk beds...SWEET!!!

Yes mom, that is me in the sheet/sleeping bag that you made me. You're the best!!!

Next day........Normandy, France!!

It's Rome Time!!!

We woke up early excited to head to a brand new city and a brand new experience. We left the hotel extra early knowing how lost we usually get. We actually made it to the train station with a couple hours to spare, so we relaxed, grabbed the only food we could find; pringles, orange soda and a snickers bar.....breakfast of champs baby, sat down and did our favorite pass time, people watching :-) Max realized that the train station is not where attractive people hang out, and I discovered that people tend to buy shoes that are way too small for their feet. Isn't it uncomfortable to have your heels hangin an inch or two off the back of your shoe? Maybe that's just me. Our train was delayed, just our luck, but were able to get on around 1:15pm on Saturday September 4th and arrived around 4:40pm. Max and I were starving so while we were trying to figure out the best way to get to our next hotel we sat down to eat at the station at a restaurant named Ciao, funny that's the name of the restaurant we ate at in Greece, can't they be more creative than calling a restaurant 'Bye?" Well let's just say we ate everything we could find, we probably ate enough food to feed a family. Many people stared at us, probably thinking we were American because of the amount of food we had while they nibbled on their miniature salads!!!
Well we discovered that the only way to get to our hotel was by taxi, one expensive taxi that is. On the way to the hotel I am pretty sure our cab driver drove in 2 lanes the entire time and never used his blinker once. I thought we were going to die at points. We survived, and made it to the Rome Park City Marriott, which was beyond gorgeous, in fact we probably look like homeless people compared to the ones walking around this hotel. We decided to unload and just take it easy by walking the property and to wash our clothes, yes we did this in the sink by hand and hung it out to dry with clothes pins. It was interesting, but kind of nice to feel like we couldn't rely on technology and the comfort of wonderful inventions like the washer and dryer. Off to nighty night after that.

Awake at 7 in the morning and on the shuttle by 8 to the city center of Rome. I barely walked 10 feet before I realized how different everything was compared to the last couple cities we had gone to. It was more peaceful, quiet, clean and just plain beautiful every way you looked at it, the details of every building were extraordinary.

Ponte Umberto

Piazza del Tribunalli

Everywhere we went there were people dressed up like this. We even found one that dressed up like death.

My favorite was this guy, he looked just like a statue, and I swear I stared at him for a good 10 minutes and he did not move a single muscle.....impressive!!!

 This is me being sad, why you ask? Because I was dooped!! Yep that's right, I was standing minding my own business when this man came up to me and handed me flowers. I didn't even have much time to react, the next thing I know is they were asking Max to give them money. What?!?! Seriously, people do this everywhere and I fell for it. I think we paid 3,50 euro for them, which is around $5 US dollars or so. They asked for more, but we said no. The rest of the day, everytimes we saw people with roses we were like, "yep, they've been dooped!!"

And now for the fun trick fountain pictures.....what is Max doing?

Ok this one is not as good, i'm suppose to look like i'm taking a drink from the fountain in the background. I blame Max for the inaccuracy.

Much better!!!

Look at the amazing detail on this pole!!!

Pantheon

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St. Peter's tomb

Statue of Caesare

Hmm, look familiar?

Don't mind if I do!!!!

Well, to be honest, I could fill 10 pages with the wonderful pictures we both took in Rome, but we don't have that much time so I will get to the 2 top sites that we were really wanting to see in Rome; the Colosseum and the Vatican.

Gettin the guns ready for my fight in the ring!

We decided to take a tour for the colosseum and it was so interesting to learn more details of the days of Gladiators as well as see the site itself. The floor base was currently being rebuilt, but you can see underneath all of the columns in which the Gladiators and wild animals were held. There are 60 elevators built into those columns so that when all the crowd and emperor arrived and the games began, the Gladiators were brought up through the wooden floors into the arena.

After the arena had been shut down and the games ended, the Colosseum was broken down and used piece by piece to build other necessary buildings.

They would even return and break holes in between the stone blocks so that they could take the metal hooks used to sustain the wall, and melt it down to create weapons for war.

The Vatican

The Vatican is pretty large, so I took a quick video scanning the entire area. THis area is seen in movies like Angels and Demons and Mission Impossible III.....we actually just watched that movie recently and it was kind of fun saying, "hey, we were just there!"

We travelled on foot for 7 1/2 hours to see all that we could see with a break for a delicious lunch, it was hot, it was exhausting and it was worth it. Rome was just as beautiful as I had hoped and it really started to sink in that we were in Europe (hahaha yes it did take a week for me). We headed back to the hotel and crashed pretty quick, we needed our rest because the next day we were travelling to PARIS, FRANCE!!!