Our last day....

Haley here. Its almost midnight here and we are all about to head to bed. Wanted to brief you on our day before we started our last day in Europe. Today, we toured Florence. Family, get excited! You all have Christmas presents!!! And I feel like I did quite a good job of shopping in Europe. Didnt spend a lot of money and bought quality presents that I think each of you will like! We are staying in a hostel called PLUS in Florence. Last minute book, but has proved to be very nice..it even has a swimming pool! We have 3 other girls in our room..one goes to Vandy, 1 to University of Virginia and one is canadian and at the University of Montreal. The American girls are studying abroad in Barcelona this semester so they are ending their time here in Europe. The Canadian girl has been all over Europe for the past 3 months. Super fun girls, we have had fun getting to know them.

Today, we started our day by heading to the train station. Last night, we found out that we will not be able to stay with the Rogers family in Munich, but no problem. It actually works out great. We are able to spend all day tomorrow in Florence and then get on a train at 9:30 pm that heads to Munich. We will get to Munich about 6:30 am and then catch a short train to Frankfurt. We will get to Frankfurt on Tuesday morning about 9:30; our plan leaves at 2:10. So, we will be sleeping on the train on Tuesday night, but dont worry, the trains are all completely safe and nice. So today, we went and booked our reservation for the train and then headed off to explore Florence. We first found the market place that had TONS of everything for sale! Italy is known for its leather and boy did they have some leather! Great fun doing a little shopping on our way to the Academia Gallery. This Gallery used to be the art school where Michaelangeo, Di Vinci, Giotto, Rafael and many other studied. These guys were the main stream artists of the beginning of the Renaissance and they all happened to be from Florence and studied and painted here. Is artistic talent in the water here? Maybe I should drink more of it....

At the Academia Gallery, among many great pieces of art, we saw the David. Amazing!! Its HUGE!!! I never imagined it to be so big. Cameras were not allowed but i snuck a picture in of David before I was caught, it was worth the chance. and my flash was off so in now way did i damage the art work:) After the David experience, we went back into the town where we explored a little...saw the Duomo, watched a marathon being run, cheered on some Italians that were struggling in the race, shopped a little more, and went to the Uffizi Museum. Again, an amazing museum with work from all the greats of the Renaissance, my favorite art period. It is still SO cool to be able to see all these pieces in real life. I studied them for so long, looked at pictures of them in books and memorized tons of information about them, but am just now able to see them in person. Great!

After the Uffizi, my brain was kinda full, but we headed out again to see more of Florence. We saw the bridge that has lots of stores on the bridge. Tons of jewelry stores with lots of diamonds! I took lots of pictures of rings that i like..you know, for ideas for the future. We headed back to our hostel, walked back through the market on the way. Ended out having to buy another suitcase for all our purchases, and made it back "home." We got back in time to meet our new friends, have dinner, and the hostel was showing Pirates of the Carribean so we watched the movie.

And that was our day. Everyone is in bed now...its been a long day. We have packed mostly. We have to check out of the hostel by 10am tomorrow. We will leave our bags in the locked luggage room they have, head to Pisa for the day and see the leaning tower they are crazy about, and spend the day there. We will get back from Pisa about 4 and have a few more hours in Florence before we catch our train at 9:30.

So thats it. Cant believe the trip is coming to an end, but i am so ready to see everyone! I called Dan today to see how his CPA test went. He answered and said, " Since your calling, im guessing your home..." Of course, i had to say no, but i wanted to say yes! I am ready to hang out with you guys. But this trip has indeed proved to be a trip of a lifetime. It has been a ton of fun, with some great experiences, some great memories and a ton of things learned. I am so glad I came. I was worried about the trip. A girl in my small group told me it would be absolutely freezing, very expensive and extremely hard. None of those things have proved to be true. It has been a little cold at times, but the last few days, I havent even had to wear my big coat, just my brown North Face. And while I have spent a little above my budget, my budget was $280 so lets be honest, that would be hard to do. And my spending is still very low, so I feel like I did pretty good for 14 days in Europe. So goodnight, love you, miss you! Will probably be able to jump on for a little while tomorrow but just in case we cant, see you Tuesday night!! We land at 9:30!

3 days left....

Haley here...Wow time has flown. It is now Saturday night and what a day we have had. We spent the night in a now called Sacile last night. It is outside of Aviano Italy. We stayed with one of Italys military Young Life people named Cheyenne but Cheyenne wasnt there so we hung out with her roommate Rachel the whole time. Rachel is a volunteer with Young Life and is on active duty with the Air Force. Last night we had a pretty chill night, just watched a movie at Rachels and went to sleep. This morning, we woke up and went to the Air Force base in Aviano. It was pretty cool seeing an air force base for the first time! I tried to imagine what it was like for my mom, who grew up on a base for the first few years of her life. Mom I thought about you! We went shopping in the commissary. Very American! Looks like Walmart inside and I got a 4 gb memory card for my camera for only $9.99!! I am a fan of the military.

Well, me, Charlotte, Rachel and her friend Casey boarded a train about lunch time and went to spend the day in Venice. Beautiful city! Seriously, the whole city is like a museum. No need to spend any money seeing things, just see the city! Now, that is my kind of city. We just walked around the maze of the city and took tourist pictures and had a lot of fun. We had a great day! My favorite was the Italian Gelato! for only 1.50€!

We left Venice about 6 tonight had headed to Florence. We got into Florence about 9:30 ish tonight (i am really not sure, i dont have a watch) and we are in our hostel for the night. really fun, great clean safe hostel so dont worry about that.

oh and my watch. i accidently left it in Berlin. I loved that watch and was so concerned about being safe with it so it wouldnt get stolen, that i left it in the bathroom:( the watch was a good one, not terribly expensive, but good nonetheless...However, i have had it since high school so i guess i got my worth out of it. but i may need a watch for Christmas mom....:)

well, thats our day...see you in 3 days!

change of plans.....

No idea what was wrong with the last post, why the letters are so big..i tried to change it, but it didn't work..

anyway....

just to let you know, change of plans in order to save money and see more cool things we will be going a different directions for the rest of the trip.

Here are our next few days:

Friday - leave L'Abri (Switzerland) and go to Milan for another Thanksgiving with some Texas boys. Stay in Milan till about 4ish then go to Venice where we will hopefully meet Cheyenne and Rachel, 2 American girls who work for Young Life in Aviano Italy. We will be staying the night with Cheyenne and Rachel.

Saturday- Leave Aviano, go back to Venice, and see Venice till about 1:00 then head to Florence Italy. Saturday night we will stay at a hostel in Florence.

Sunday - See Venice!! I get to FINALLY see Michelangelo's work!! SO excited!!!!! Sunday night is still up in the air. We have a night booked at the hostel but we possibly will cancel it and take a night train to Munich Germany. It is a LONG train ride, and if the reservation for the train is cheaper than the hostel, then we will take the night train. Don't worry, they are safe and comfortable! Better than airplanes!

Monday - get into Munich, at whatever time that may be. We will be staying the night with the Rogers family, a Munich Young Life family that is from Knoxville Tennessee. Yay for Volunteer fans!!!!

Tuesday - take the 4 hour train ride from Munich to Frankfurt and hope on a plane. See you that day!


Well, here is the brief rundown of our new plans! Will keep you updated to tell you how it all goes! Love you! Goodnight!

Happy Happy Happy!!! from Haley

Happy Birthday Mom!!!!

and Happy Thanksgiving!!!

We are at L'Abri..things are great..will write more about it later. We are getting ready to have Thanksgiving dinner here! yay for celebrating an American holiday with Americans in Switzerland!

Random events of the last couple of days:

yesterday, we had to wait in Aigle for a couple of hours before we could get a bus to L'Abri. While we were sitting there waiting on the bus, a train pulled up. I thought I heard a knocking sound and turned around. Diana Bendor-Samuel was on the train! Diana was in my youth group at Northwest and I house sit for her family from time to time. Awesome family and I love that girl! She is in the 9th grade at TCA; how random that we ran into each other in Switzerland!! small world...

and..we are at L'Abri in Switzerland. I was just looking through the guest book from the last couple of years and found Rachel Farrar's name in it. Another small world. Rachel is in my small group from church. Rachel, if you read this, Kay from L'Abri says hi!

well, thats all, 2 people are waiting. heading out to Italy tomorrow morning. will update more then! Have a great day celebrating turkey and football! Love you!

day six, charlotte version

Since we stayed in Paris another night, we spent today first going to Notre Dame. Although we didn't climb to the top or go down into the Crypt, we saw a great deal of the famous church. Our group, the girls we ate dinner with, got hot chocolate across the street from the Fountain at Place St. Michel, after which Haley I ventured off on our own. We decided to walk down the canal to the Champs-Elysees. We meandered our way up from the Christmas festival shops to the Louis Vuitton, Mercedes shops the street is known for. We finised at the Arc de Triumph where we witnessed to fools running across the Charles de Gaulle circle thing, not a smart thing to do when there is no insurance company that will cover you if you get into an accident on it. There are no lanes, no lights, no rules... pretty crazy. They say there's an accident everything 30 minutes, we never witnessed one despite all the honking. After that we made our way to the Eiffel Tower. Once there we climbed our way to the top, what an amazing view and experience to be standing at the top of such an internationally known structure. We timed our climb so well that when we got down the tower was lit up in blue and it was 5 minutes until the top of the hour so we got to see it twinkle, so magical! (yes, I know I'm cheesy.) wish I had someone to share that romantic moment with, oh perhaps years from now I'll have the privilege of doing that. After our day we were pretty beat from all the walking and climbing so we made our way to the metro to make our way home. I must say I'm rather proud of myself for figuring out the Metro so quickly. We grabbed food at the grocery store for dinner and I am now considering heading off to bed. We have an early morning since we have no train reservations for the train the leaves at 8 tomorrow for Lausanne so we can arrive in Aigle on time to get to L'Abri.

day 5, charlotte version

wow, what a rush! and I am loving it. after getting in last night and going straight to bed, we woke up refreshed for a free general tour of Paris with Alex, who was not only interesting and witty but attractive as well. on our tour we saw the Fountain at Place St. Michel, Notre Dame, statue of 'good' King Henry the IV, walked along the canal, saw the Lourve, Palais Royal, walked along the monument corridor, saw the Jardin du Tuileries, the Obelisque (that Napolean stole from the Eygptians-he seemed to do that a lot), walked along the Champs-Elysees and finished up between the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais, neither of which are actually palaces. go figure. after the tour, Haley and I headed back to the Lourve to see the Mona Lisa, Venus du Milo, the Winged Victory of Samothrace, the Sphinx and as much art as we could. I know Haley wish she had time to see more and I think I rushed her through but there's just soooooo much to see that it's overwhelming. After all that we raced back to the hostel to change and then raced back on the metro to meet up in the "Pink" Light District (makes more sense, since it's only one street) for the Montmarte(I don't think I spelled that correctly but I don't really have time to change it) tour. We saw the Moulin Rouge, St. Basilica's of Paris, saw where Vange Gogh and Picasso lived, painted and hungout. Plus we got to see where some of the scenes from Amelie where filmed. It was a fantastic tour, again with Alex, despite the cold and occasional rain. We then ate with some girls we had met on the morning tour who came on the evening tour. There was Mai-Ling (Australian), Kate (Australian), Haley (from Liverpoool, she got a flight for 4p(pence)), and Lauren (Australian), yes lots of Australians. We ate at Chez Eugene in the Artists' square. It seemed a very Parisian thing to do and was lots of fun. After all of this, Haley and I decided to stay in Paris one more night.

backtrack, day four, charlotte's version

today we saw Brussels- in the snow! we saw the Royal Place, Royal Palace, the Sablon, Palais de Justice, the EU, Parc de Cinquentenaire, Shuman, Colonne du Congres, the Botanical Gardens, Rue Nueve, Atomium (World's Fair structure), Laeken Palce, St. Micheal Church, Bourse, Manneken Piss. The most interesting thing I learned(and odd) is that there;s a different church for the baptisms, regular attendance and burial for the Royal family. we came back to Marissa's to grab our bags and take her to dinner. Dinner was good but the great thing was that the parents of one of the girls we were eating with (one of Marissa's high school wyldlife leaders) paid our bill! It was super nice of them. anyways, we rode the Thalys high speed train into Paris and I can't wait to see it all!