Our Last Day in Europe (Rome Day 2)

For our last day in Europe and our only full day in Rome, we woke up and headed straight to the Vatican.  There was an insane amount of people there.  We started off visiting St. Peter’s Basilica, and we were able to make some moves again and get in line with a big group of kids.  This let us avoid a line that was more than an hour long.  The church was so big and the murals, paintings and statues inside were beautiful.  

After this we tried to see the Vatican Museum and the Sistine Chapel but the line was over four hours long.  We decided since we only had one day in Rome we would have to skip it; so we instead headed to the Colosseum.  We did an audio guide tour (mainly so we could skip a huge line), but it turned out to be very cool and informational.  Included in our ticket price was access to the surrounding historical areas: the Palatine, the Roman Forum and other ancient ruins.  It was crazy to see what the Romans had built back then without the technology that exists today.  There are still many excavation sights today in that area discovering more structures from the Roman Empire.

After the Colosseum, it was pretty late so we headed back to our apartment to start packing since we were leaving in the morning.  We went to the grocery store across the street and bought some wine to celebrate our Europe trip after dinner.  For dinner, we went to a restaurant around the corner from our apartment called La Taverna di Pinocchi.  We sat at a table that had a puppet Pinocchio sitting at. The service was by far the best we’ve had since being in Europe and the food was amazing.  We each ordered the menu of the day which included an appetizer, a main course, a dessert and a drink.  We each ordered the wine and it came with a half liter bottle of the house wine.  Then, the waiter could tell that we weren’t sure what to get for the appetizer so he brought out 3 plates with a sample of everything for us.  For our main course, Jamie and Jose ordered the steak and Cara ordered pasta with bacon and tomato sauce.  Everything was so delicious and it was a nice last meal for the end of our trip. 

Trevi Fountain, Pantheon, Piazza de Poppolo (Rome Day 1)

After leaving Amsterdam we headed to our last stop: Rome!  This was by far the nicest place we’ve stayed in since leaving Seth and Alli in Provence.  We have been staying in hostels the whole time, but this place was more like a 3/4 bedroom apartment with a shared kitchen and 2 bathrooms. The proprietor was very friendly and helpful.  We went to find lunch and ended up at a little pizzeria down the street.  We were either really hungry or the pizza was delicious!  Afterwards, we explored the city a little, starting with Trevi Fountain.  The fountain was beautiful.  After taking a couple pictures, we each threw a coin in the fountain over our shoulder and made a wish!

We then headed to the Pantheon.  The temple was already closed for the day, so we just took pictures outside.  From the Pantheon, we walked over to Piazza de Poppolo.  In the piazza, there is a 2000 year old Egyptian obelisk, along with a few fountains and many statues.  The piazza was so nice to just sit in and enjoy the atmosphere.  Later, when we got back to our apartment, we went to a little café across the street from us and had sandwiches and pastries.  The pastries were so good!  After hanging out a while longer at the apartment, we called it a night since we had a lot to do the next day.

Anne Frank House (Amsterdam Day 3)

For our last day in Amsterdam, we started off by going to the Anne Frank house. The line was pretty long so we decided to walk around a little and do some souvenir shopping and eat lunch.  When we got back to the museum, the line was a lot shorter.  Inside, the museum starts off by explaining the Anne Frank story.  The family, along with another family, went into hiding, after the Nazis took over Amsterdam, above the actual factory that Otto Frank owned.  They lived up in the top 2 floors of the building which was labeled as spice storage and therefore had all of the windows blacked out.  The stairs to these floors had been concealed by a bookshelf, and we were actually able to walk up those stairs.  It was very surreal to see the actual size of the rooms they lived in.

After the museum we went to Vondelpark and walked around and did some people watching.  There were groups of young people sitting in the park eating sandwiches and enjoying wine and children on field trips with their class.  After hanging out here for a little bit, we went to eat dinner.  We went to another restaurant on the “ethnic aisle” and had unlimited spare ribs!  It was pretty late by the time we finished eating, so we went back to our hostel to pack and go to sleep.

Van Gogh, House of Bols, Heineken experience (Amsterdam Day 2)

On our second day in Amsterdam, we started off the day at the Van Gogh museum.  On the way there we stopped at the Museumplein Park where there was a huge I amsterdam sign and big fountain.  The Van Gogh museum housed most of Van Gogh’s original paintings along with many originals from the artists that inspired him such as Monet and Gaugin.  We definitely learned a lot about Van Gogh.  For example, Cara’s favorite painting by him, the Almond Blossom, was painted for his brother Theo's newborn son after he was born.  Van Gogh’s sister in law, his brother Theo's wife, dedicated much of her life after Vincent and Theo Van Gogh passed to promoting his work and it is greatly because of her that Van Gogh is as successful as he was after he died.

Across the street from the museum was the "House of Bols" distillery where you can learn about the Bols family and the genever (which was the precursor to gin) and liqueurs they make.  We decided to eat lunch first since the tour included a tasting and cocktail.  The House of Bols was pretty neat.  Bols makes the number one liqueur in Amsterdam and is exported worldwide, even to the United States.  The tour was very interactive and included a sniffing test, a bartender lesson, a tasting and a cocktail.  We each got to choose our favorite cocktail along with 2 samples of genever or liqueur. 

After the House of Bols, we went to the Heineken brewery.  This tour was also very interactive as well, along with a "4-D" video, a tasting, and many other fun things to do.  We made a music video in Dutch, saw many Heineken commercials from the 70s to the 90s in really comfortable green chairs, and received 2 free beers. 

After the distillery and brewery tours, we were pretty tired so we went back to the hostel to relax before dinner.  We ate dinner at a Mexican restaurant on the “ethnic aisle” where we all got unlimited fajitas!  They were so good and we definitely got our money’s worth.  After dinner we went to an Ice Bar that was literally made out of ice.  Our drink glasses were even made out of ice.  The actual ice room was very small so you could only go experience it for 30 minutes and in groups of 30.  It was very cold in there (about minus 12 degrees Celsius) so we were ok with only spending 30 minutes in there.  We then headed to a sports bar near our hostel where we hung out for a while.  We ended up sitting next to a guy from Columbia and his friend that was visiting from the U.S., who we talked to for a while.  We then headed back to our hostel and went to bed.