So, our trip was amazing. We've been home almost a week now and I'm still raving about it. And so far I still remember everything.
We spent the first 3 days in Munich, Germany and it was pretty cold there. We had to wear all our jackets and sometimes even wore gloves. And we had some bad timing too...it was Easter...and shops are closed on Good Friday, Easter Sunday and Easter Monday! Tourist spots are open, so it wasn't too bad. It was just hard finding cheap water and snacks. We stayed in the Holiday Inn City Center, which was convenient b/c the s-bahn was underneath. Once we figured out how to navigate the underground mall...
Big things we hit...
Deutsches Museum - they have an awesome KinderReich (kid's world) downstairs where my brother and I played for a while. There was water play (never can get enough of that) and firetrucks and instruments. Lots to mess around with. Upstairs, we also saw big boats, trains, subs, and so much more.
Marienplatz - watched the Glockenspiel, and loved the dancing. We even ate in the Ratskeller which is under the Neue Rathaus.
Hellabrunn Zoo - Mom thought there was an Easter Egg hunt, but it was more of a search for clues kind of hunt...and since we could not understand the german clues...it was not that fun. But we enjoyed the zoo and seeing the brand new baby elephant. So cute!
BMW Welt - Just checked out a lot of BMW cars and crawled all over them...oops. We thought Uncle Chris would like to be there.
Salzburg, Austria
After the quick trip to the zoo in Munich, we got on a train to Salzburg.
Mom rented a cute little apartment near Mirabell Palace (Sound of Music, anyone?) and everything was pretty walkable. It did not have internet service, well, it did, but we needed wifi. Oops. The apartment was fab except that after the 1st day...it did have a little bit of a smoke smell. What can you do though? Germans and Austrians smoke everywhere all the time.
We took the funicular (so fast and steep) up to the "castle" the Hohensalzburg Fortress. The views were amazing up there, but it was super windy and cold that day. They did have a marionette museum, but it was super small. Mom got us these Mozartkugeln, which are these chocolates with nougat and in the center there is marzipan! Yup, when we got to the marzipan part, we didn't like it anymore. Yuck.
We tried to go into the famous Cafe Tomaselli, but couldn't make it thru the thick cloud of smoke when we opened the door. We ate twice at Gablerbrau b/c it was pretty darn good. My brother and I had homemade pasta and it was delicious. Near Gablerbrau, there is this crazy steep "road" that we hiked up twice. We loved it. We were crazy.
Also, wandered around Mirabell Gardens where some scenes from the Sound of Music were filmed. Love it. It was pretty cold in Salzburg, but the sun did eventually come out.
Venice, Italy
From Salzburg, we rode a "local" train to Villach and from there we transfered to a double-decker motorcoach. Villach was a small town and we were able to stop there for a bit for lunch (more schnitzel) and gelato.
We spent a week here in a fabulous apartment in Cannareggio near the San Marcuola vaporetto stop. It was also near the Casino and a short walk to Ca D'oro. There was a Billa supermarket nearby, as well as a local fish market, though Mom and Dad liked the seafood at the Rialto Markets. They bought yummy fresh shrimp there for 11E per kilo. We ate mostly at home, all sorts of pasta. I think we had 3 meals at restaurants. We even went to eat at Da Romano on Burano Island, just like that No Reservations guy suggested. We had to goh risotto and it was amazing (well, Mom and Dad liked it). Brendan and I really like calamari (frito misto). We spent our days riding around on the vaporettos. Dad even found a less common line (41/42 from Guglie) to get to San Marco. It was quicker and fewer stops, plus we got to see the big loading docks and cruise ships.
We went to Piazza San Marco a few times at night and it was amazingly fun. We would run back and forth and back and forth until we our cheeks were bright red and we were sweating. We'd also chase the pigeons if they were around, but we loved just running in the open space. Once a bird landed on my head, which was totally crazy.
One day we went up the Campanile and went inside the Basilica. The campanile was pretty cool. We rode an elevator up and then had a 360 view of the city. Amazing. We didn't get to ride on a real gondola, but we did ride on a traghetto. A traghetto is a gondola that makes a crossing on the Grand Canal. Mom and Dad took us on the longest crossing point, but it did happen to be the windiest day, so we had a bumpy ride.
Brendan had gelato every day...but I grew bored of gelato, (can you believe it?) so towards the end, I didn't have any. Amazing to think I could get sick of gelato! I now like pesto pasta. Not that I didn't before, but now I request it. The cookies in Italy aren't very good, but Nutella is. And the surprise eggs. So cool.
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