The final adventure...

Greece. Where do I even begin. If any of you have ever seen Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 or Mamma Mia, they were both filmed on the Grecian island Santorini where we stayed for the week. This vacation was our final one together and turned out to be relaxing and filled with some amazing memories. There's not too much to tell about this trip because our main focus was just relaxing and hanging out but we did climb a volcano, ride ATV's around the island, ride a donkey (can't say that was my favorite part), see the most beautiful sunset, and swam in hot springs. Breathtaking, mesmerizing, picturesque, unreal - all words to describe this island. Every picture I took it looks like a picture out of a magazine and we photoshopped the people in.

Amazing right? I almost didn't believe it when i saw it. We stayed in an apartment while in Greece that was really a hostel. Nicest hostel I've ever been to! We had our own kitchen, living room, and balcony. Stavros, the man that owned the hostel was a typical Greek man, plump, friendly, and all about hospitality. Over the week we saw the sunset over Oia, which claims to be the #1 spot for proposals, Fira, and many other cities of Santorini. All looked like this, and all of them took my breath away. If anyone is looking for a Greecian vacation, I would recommend Greece to anyone! Absolutly amazing trip to end this whole experience with!

Hola Barcelona

Barcelona, Spain, the land of flamingo dancing and bullfights. Well little did I know that both of these could not be further from the main events in this city. Though Barcelona is part of Spain, it is in fact the capital of Cataolonia, a separate community inside of Spain. This city refuses to have bull fight arenas and has very few places that perform the flamenco dance. Basically, Barcelona refutes any stereotypes that Spain has to offer (except for sangria). In fact, they even imported palm trees from Hawaii (and rented some too!) and bought sand from Egypt to make beaches. They used the Olymics as a cover story, but my opinion they just wanted to make their city remind them of vacation. The first day we got there we went on yet another walking tour learning about all these wonderful facts I just shared, along with many others.

Since I've heard that many of you enjoy my food pictures so I thought I'd throw on (of my 50) in of the food market we went to every single day. Imagine Saturday's Market, but filled with only fruits, vegetables, bread, and sweets. Literally at every turn there was a new stand filled with every and any fruit you can possibly imagine. Of course we all loved it and went back every day (sometimes twice) to get a little snack. Possibly my favorite part of Barcelona was this market; so colorful, so lively, so delicious!

We also went to the beach one day (and got incredibly burnt! that sun is no joke). Like I said the sand was all imported so it was very dense and hard to walk on. The only disappointing part of this beach was that literally every 3 minutes a vendor would come by asking if we were interested in massages, coconuts, or scarfs. But that didn't matter, because it was 75 degrees, we were on a beach and in Barcelona, we couldn't complain. 

Not really sure what this palace was, but it was so beautiful! There is a magic fountain in front which is apparently spectacular to see, but we were a month too early. After climbing about 5,000 steps we finally got to the top stairs of the palace, which was absolutely amazing. We then kept going up and found the Olympic stadium (pictured below)!

 Our next stop....the Sagrada Familia! This is by far the most breathtaking intracite church I have ever seen in my life. The whole outside tells the story of Jesus from birth till death, every nook and cranny with some type of symbolism. I was in awe of this church.

After the Sagrada Familia we went to Gaudi's park. Gaudi seemed to have a love of gingerbread houses and mosaics because this entire park was filled with them. Gaudi also designed many buildings around the city, each more famous than the next. One was right by our hostel and we fell in love with it. It was so subtle compared to his other work but still so so cool.

 Barcelona: beautiful sights, weather, friends, and city. Even though my hand was constantly on my purse (Barcelona has high petty crime rates) we saw so many sights and had such a fun relaxing vacation. Trip two was definitely a success!

And the traveling month begins....

IN BERLIN! Honestly Germany was never my number one European country to visit, but I have to say it turned out to be one of my favorite places we went. After a daunting trip to Berlin (we had an overnight layover in London) we we so tired and just wanted to sleep for a few hours before seeing the sights. Unfortunetly the hostel closes for a good 5 hours in the middle of the day and we came just after they closed up. So Amy and I, delierious from being so tired, found a table at the park right next to the hostel and killed some time playing cards, rocking out to Taylor Swift, and eating M&M's, some of my favorite things to to. If I have learned nothing else from the trips I've taken, cards are always a good way to kill some time. After we got into our room at the hostel we went exploring.

On our second day in Berlin we finally mastered the metro system, called the S-ban and U-ban. We went on a tour throughout the city which started at the Brandenburg Gate, pictured above. This tour was full of information about Berlin and the different struggles they went through to unify their city. Another stop on the tour was a hotel (I forget the name) that Michael Jackson hung his baby from the third floor balcony!

We ended up seeing all of the famous sights in Berlin but there is too many to put up all the pictures. This city was so rich with history it seemed that there was something to see at every corner!

Above is a picture of one of the museams on Museam Island, a trio of museams surrounded by rivers. The next day we took a day trip to a nearby concentration camp. Something I did not know was in World War two there were two types of camps; concentration and extermination camps. Concentration camps, like the one we went to was meant for the sole purpose of working the prisioners to death. On top of building planes and moving cement there was also the "death run" where prisioners were required to run from one end of camp to the other for 10 hours. The excuse of running people to death was they were testing what boots were the most sturdy for soldiers to wear. This was one of the most sobering experiences I have ever experienced. There were personal stories about the survivors and the thousands that were killed in very place we were standing. The concentration camp we went to held experiments on children and we saw the horrific building they were kept in then later executed. The camp now serves as a memorial to the thousands that died at this concentration camp.

After that highly depressing day we decided to end Berlin on a high note and visited the nearby town of Potsdam. I have almost no idea the history of this town except it used to be the home of Prussian kings. So obviously, there were so many things to see. We ended up renting bikes throughout the town and let me tell you, it was the best decision. Bikes were so efficient and it was so much fun! This city was my top two favorite places I've gone to abroad. This town was full of castles and gorgeous buildings literally right next to each other.

One final note about Germany, the sausages there were unbelievable. Europe has this love for baguettes (that my family soon learned after they came) so of course their sausages were on baguettes. For some reason, this made the sausages 20 times better than any I've ever had. Bottom line, if you go to Germany make sure that sausages are in your diet every single day. Getting back on track, the night after spending the day in Potsdam,  we had to sleep in the airport again. So we decided to catch a late train to the airport (that's about 20 minutes away). However, as precedent would tell us, nothing is that easy. The train to the airport was canceled that night for track maintenance. After may changed trains and a few run-ins with the drunken locals we finally found the airport and made our way to BARCELONA!!!!!!