Cinque Terre

Saturday we visited Cinque Terre (Italian for five lands) and enjoyed fantastic views of the Italian coast and these five adorable villages. In addition to the great views, we also enjoyed the best gelato we've had in Italy (pictured below) in the village of Vernazza. The region is also famous for its focaccia bread (also pictured).

Under the Tuscan...

We just returned from visiting, among other Italian destinations, Florence and Pisa. The obvious attraction in Pisa was the famous leaning tower. It really is leaning very precariously, and we decided NOT to climb the stairs to the top. We did attempt to take photographs that make it look like we're holding up the tower, but we didn't get great ones.

In Florence Mom and I climbed the 436 steps up to (and back down from) Il Duomo. Inside the dome are beautiful, elaborate frescoes. We still enjoyed the views from the top of the dome despite rain and poor visibility.

Another highlight of Florence was seeing Michelangelo's David. We saw the real thing in the Accademia Gallery, but photographs were not allowed. The sculpture is enormous and awesome! We took our photographs at the replica in the Piazza della Signoria.

Salzburg

Our first visit to Austria was amazingly beautiful! We enjoyed a walking tour of Salzburg where we learned about lots of interesting history, including Mozart's birth and life there. We also enjoyed the beautiful Salzburg cathedral (whose dome is pictured below).



The other fun part about Salzburg was visiting many filming locations of The Sound of Music. The first photo on this post is the hill in the opening scene where Maria (Julie Andrews) sings "The Hills Are Alive." Below is the actual gazebo where Liesl sings "Sixteen Going on Seventeen." (Some of the shots of the interior were re-filmed in Hollywood to make it look bigger inside, but this is the original one.)

Bavaria

We took a trip last week to Bavaria and Austria, and we were amazed at the beauty of the Alps in the summertime.

I mentioned in an earlier post, when we first visited Neuschwanstein castle, that I had wanted to see the castle since childhood. Since it was so snowy/cloudy when we were there before, I had to delay my dream of seeing the best views of the castle--from the famous Marienbrücke (Mary's bridge). So we made the steep hike up to the bridge, and at the climactic moment I walked onto the bridge to see the view I've been waiting for, this is what I saw:

Yep, that's the entire façade of the castle in scaffolding. At least it was a breathtakingly-beautiful day, and the rest of the (scaffolding-free) scenery was GORGEOUS!

While in Bavaria we also stayed at a super-cute Gasthof near the Austrian border.

The other Bavarian highlight was going to Munich and seeing the performance of the famous Rathaus-Glockenspiel in Marienplatz. The action lasted almost 15 minutes!

Defying Gravity

Mom and I saw Wicked in London last Wednesday. It was my second time seeing it, and I loved it even more this time! It's so much fun! The songs are fantastic, and I can't wait to go back and see it again!

We also rode on the London Eye and saw beautiful views of the city.

What the hail?

We had some freak weather today, including this crazy hail that blanketed our lawn this afternoon. We also had lots of flooding on the roads around our house.

WE SAW THE QUEEN!!

A few months ago I blogged about the Queen's actual birthday, and I mentioned that the 2nd weekend in June is her observed birthday, when they have the big parade in London called Trouping the Colour. We (my Mom and I--Jacob wasn't there) saw parts of that parade today, but the most important part was that we SAW THE QUEEN!! She rode past us in a horse-drawn carriage. The photos aren't super-close or really great quality, but I can't believe I actually SAW HER!!! It was thrilling!

(I'm pretty sure that's her hubby Prince Philip next to her. When I zoomed in it looked like him, plus his uniform is very decorated.)