Brandon O'Brien

Wednesday, September 3, 2008 @ 11:00 PM in 2008 Europe Wedding

We left Venice at 6:45am and got into Rome a little after 11am. We checked into our hotel and then set about exploring the city. The first spot we made sure to hit was the Colosseum. We paid for entry so we could walk around inside the Colosseum and took more pics than I'd like to admit. The Colosseum was definitely a highlight for me, not just in Rome but the whole trip.

We walked from the Colosseum to the old Roman Forum which was basically the "downtown" back in roman days. Seeing all of those sights and walking around was enough for one day, so we went and caught a train back to the hotel (we were staying slightly outside of Rome, but not far from a train station).

I don't remember having many feelings one way or another about Rome prior to this trip. I knew it was a city filled with history but I don't recall it being one of the destinations I was really looking forward to. We booked Rome because the flight back to the US was significantly cheaper. I'm extremely glad we made it here though. Some people say Rome is a hot touristy destination, but I really liked the city.

Note: This post was written about 13 years after I went on this trip. Unfortunately I didn't keep a journal so this is pieced together from our itinerary and photos.

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Tags: italy, venice, rome, train

Posted from: Italy

Tuesday, September 2, 2008 @ 10:00 PM in 2008 Europe Wedding

We started the day wandering through some of the fish and fruit markets. If we actually had a kitchen or a way to prepare the food, it would have been awesome to get some of the fresh seafood and prepare it for dinner.

After the markets we went to St. Mark's square and took a tour of the St. Mark's Campanile (the big bell tower). There were some amazing views of the entire city of Venice and surrounding islands. Pretty much all you see are the orange roofs of the buildings and the winding alleyways going between them.

Once we finished up at St. Mark's, we did some more aimless wandering and eventually came across a waterfront where there were some huge yachts parked. We took some photos and explored some more before getting some dinner and heading to bed. Tomorrow is another big travel day taking us from Venice to our final stop of the trip, Rome.

Note: This post was written about 13 years after I went on this trip. Unfortunately I didn't keep a journal so this is pieced together from our itinerary and photos.

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Tags: italy, venice

Posted from: Italy

Monday, September 1, 2008 @ 10:00 PM in 2008 Europe Wedding

We got into Venice bright and early (around 7:30am). One thing I still remember is pulling into a station just prior to the crossing into Venice. It was neat waking up in an entirely different climate, region, city and country. We left a small farming village in central Germany the previous day and were waking up in Venice Italy this morning.

We spent most of the day today doing some walking and sightseeing. We made sure to hit the Rialto bridge where we spent quite a while taking photos. We spent some time walking through all the various narrow alleyways and basically getting ourselves lost in the maze of the city. We did end up at St. Marks square

It's too bad I didn't write down what we did each day. It's really hard to recall all the stuff from this trip after such a long time.

Note: This post was written about 13 years after I went on this trip. Unfortunately I didn't keep a journal so this is pieced together from our itinerary and photos.

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Tags: italy, venice

Posted from: Italy

Sunday, August 31, 2008 @ 11:00 PM in 2008 Europe Wedding

A recurring theme with our planning of this trip was being overly ambitious in regards to seeing as many sights as we could. That being said, we spent today mostly on trains traveling from Frottstadt to Venice, via Munich.

We said goodbye to all of our friends in the morning as everyone was going their separate ways. Patrick and Chrissy were heading off to spend some time with Tobias while Scott and Stefanie were going to their honeymoon in the Greek islands.

We left Frottstadt around 1:30pm and after several connections got to Munich around 6:40pm. We had a couple hours to kill before we had to catch our overnight train to Venice which left a little after 9pm. We walked around the main square area of Munich and had dinner while waiting for our train.

The train wasn't too bad. We were in a room with 6 beds that were stacked hostel style. I remember waking up quite a bit, but that's to be expected on sleeper trains.

Note: This post was written about 13 years after I went on this trip. Unfortunately I didn't keep a journal so this is pieced together from our itinerary and photos.

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Tags: germany, frottstadt, munich, venice, train

Posted from: Germany