Innsbruck

I was finally able to make it to the last “large” Austrian city on my list – Innsbruck!  I went with a fellow Fulbrighter and as per usual we took an early train across the country to arrive mid-day. We checked into our Airbnb, got lunch with gelato of course, and then went into the cathedral.  As with all European churches and cathedrals it was quite impressive, but it had an interesting room with wallpaper of floating cherub heads…most of their faces were missing so it was simultaneously charming and a tad discomforting. 😛 After that, we went up the northern slope of the Alps with the Nordkettebahn.  We had absolutely perfect weather and could see every mountain peak and city building!  Due to unfortunate timing, we only made it to the second highest point, but that was okay because half-way up we got to enjoy a glass of wine while overlooking Innsbruck. 🙂 After coming down the mountain again we had a delicious dinner of cured meats, cheese, bread, and wine right near the river in the old city center.  It was so enjoyable and the time flew by since it didn’t get dark until after 10 pm!

On Sunday, we managed to find an open bakery and then started our morning hike in the rain.  We took a bus up the mountain to where we had wine the day before and started from there.  It wasn’t raining hard, but just a constant, steady sprinkle.  Honestly though it was kinda nice because then it wasn’t too hot and the clouds sitting between the mountain peaks were so pretty!  We eventually made it to the Höttinger Alm which was isolated on the mountainside and had Highland cattle in the “back yard” to which we were able to get surprisingly close and they were so adorable.  The fog was also moving in and out extremely quickly, which took us by surprise!  Anyway, we had lunch there – Kapressknödel and Speckknödel with sauerkraut and a Radler.  We were both so in love with the first one that we ordered another without the kraut to split (seriously so delicious).  We left via the ski slopes, which was a slight mistake, but our snail- and slug-filled hike was super nice!  Once we were back in town we got gelato again (the snickers was so good omg), walked around the gardens, and got a toast dinner in a cute restaurant…definitely a trip with a lot of emphasis on the food. 😛

Our last day also started early and we caught the first shuttle bus to the Swarovski Kristallwelten.  It was sprinkling a bit when we got there, but the first thing we saw was the giant waterfall head.  8^th grade Erin who learned about the factory in Austria was super happy to finally be there! 🙂 The actual “museum” was a series of very strange art installations…the only one I really liked was the crystal dome.  There was one small room at the very end that was more like a museum with a bit of history on the company and some old jewelry pieces – I enjoyed that part the most.  Then it led right into a HUGE shop…I’ve never seen that much Swarovski before (and I did manage to successfully restrain myself)! 😉  After that, we went back into town and got on a bus to the castle.  We mainly wanted to go to the Chamber of Art and Curiosities Museum, which certainly was different.  We wandered the gardens some more and tried to befriend a peacock before going back into town with an unintentional detour to an outlook post.  We packed up our stuff, got a pizza lunch, and then caught our train back to Vienna. It was a really nice long weekend trip!  Thanks Austria for having so many bank holidays! 😀

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Met some Highland cows 🙂

So many big snails!

Salzburg

Another great visit from a high school friend!  She came over to Austria and we spent the first three days doing the grand Viennese tour – we actually saw so much! 🙂

The following Monday was our first day in Salzburg!  We had a super early train ride, checked into our hotel, then headed straight for the city center.  We started with the Salzburg Dom, which had about 5 museums in it – was really intense!  After that we just grabbed a bit of lunch before finding another bus to take us to the Hellbrunn Palace.  We did the trick fountain tour there, which was so cool and so much fun!  We managed to avoid getting wet until close to the end, but that Markus Sittikus was a trickster.  We were inspecting every stone we walked by in case it sprayed water at us!  We did the other museums on the grounds (some nice views included) and danced around the Sound of Music gazebo for a while. 🙂 We ended the day by doing a tour of the Salzburg castle (definitely took the funicular because we were not doing that hike in the heat oy).  From the top of the one tower, we had a great look at the city and the surrounding mountains!  After some yummy stir-fry in a quaint alley we called it a night!

Our second day in Salzburg was equally busy with an early start.  We took a bus out to the Unterbergbahn – a very high cable car that takes you up to the mountain tops.  We walked around there for a while and checked out the view, snow, and flowers. 🙂 Then we tried to visit the Nonnberg Abbey from the Sound of Music, but we could only see the outside because of a funeral. 😦 After that, we visited a few churches (St. Francis, St. Peters, and the Collegiate Church) before heading to Mozart’s birth house!  That was pretty cool too and actually had a lot of trinkets from the entire family.  His first violin was so cute and tiny!  We wandered through the Mirabel gardens after that – reenacted more from the Sound of Music with some entertaining people from Ireland. 🙂 We grabbed some dinner and gelato (of course) before taking a later train back to Vienna!

It was a such a fantastic visit and I’m glad we got to have a “Part II” to our European adventures together! 😀

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Residence Fountain

Residenzplatz

Salzburg Cathedral

Hellbrunn walk up to the Volksmuseum

View from Hellbrunn

Hellbrunn gazebo from Sound of Music

Salzburg

Alps

Snow in the Alps at the top of the Unterbergsbahn

Mozart’s birth house

Mirabell Gardens

Rome – Vatican & Tivoli

Saturday was our Vatican day!  We left early so that we could get in line for the museum before it opened since we didn’t buy tickets in advance.  Once we got to St. Peter’s Square, we automatically saw a line formed and thought, “Wow, 30 minutes before it opens and there’s already a decent line!” So we just hopped in and didn’t think…after standing there for about 15 minutes we realized that it was the line for the basilica and not the museum…with the help of Google we learned that the Basilica and the Vatican Museum have two different entrances and that we would need to wait in line for both, but figured we’d just keep our spot and go to the museum afterwards.  That decision was worth it in the end to avoid the ever-growing queue that was building up behind us.  Plus, the Basilica was amazing!  I was mostly impressed by two things: 1) Michelangelo’s Pietà and 2) what I learned is called a baldachin.  This is a large sculpted canopy by Bernini set over the main alter of the basilica and Saint Peter’s tomb. The sheer size of it is impressive and it definitely demands your attention as you enter the basilica, but what I loved was that the four columns made of bronze cast in a spiral, twisted shape.  Really amazing!  Since it was the day before Palm Sunday, there was a lot of bustling about as workers set up flower arrangements and coated everything in palm leaves.  After the basilica, we got in the extremely slow-moving line that was for the museum.  Although at times we were extremely bored and I got sunburned, the wait was definitely worth it as well.  We saw so many pieces of art which I had learned about in my Survey of Western Art course in college.  It houses my favorite statue of all time, which is Laocoön and His Sons, so I was very excited to see that!  What I also enjoyed was that it was displayed outside in a courtyard of the museum rather than in a large marble corridor like most of the other statues.  I’m also a fan of Da Vinci (and especially his unfinished works), so it was really cool to also see his painting titled St. Jermone in the Wilderness.  For the rest of the evening we wandered along the river near Castel Sant’Angelo until sunset.

Skipping ahead to Monday, we did a day trip to the town of Tivoli about 30 km outside of Rome.  The area is home to a few UNESCO villas.  We started by going up to the villa in town first, only to learn that it’s closed on Mondays!  We were so sad, but our time wandering the little streets was perfect.  Each one was filled with its own charm and felt so cozy.  We made the most of it though and ate our lunch in a park on the hillside that overlooked the valley – wasn’t too bad of a view if I do say so myself. 🙂 Afterwards, we went to the other site, Villa Adriana, which was in fact open for the day.  The property was extremely expansive and included Roman ruins, gardens, and turtle-filled ponds.  After a lot of confusion though, we eventually made it back to Rome and ended our evening with fantastic cannoli at I Dolci di Nonna Vincenza! 🙂

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St. Peter’s Basilica

Laocoön and His Sons

St. Peter’s Square getting ready for Palm Sunday & Easter

View from Tivoli

Vatican Museum gardens

Gotta stop and smell the flowers

UNESCO Villa Adriana

Villa Adriana ruins

Rome – The City

We arrived in Rome on April 7^th, but didn’t have our first full day in the city (Saturday was exclusively at the Vatican) until Sunday.  After barely figuring out which bus to take, we ended up in Piazza Venezia at the National Monument of Victor Emmanuel II (a.k.a Altare della Patria).  From what I’ve read he was the King of Sardinia and defeated the Austrian army (ha) and began the movement for a unified Italy.  It was inaugurated in 1911, but the interior is filled with tons, and I do mean tons, of Italian flags.  From there we saw the Trajan Forum and column and then headed straight to our goal, which was the colosseum.  I have to say that I still consider it to be a major highlight, if not the best part of the trip, but I can’t even pin point exactly what impressed me the most.  Was it its size?  It’s age?  Imagining everything that took place there?  Wondering how they were able to build it considering their technology?  I don’t know, but along every part of both levels I was amazed.  For a large crumbling structure, it is quite phenomenal.  An added bonus was that our ticket included the Roman forum, so we spent some time there afterwards and enjoyed the wisteria among the ruins. 🙂 My second highlight was our stop (with gelato of course), which was the Trevi fountain.  In this instance, I know what impressed me and that was its size and the color of the water!  The fountain was way larger than I thought it would be and the water was bright aqua – so cool!  After that we saw the Pantheon, still don’t understand how they built that, and then spent some time in the Piazza Navona.  We ended our evening with some fantastic pizza at a restaurant nearby!

Tuesday was our other day in the city and our plan was to start in the Borghese Gallery, which ended up being a total bust.  Apparently, they only sell 360 tickets per day, so when we got there they were sold out for the next week!  It was crazy (and honestly, they must lose a ton of business that way), but we left and sulked our way through the gardens.  Our theme of the day was churches with famous pieces of art, so the first one we went to was the Santa Maria della Vittoria to see Bernini’s Ecstasy of Saint Teresa…fantastic to say the least.  Then after an interlude lunch at the colosseum we saw Michelangelo’s Moses in San Pietro in Vincoli.  Then the last one was saw was the Saint Matthew series painted by Caravaggio in San Luigi dei Francesi.  Every time I see one of his paintings I’m so impressed by how well he paints shadows because his paintings look more like photographs.  And so our final day in Rome ended with gelato and more cannoli…a good ending to a great trip! 🙂

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Ponte Sant’Angelo Bridge by Castel Sant’Angelo

Tiber River

Altare della Patria (National Monument to Victor Emmanuel II)

Foro di Traiano (Trajan’s Forum)

Colosseo (Colosseum)

Foro Romano (Roman Forum)

Trevi Fountain

Pantheon (not to be confused with the Parthenon)

Maribor, Slovenia & Neusiedlersee

In the middle of March, my best friend from college flew all the way over to Austria to visit!  We had a fun-packed week that was non-stop, which included three countries!  Our first stop was to Bratislava, but I unfortunately forgot Mickey in the daze of our early bus trip.  We saw the blue church, a park, the castle, the river, and enjoyed some traditional Slovakian haluski and wine. 🙂 Our second trip was to Maribor, Slovenia – the second biggest city in the country.  We spent two days in the charming town and had a great, centrally-located hostel as well!  We were basically on every street twice and couldn’t have been anything but relaxed there.  We spent time on the river and enjoyed a wine tasting at the Old Vine House – home to the world’s oldest grape vine (400 years old)! Our second day there, we were a bit more outdoorsy and strolled through the quite large park and then up through the forest to the pyramid hill look-out point.  From there we had a great view of the whole city while standing next to centuries old castle ruins.  We returned to Vienna, but left it again just as quickly, however this time we stayed in Austria.

We visited the Neusiedlersee National Park and even though it was sprinkling the whole time, that didn’t stop us.  Getting there proved a bit difficult, but we walked through some great marsh areas and saw a decent amount of wildlife!  The lake was a lot larger than we expected for some reason, but it was nice to spend a day outside free of people and commotion.

For her last few days in Austria we spent our time wining and dining our way through Vienna. 🙂

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Maribor, Slovenia

Maribor

Maribor Park and Ponds

Maribor from Pyramid Hill

Neusiedlersee Marshes

Neusiedlersee

Disneyland Paris!

MICKEY MADE IT TO DISNEYLAND PARIS!

Really I could just leave it there, but of course I won’t. I met up with an exchange friend from high school in Paris to fulfill our Disney dream that has been 5 years in the making! We had almost three full days in the parks and were there from opening until closing. 🙂 We rode nearly every ride (and even a few that were new for my friend who has been there multiple times) and soaked in the splendid Disney magic! Disneyland Paris had great walk-through attractions that took you through different movie stories like “Alice’s Curious Labyrinth”, “Aladdin’s Enchanted Passage” or the stained glass and storybook portion of Sleeping Beauty’s castle. One of my favorite attractions in Magic Kingdom though was “La Tanière du Dragon”, which was the prison that held Maleficent in her dragon form beneath the castle. The animatronics were so realistic and a few times it even scared me! You could see the dragon breathing, clench its claws, and nonchalantly swish its tail in the water while it slept. When it woke up it would blink, roar, blow smoke out of its nostrils, and swing its head! There was an adorable parade every afternoon with great music and dancing, but the final firework show at closing was by far the best. The projection show was top-notch, although it was a little strange to have an English-speaking Peter talking to a French-speaking Wendy. 😛 Although it was cool to hear some Disney songs in French and also made me realize how many of their movies are set in France and/or Paris.

We were easily able to park hop between Magic Kingdom and Walt Disney Studios, which worked super well with our plans. For February, we had pretty good weather the whole time and since it was the off-season the parks weren’t overly crowded! If nothing else though, we certainly ate well – Disney does a good job with that! I took way too many pictures on this trip and had so much fun posing Mickey and spending time with my friend! It was certainly a birthday week to never forget! 😀

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Magic Kingdom entrance (Disney Hotel)

Disneyland Paris castle! ❤

View of Fantasyland from castle balcony

Alice’s Curious Labyrinth

View from Queen of Heart’s castle

Even the bushes looked like the animated ones

Genie’s lamp in Adventureland

Kaa and Zazu in Adventureland

Big Thunder Mountain!

Walt Disney Studios!

TravelMickey with Walt and Mickey ❤

Hallstatt

To end the first month of 2017 with a bang I took a little day trip to the town of Hallstatt in Upper Austria.  The town was listed as a UNESCO Cultural World Heritage Site in 1997, as well as a natural site for the Salzkammergut Region.  It was such an adorable and quaint town!  It was nestled on the Hallstätter See and in the mountains so that meant real snow!  At least this way the cold felt justified unlike in Vienna, where it’s been gray and windy all winter with hardly any snow.  We had a guided tour and learned a bit about the importance of salt mining in the region and its history that dates back over 7,000 years!  One of the strangest parts though was the Beinhaus, which housed the skulls, humeri, and femurs of deceased people.  Apparently during a jump in the population, Hallstatt ran out of space in the Catholic church’s small cemetery so they began digging up people who had been buried for 10-15 years and placing a new body in the empty grave.  They then bleached and painted the old bones with the person’s name and birth and death dates.  The last person to have this done had her bones placed there in the 1990s and as long as you put it in your will, Hallstatt will still do this for anyone today.  After the tour and grabbing something to eat, we hiked as far as we could up the snowy mountain for multiple breath-taking views of the lake and town (which is a lot smaller than we thought until you’re looking down on it).  Even though I fell twice, it was great to experience a typical mountainous region of Austria with tons of snow.  I’m super glad I was able to visit Hallstatt and especially during winter – there’s something about the glistening snow that makes it even more enchanting.

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View from half-way up the mountain

View from town

Hallstatt mid-day (sun already behind mountain)

Hallstatt in focus (evening)

Venetian Islands & Verona

I have a feeling that no matter how many times I visit Venice, even 50 years from now, I will still be mesmerized by how beautiful and unique it is.  I did my first ever solo trip over Christmas break and chose Venice as my destination.  Ever since I began planning for my study abroad year in Germany back in 2014, I wanted to visit the Venetian island Burano, but on my first trip to the island, there just wasn’t enough time, so I thought, this was my opportunity.  I took an overnight bus and arrived in Venice on January 5^th and spent the whole day wandering around and getting lost in its labyrinth.  I decided to do some museums this time, so I got a pass and did the Doge Palace and the Museo Correr.  Both were fabulous and the rooms in the Doge Palace were magnificently overdone. Haha!  Imagine as much gold as you can on a ceiling and then add ten times more – pretty crazy.  I enjoyed the city and a pizza dinner by myself on the Grand Canal to end my first day of mindless wandering.

My second day was the one I had been waiting for!  I island hopped and started by taking a lagoon boat to the glass-making island of Murano.  Small but charming with every storefront filled with hand-blown glass!  I went in glass factory after glass factory admiring their work and one of them even had a demonstration going on where an artisan made a vase and a galloping horse right in front of us!  It was so impressive and they showed us that even though it looked cool, the glass was still really hot by placing a piece of paper in the neck of the vase at which point it instantly caught on fire! :O  My museum pass also got me into the glass museum, which I also found fantastic because I love glass!  One of the only types of art where I can appreciate the old and the modern, unlike paintings…but afterwards I took another boat to the island Burano!  It was everything I’d hope it would be!  The colors were phenomenal!  Rows upon rows of colorful houses – lime green, hot pink, scarlet red, royal blue – absolutely breathtaking and makes you crack an instant smile.  Every building was charming and their crumbling imperfections only made them better.  I just couldn’t stop taking pictures because every street and building was fabulous!  I did the very small lace museum there as well because apparently, Burano is famous for their lace making like Murano and glass.  On my way back to the boat, I made a black cat friend, which made me happy, and after a 45 minute ride I was back in Venice for the evening.

On my last full day in Italy I did a day trip to the city of Verona.  I honestly had no idea what I was doing when I initially got there and decided my best option was to just pick a bus that had the most Piazzas listed and follow the crowds.  It worked in my favor and I got off the bus right at the Verona Arena, which was built in 30 AD – amazing!  I wandered around and found some pretty beautiful churches, bridges, and ended up at the Roman Theater and Archaeological Museum.  It was a great choice because not only was it super interesting, but gave a great view of the city from the hillside across the river.  I even stumbled upon the Castle Vecchio, which was a happy surprise, and the Romeo and Juliet balcony (the amount of people there was ridiculous).  Eventually though I had to leave and go back to Venice, but my Italy trip was basically over then!  I took a bus back to Vienna the next morning, but I’m so glad I did this trip!  Traveling alone was something I wanted to prove to myself that I could do and visiting one of my favorite European cities was the best way to do it!  I learned and experienced so much and am grateful for it (even if my family was freaking out)! 😉

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Island of Murano

Sunset in Burano

Burano

Murano glass sculpture

I think my new favorite picture of Mickey in Burano

Arena in Verona

Verona with Roman Theater & Archaeological Museum

Roman Theater & Archaeological Museum

Ireland – Cork & Dublin

On the third day in a row of our Irish city excursions, my friend and I headed south to his college town, Cork.  Significantly larger than the towns from the previous two days, there was more walking to be done, but that didn’t stop us from sitting down with some great peppermint hot chocolate. We saw as much as we could, considering many things were shut for the holidays…did two free museums, went to the park, visited the college, and admired many churches.  It’s definitely a cute college city with plenty to do and lots of good restaurants, so before we left we had a tasty burger for a late lunch and some delicious Turkish Delight to-go afterwards.

On the train back, my friend hopped off in Roscrea and continued onto Dublin to meet with our other friend.  I stayed with her and her lovely family until after New Year’s.  The next morning, we went for a stroll in the surprisingly large and confusing Phoenix Park and saw the Dublin deer!  They were smaller than you’d think, but absolutely adorable and pretty comfortable around people.  Afterwards, we ate at The Hole in the Wall – apparently, Ireland’s longest restaurant. 🙂 Each room was a different Christmas theme and they went all out because every inch of that place was covered in snow, presents, Santa, and garland!  My friend and I headed into town after and saw the Ha’penny bridge, walked around Temple Bar, Trinity, and tons of side and shopping streets that included Molly Malone, an adorable post office Christmas village, and the spire.  I loved that Dublin was still decorated for Christmas because it made everything glimmer.  After a long day, we ended it by eating what is probably considered an unhealthy amount of gingerbread. 🙂

The following day we visited the Dublin “castle”, which oddly enough had a little antique car show going on, visited the Chester Beatty library (really cool), Archaeology Museum, and Natural History Museum.  The Archaeology Museum had a super interesting section on bog people and displayed them with their histories and theories as to how they ended up dead and buried in the bogs.  They were so well preserved – honestly kind of crazy! We hit the town for New Year’s Eve, but still got up at a decent time to go to Howth the next day! It was an adorable village on the edge of Dublin along the Irish Sea.  That day the wind was so strong and the sea was so rough though!  We saw one seal in the water, but I honestly don’t blame them for not being out and about.  We walked along one part of the beach, despite the tide being high and then went in the other direction up the hill and along the cliffs to have a super great view!  We would have stayed longer or walked farther, but the wind was literally blowing us from side to side, so we headed down for a warm drink and a train back.

I flew out the next day and was sad to leave behind the friendly and polite Irish.  Even at 6 o’clock in the morning my taxi driver was cheery and I hope one day I’ll make it back!  It was so fantastic to visit friends who I met while studying abroad in Germany and what made this journey that much better. 🙂

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St. Fin Barre’s Cathedral in Cork

River Lee in Cork

The Dublin deer of Phoenix Park! 😀

Gardens of Dublin “Castle”

Irish Sea in Howth

Howth

New Orleans

My senior year of college has come and gone and during that crazy year I spent my spring break down in New Orleans, Louisiana.  Granted that was, oh nearly 10 months ago, but now I am finally getting a chance to sit down with all my photos downloaded and write.

The purpose of our time in New Orleans was to participate in an interfaith volunteering mission trip.  We consisted of three religion clubs – Juniata Christian Fellowship, Hillel, and Unitarian Universalists.  We worked with a great man named David Young, the founder of Capstone, who has now devoted his life to providing food to the people of the 9th ward in New Orleans, which became a food desert after Hurricane Katrina.  Unfortunately, even though Katrina was 10 years ago, this area still hasn’t recovered.  People have to go several miles in order to grocery shop and this is extremely difficult for most of them.  David has either managed to purchase or rents empty lots in the area where washed away houses used to stand.  In these plots, he grows fruits and vegetables, which he gives away completely for free to families in need.  David is also a beekeeper and the honey that he sells is his only source of income.  However, maintaining these gardens is no simple task and requires as much help as he can get.  Our job for the week was to help him in anyway he needed.  We weeded, dug holes, cleaned goat pends, scraped beehive frames, and battled fire ants (not an assigned job, but everyone had to deal with them haha).  He gave us a tour of the area including the levee that failed during the storm, the damaged wetlands due to the construction of canals that caused the movement of saltwater, and the (actually unhelpful) Brat Pitt housing developments.  Overall, it was quite enlightening and disheartening because the city received a lot of help directly after the hurricane, but after a while people forgot and it still needs that help.

Between our days of working and in the evenings we did, however, indulge in some touristy things, but also explored each others faith.  We went to a service from each representing club, which was very interesting!  We also visited the Louis Armstrong Park, the Saint Louis Cemetery Number One, tasted some frog legs at the French Market, and visited Jackson Square.  We could only go into the cemetery with a tour guide and learning about the methods they used and the payment process including perpetual care, was super interesting!  We had a tame night out on Bourbon Street (what a cultural experience haha), visited the wind chime tree, got powder sugar smothered beignets from Cafe Du Monde, and destroyed a huge bag of crawfish (the aftermath was seriously crazy).  It was a crazy and busy trip, but such a great city!  I’d love to go back again!

Also, check out this video link done by Huffington Post on David.

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Louis Armstrong Park

L.A. Park

Saint Louis Cemetery Number 1

This tomb won’t be getting anybody else added

Jackson Square

Capstone – check it out!