My mom, my husband, and I headed to Europe to join my younger daughter Danielle, who had just finished her study abroad. She’s now very fluent in Spanish, which came in very handy since we definitely encountered a decent number of people in Spain that didn’t speak English (luckily the same wasn’t true in Italy).
Jade and Noah didn’t come on the trip because Jade was absolutely not interested in a vacation filled with random sightseeing, and we knew Noah would be bored too. We have a big extended-family cruise planned for January, so they have that trip to look forward to.
Anyway, here are some details of the trip and pictures. It was hard to choose just this many!
Madrid
The first couple of days were spent in Madrid visiting some of the spots that Danielle had already seen and loved.
- We started out at Palacio Real, a very fancy palace. Had to wait in a pretty long line for it (an hour and a half in the sun), but luckily this was the only site we really had to wait for on our trip.
- We then met at a local mall and did a little shopping before we met Danielle’s host mom.
- We also visited several gardens, including the one in pictures below that had peacocks!
Barcelona
- Our Vrbo apartment had LOTS of stairs, as did all of Europe. Basically you should do some serious training on a stairmaster to visit Europe.
- We took a cable car ride to get some cool views of the city and visited an old castle at the top.
- Then we took a tour of the city that focused on architect Gaudi’s work and visited La Sagrada Familia, a gorgeous Basilica. And later that evening, we took a tour of Park Guell, another of Gaudi’s famous sites.
- On a whim, we ended up visiting this cool old elaborately decorated hospital–we loved it so much that we ended up going to a random choral concert that night just so we could see the auditorium that the architect had also designed.
- We also stopped in a bookstore, and I had to get a pic in the middle grade section, of course. 🙂
Venice
- Our Vrbo in Venice was absolutely gorgeous–by far the nicest place we stayed, and it had an incredible balcony overlooking the lagoon.
- The vaporetto boat rides are such a fun way to travel around Venice! As soon as we got in town, we took the vaporetto down the Grand Canal and listened to Rick Steves’ audio tour.
- The next day we went to Murano and spent the day shopping at the glass shops. I could basically have bought everything in Murano–I am in love with glass! We also watched a glass blowing demonstration and watched the artist make a horse.
- Then we spent a day just wandering Venice (with the help of Rick Steves) and seeing all the canals and fun shops with displays of masks and old-fashioned Venetian clothing. St. Mark’s Basilica is especially cool because of all the different styles and materials that were used. I especially love the cool multi-colored columns!
Rome (and Florence)
- Our final stop was Rome (including a quick day-trip to Florence). Our Vrbo here also had a nice balcony–though not quite as gorgeous as the Venice one–and LOTS of very steep stairs! We were just around the corner from an open-air market, which was pretty cool.
- We splurged on a day-long private tour of Rome with a driver for parts and skip-the-line tickets to the Colosseum, the Pantheon, the Vatican and the Sistine Chapel. It was expensive, but it was well worth it to get all the sites in and to have a guide tell us about everything.
- Since Danielle is a landscape architecture major, she was excited to visit some gardens she’s studied. We did a trip to Villa d’Este, which was absolutely gorgeous! One of the highlights of our trip.
- We then did the day trip to Florence and booked a visit to Villa Medici of Fiesole and Boboli Gardens (neither of which really lived up to Villa d’Este, but it was still cool for Danielle to see them–and Boboli suffered from the fact that it was very hot that day and there were lots of open spaces with little shade).
- Our final day in Rome, we used Rick Steves to visit any sites we might have missed, including the Spanish Steps and the Keats-Shelley Museum, which has a gorgeous library!
Philadelphia?
- Our flight from Rome took off two hours late because of weather in Philly, so we ended up missing our connecting flight to Chicago. Our bags did not miss the flight, which meant we were stuck without them for the night and had to do a quick run to Target to buy some essentials. We also ended up re-routed to Milwaukee or we would have had to wait another day–but that meant that when we got home, we had to drive an extra hour and a half or so to pick up our bags at O’Hare.
- We figured as long as we were in Philly, we might as well visit the Liberty Bell. We also saw the rest of Independence National Historic Park, but only from the outside, since we hadn’t booked a tour.
Thanks so much for sharing your travel and photos!
This looks like an amazing trip! I also recently went to Rome with my family, and it was a wonderful experience. I’d love to go back to Italy sometime and spend some more time getting to know the country.
Oh wow! Very nice!! I went to Italy a decade ago (god that makes me feel so old to say that! Lol!) We didn’t get to do Venice, but we did Rome, Pompeii, and a few other cities. It was a trip of a lifetime and my only regret was that cameras weren’t as savvy back then! Lol! I took lots of pictures though of things that was “okay” to photograph as that was during the time when they told you NO FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY! No smartphones at that time! Even Philadelphia looks fun! We actually had a layover overnight in Boston, but since I forced myself to stay up on the plane ride home, I had zero energy to go anywhere with half our group that did. I guess they slept on the plane! I know I went to bed early that night, like 7 or 8! Lol!
Glad you had a fantastic time!
Yeah, we were way too tired that night – we managed to eat and do a Target run, but that was it. Since our plane didn’t take off until 1:45, we went out in the morning to Independence Park, since we were wide awake pretty early.
Incredible pictures. What an amazing trip you had. It seems like we all are suffering the diversion delays with all the rain these days. Glad you had a good time and arrived home (eventually) safely
Yeah, luckily my experience wasn’t as traumatic as yours – we weren’t just stuck in an airport for 10 hours. Ugh!
Loved seeing your pictures. It sounds like a wonderful family trip. I haven’t gone anywhere exciting lately. My daughter is getting married at the end of August. That says it all. Right?
Ha! Yes, I’m sure all of your time (and possibly many of your funds) are going toward wedding planning. But that’s a wonderful reason not to be taking a trip!
Wow… looks like you had some great experiences! I love Italy and loved my one trip to Spain as well.
Oh Nicole, such lovely photos! It looks like you had a wonderful time! I really really want to go back to Barcelona (actually I would just live there if we are wishing for stuff heh), and I’d love to go to Madrid too! And I would probably want to go back to Rome too to see more historical stuff- I saw some, but it was a pretty brief trip. My mom bought a ton of stuff when she went to Murano too ha! Where is your January trip to? Thank you so much for sharing your photos!
Our January trip is going to be a cruise to the Caribbean and Puerto Rico. Definitely looking forward to that one too!
Your pictures are so pretty! I’m glad it was a fun trip, even with the flight delays.
What a lovely trip! Rome and Florence have my heart (the second especially). You all look fresh as daisies in those pics…which surprises me, since the heat has been unbearable for weeks now here in Italy.
No I was definitely sweating bullets in most of these pictures – you just couldn’t see it. LOL! I suppose I probably just shied away from the ones where I looked like I was melting – there were plenty of those!
Ahhh these pictures are fantastic! I adore Italy, certainly one of my favorite destinations. I’m so happy you had a great time! 🙂
Beautiful pictures! I need to go to Rome or Italy for sure at some point in my life since I am part Italian/Sicilian. Love seeing all of this, looks like it was such a great trip! I finally started getting my pictures put up, and I’m spreading it over three posts. I’ve linked the first post below!
That sounds like a great trip! I loved Rome and Venice and would easily go back to either one of them! Haven’t been to Barcelona or Madrid, but would love to go. Glad you had such a fun time. 🙂
Great photos and you’ve made some wonderful memories. It brought back memories of our trips to those cities – all wonderful in different ways.
Terrie @ Bookshelf Journeys
https://www.bookshelfjourneys.com/post/monthly-wrap-up-july-23
Thanks for sharing all of this! Rick Steves is always so helpful, love his guides. I aspire to visiting Rome some day but we haven’t made it happen yet. I’ll remember that the Villa d’Este is a must see.
I did post some pics of a visit to Paris recently. That has definitely been the travel highlight this year.
What a fun trip! I’ve been to Venice and Florence, and I love them both, but I’ve never been to Barcelona. Someday I will make it there! I really want to see all the great architecture there. Also agree on all the stairs. I did THIRTY flights of stairs at the Louvre alone. SO. MANY. STAIRS.
Yes, our Apple watches kept announcing that we’d been way more active than usual. Looking at the graphs of our normal flights of stairs and Europe flights of stairs was pretty funny!
What an incredible journey this seems to be!
Oh wow! What a wonderful trip of a lifetime!! I would LOVE to see the gardens.
Karen @For What It’s Worth
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