Brent & Kristi's Europe page

Day 1 -- From Sacramento, we flew to DFW (Dallas-Ft Worth). Here we are waiting for our flight to London.
Buckingham Palace. We arrived in London too early to check into our room, so we did some sightseeing. We were pretty exhausted, having been up from Sunday morning through Tuesday at this point.
Westminster Abbey -- That's Kristi behind the garbage can on the right.
Westminster Abbey -- That's Brent near the light pole to the left of the walkway.
A panorama of the Houses of Parliament. That's Big Ben on the right.
Brent about to get trampled by some statuary.
Finally. Our tiny hotel room in London. To open the door for getting in & out, we had to step onto the bed.
Day 2 -- The Grand Place in Brussels. It was the most beautiful square we saw on our trip. All of the buildings were very ornate.
Day 3 -- A closer view of some of the same buildings. We couldn't leave Brussels without a few more visits to the Grand Place.
The opposite side of the square. This was taken during sunset. Notice how the gold in the building really shines.
Day 5 -- Amsterdam. This was by far our favorite city. It has lots of water & trees, & not very many cars. (Everyone bicycles.)
An odd site in Amsterdam: wood! We wish we had pictures of the other homes in the city, so you could understand the strangeness.
Speaking of strange -- our room in Amsterdam. Notice the naked woman next to the blow-up plastic tulip. It was clean and nice, but definitely the most interesting room of the trip!
The Rijksmuseum -- We also have a picture of the McDonald's sign just to the left of Brent.
Day 6 -- Double-decker bicycle parking. There were thousands of bicycles in Amsterdam. It could take up to 6 years to get a parking permit for a car in the downtown area.
The Dom in Köln, Germany. We stopped here for a few hours waiting to catch an overnight train to Basel, Switzerland. This picture is out of focus, but the Dom was quite impressive.
Day 7 -- Interlaken, Switzerland. You can see the Swiss flag flying in the wind almost in the middle of the photo.
Day 8 -- This was one of our favorite stops. We stayed in Interlaken longer than any other town (3 nights).
A panorama of the Lauterbrunnen Valley. We rented bicycles & rode them to this valley to see Trümmelbach -- 10 glacial water falls inside a mountain.
One example of the incredible sights inside the mountain. The following pictures are inside a cave, lit by flash.
You really have to see it to believe it. Over 20 liters (5+ US Gallons) of water per second shoots through the holes bored through the rock.
All the water you see in this stream is the same amount bursting through in the 2 photos above! It really is incredible.
That's Kristi on her rented bicycle. We're getting ready to leave Trümmelbach & ride back to Interlaken.
Day 9 -- Lake Thün (pronounced Tune). We took a boat ride to St. Beatus-Höhlen and explored the caves.
This is taken from the entrance to the caves. That's Brent waving to us from the bridge. Kristi realized too late that the view from 10 feet to her right was a much better view. Oh well, Brent was already on his way back....
Back on the boat with Jordan & Blair from Louisiana. They were staying in the room next to us at Walter's. It was fun to wander around with them -- we also ate fondue & played spades one night.
That might be Spiez in the background.
Walter's Backpacker was by far the best value of anywhere we stayed. For 6 Swiss Francs ($4), he would wash & fold a load of laundry. For 7 Swiss Francs each ($4.30) you got this table-full of food. It was always enough for breakfast & lunch.
Day 10 -- The Dying Lion in Lucerne, Switzerland. Brent is actually about 50 yards away from the lion. It is HUGE!
Day 11 -- The Bocca della Verita (Mouth of Truth) in Rome. Legend has it that if you put your right hand into the mouth while telling a lie, it will snap shut. Why would you tell a lie with your hand inside??
Trevi Fountain. It was beautiful, but the area was sooooo crowded it was unbelievable.
Day 12 -- On the way out of the Vatican Museum. Kristi liked the stairways. Of course, there were a million other things to take pictures of in the museums, but this is what we ended up liking the most.
A view of Michelangelo's dome in St. Peter's Basilica. We climbed many steps to the top of the cupola.
Bernini's Piazza St. Pietro from atop the cupola. We have a 360-degree panarama taken from this vantage point. Nothing in Rome can be taller than the dome, so the view is pretty spectacular.
Inside St Peter's. We both liked this very ornate statuary. It was quite dark inside, so Brent did a great job of getting this shot.
The Pantheon. They were having mass inside, so we just got to take a peek at the inside. That's Brent sitting at the bottom of the front column. Each column is one piece of marble. How did they transport stuff like that?
Day 13 -- The Colosseum. We actually stood in line twice to see the inside. The first time we didn't have cash. It was the only museum/sight we saw that didn't take Visa.
Another shot of the Colosseum. Pretty impressive.
The duomo in Florence. It was an incredibly ornate & colorful church. It was one of Kristi's favorites. Brent pieced this photo together from about 5. The tall bell tower was built much more recently that the rest of the structure. From this view, you don't realize the immensity of the whole building. Note how small the people look next to it.
Piazzale Michelangelo. The duomo is the huge building at the left of the picture. Now you get the idea of the size of the duomo. We walked here to have dinner at a restaurant Brent's grandpa Saul recommended. We were sure glad we did! It was such a wonderful view.
This statue is the reason for the name of the Piazza (a replica of David). The restaurant where we ate for Brent's birthday is lit up behind the statue.
Day 14 -- The Cinque Terre. Five towns built on cliffs along the Mediterranean, all connected by foot paths. You can see the train tracks leaving Vernazza, the town where we stayed (#4). You can see the terracing of the grapes on the cliffs, the swimming area beneath the tracks & Monterosso in the background.
Day 15 -- A neat view of the town & the water. Taken as we started our walk to Corniglia (#3), Manarola (#2), and Riomaggiore (#1).
Some kids, mostly locals, jumping from a bridge just before Manarola. It was about 100 feet high. Pretty daring.
The typical look of towns of the Cinque Terre. Very different from anything else we saw, but also much more touristy than we expected.
Kristi wishing we had gotten on a train going in the right direction. We had to wait for 3+ hours in La Spezia for the next train back to the Cinque Terre.
Day 16 -- Can anyone remind me where this was taken? What a tourist trap that was. We only spent an afternoon walking around Pisa.
Day 20 -- Venice. Typical view from a bridge in Venice.
Our friends Michael & Bonita from Australia. We met in the train car with no A/C after everyone else left the car. We spent the weekend with them in Venice & then met them again in Munich a few days later.
Day 22 -- Innsbrook, Austria. Another one of our favorite places. We took a tram up to the top of this mountain, and then walked down. The views were incredible, but I'm not sure my toes have recovered even now.
Happy cows on the hillside. We saw goats & goatherders, sheep & shepherds, cows, but no cowards (heehee). Because of this little walk, we had to have our shoes fumigated when we got back to the States.
Day 23 -- Mirabelle Gardens in Salzburg, Austria. This is where they filmed "The Sound of Music." It didn't look anything like what I remember in the movie, but the grounds were beautiful. Mozart was born here & we saw one of his residences.
Day 25 -- The Münster in Ülm, Germany. This is looking straight out at two of the towers (one under construction). You can't tell from this picture, but we will be much, much higher than these towers by the time we're finished climing....
A look straight down while climbing higher.... (Take note of the blue & red truck.)
And higher.... Notice how much smaller the truck is in this picture. Also, that's a car by the fountain -- and some people, too!
Remember those towers?
We made it to the top! Our hotel is in this picture, but it's too hard to explain which building it is, so I won't try.
The last section of the climb. That's a spiral staircase in the middle. This was the only way up & down. It got kind of tricky when we had to go down in order to allow other people to get up. We had to pass about 10 people standing on the stairs on our way down. We have a funny story about being at the top when too many people tried to come up.
One fun gargoyle (decending the Münster stairs). Probably Kristi's favorite picture.
A drawing of the Münster. We climbed to 143m (470 feet, 768 stairs). That's as high as you can get. It's the tallest church steeple in Europe). You can see the other towers (remember one was under construction?!) toward the back of the structure. They sure don't look very tall when compared to the steeple!
Our panorama of the Münster. It really is impressive.
Day 28 -- Titisee, Germany in the Black Forest. Here we stayed in Haus Irma. There was a goofy-golf course practically in her back yard. We rented one of the paddle boats you can see in the picture. The woman tried to rip us off with the change.... And then the boat was so uncomfortable, Brent ripped the seat out! (They were removeable)
Day 29 -- A tiny train station in Geneva, Switzerland. We had to catch a train here. Unfortunately for us, we had done a great job of spending all of our Swiss Francs on our first visit to Switzerland. Of course, we had to catch a bus to this train station, and didn't have francs. Brent ended up charging it on his Visa (about $1.60). What a pain. A few minutes prior to this picture, there were many armed guards wandering about -- but they all packed up & left at precisely 5 PM (See clock 5:03)!
On the train to Chamonix. This was the most scenic train ride of out whole trip.
Day 30 -- Chamonix. At this point, we were in heaven! The scenery was beautiful, the weather great, the room was clean, there was a Tex-Mex restaurant one floor down! How could it be any better?!
Hiking uphill to the Gran Balcon. For this hike, we decided to walk up the mountain & let the ski lifts bring us down.
View of Chamonix & the glacier on our way to the Gran Balcon. We considered hiking the other side of the valley to the glacier (there were MILES of hiking trails) but decided seeing views of the glacier might be nice, too.
Hiking the Gran Balcon (we made it!). Kristi is sitting on a rock. Brent took the picture while standing in snow! It sure was colder at the top than it was when we left town! We hiked over 1km up (3280 feet). Unfortunately, it seemed to get cloudier the higher we climbed, but the views were still incredible.
Day 32 -- Notre Dame in Paris. No flash pictures allowed, so Brent did a great job of getting some pictures in very low light.
A sculpture on one side of the Arc de Triomphe.
Kristi atop the Arc. We did visit the Eiffel Tower, but we only climbed to the first platform.
Day 33 -- The catacombs. You can't really tell by this picture, but this tunnel went on & on for a long while. There were lights & that's ventilation in the dark stripe.... Thank goodness, because we walked through a doorway and...
BAM! This is what we see.... The rest of the walk, and it was a long walk, these made the walls. Millions of bones. When we finally did get to the exit, it spit us out onto a street with no markings! We had no idea where we were.
Le Tour de France. This was day one -- a time trial. The bicyclists were moving very fast. Brent took several pictures & ended up with cars, wheels, the crowd -- this was the best picture of a cyclist. We think he rode for the German Telekomm team (the pink gives it away).
Sacre Coeur. The camera is sitting on a fence. Brent did a good job of getting the two of us and most of the building in the shot.
Day 35 -- Our wonderful hosts in Paris, Rebecca & Hervè. They graciously allowed us to stay with them while we explored Paris. It was nice to have friends to eat, play cards & just hang out with. Thanks again, Hervè & Rebecca!
Back at DFW. The seeds that we bought as gifts, that we had carried with us since Amsterdam, that got confiscated going through US Customs. The guards were nice enough to let us take this picture -- since there were no photos allowed in the Customs area.
By the way, we didn't buy any, but the flower seed shop's selection was so extensive as to include such exotic seeds as dandelions. We got a chuckle when we saw them for sale amongst all the other flower seeds.