Pieces of love: munich

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Honeymoon review

AKA, we are back.

How to summarize 2 weeks in Europe? Well, I'll certainly try...

We started our trip in Munich for Oktoberfest. I had no idea what to expect, but what we did find was not what I thought it was going to be. Huge structures holding hundreds of people, a band, and rows and rows of excited beer drinkers, singing, food (by far the best rotisserie chicken I've ever eaten), and of course even more beer. DH and I shared benches and tables with various groups of nice people and had a blast at the fair that accompanied the beer tents.

Lowenbrau tent, around 1PM on a Monday. And this isn't even HALF of it!

From Munich we traveled south to Naples and Ischia, an island off the coast. We feasted on pizzas, rode funiculars and visited castles (who knew Naples had so many castles?) and went to a natural thermal water park. I thankfully didn't get sick on any ferries, although we made a mad dash and made the ferry on the return to Naples in 8 minutes flat.

View of Mt. Vesuvius from Naples

View of the port of Ischia from our room window

From Ischia we went north to Florence and walked, ate, and drank wine through the three nights we were there. Florence is amazing - we went back to places we first went to in 2007 and even got to enjoy some sun on the rooftop pool of our hotel. Florence will always hold a special place in my heart.

Duomo at sunset

Ponte Vecchio at night

View from the top of Giotto's tower, 411 steps up

And from Florence we traveled to the coast and visited Cinque Terre. Just amazing. The people are fantastic and the slower way of life there was much appreciated. We visited each of the 5 towns and made a day trip to Lucca, 5 kilometers from where my grandpa was born. Pasta, cheese, wine, and olives are things I'll never forget but will always miss. Below - Monterosso.