Holiday Weekend in Stockholm

This past Monday was another one of the loved, completely random British holidays (summer bank holiday).  Even though we had just traveled the previous weekend, we hated to waste a holiday so took a quick weekend trip to Stockholm.  Stockholm is the capital of Sweden.  The city is spread across 14 islands in the southeast of Sweden so you can generally see water from most points in the city.  The islands are connected by multiple bridges as well as frequent running passenger ferries making the city pretty easy to navigate despite being made up of so many islands.

I loved the other two Scandinavian cities I visited during our time in Europe (Oslo and Copenhagen) and Stockholm was no different.  The people have been really friendly, the cities have been clean, and the weather has been gorgeous (I definitely lucked out with this one though).  I told David if we were ever to do another expat assignment, I would want it to be in one of these Scandinavian cities.

Unfortunately, Colin had a high fever during most of our time in Stockholm so we had to keep our sightseeing to a minimum.  We still got to visit a couple of interesting museums, take a boat ride around the islands, and visit an amusement park.  We also spent a lot of time just walking around, enjoying the fresh air and great weather.  Not bad for a quick two night trip with a sick toddler.  Here are some photos from the trip:

Doesn't get better than a drive through Stockholm

Colin smiling despite his 102 degree fever

Vasa Museum - displays a salvaged 17th century warship

Trying to steal my camera at lunch

I couldn't convince David or Colin to join me at the ABBA Museum

David and Colin in front of the Royal Palace on a beautiful morning

Anniversary Trip to Dubrovnik

David and I celebrated our five year wedding anniversary by taking a long weekend trip to Dubrovnik, Croatia.  Of course, our travel mate Colin was in tow so it wasn't exactly a romantic trip, but I couldn't imagine it any other way.  We decided that we wanted a relaxing trip that wasn't full of too much sightseeing so we booked a nice all inclusive resort to stay at outside of Dubrovnik and spent most of our trip lounging around at the pool.  Colin LOVES swimming and had a blast in the pool with a new inflatable boat that we bought for him.  He was also getting the hang of swimming on his own with water wings on by the end of the trip.  

Of course, we couldn't miss out on seeing the city of Dubrovnik even with our plans focusing on relaxation.  The city of Dubrovnik is a UNESCO World Heritage sight.  The Old Town is surrounded by defensive stone walls and walking the walls is the major tourist attraction in the city.  The city received significant damage during the war in the early 1990s over the collapse of Yugoslavia.  Most of the damage was repaired by the early 2000s, but you still do see reminders of the bombings the city was a target of.  Colin walked the entire city wall path on his own, which was 1.25 miles and included over 600 stairs.  David and I had a hard time keeping up with him!  We also spent some time on the main street in the Old Town (Stradun) including a much needed ice cream break and took a cable car up Mount Srd for a view over the city.

On the way home, we went to the airport to check-in and were told we were removed from our connecting flight between Dubrovnik and Munich (although our flight from Munich to London was fine, other than the fact that we had no way to get there) because we hadn't called to confirm our flight two days in advance.  Huh?  I definitely had never heard of doing that before!  We learned our lesson to not trust an Eastern European airline (Croatia Air) ever again.  They couldn't get us on a flight until the next day, and the flight required a 10 hour layover in Zagreb, Croatia.  Fortunately, our luck turned for the better, and I was able to get us a flight with only a three hour layover in Frankfurt the following day by calling the airline directly.  We also received help from someone at the airport in finding a very nice apartment to stay at with free transfers to the airport owned by the sweetest Croatian family.  The apartment was in Cavtat, a bayfront resort town that we had wanted to see but didn't have time so everything ended up working out despite the inconvenience of getting home a day later than planned.  I guess with all the traveling we have been doing, we were due for something to not work out as scheduled.

Here are a few photos from our trip:

Colin swimming with his water wings in our hotel's pool

Boating!

Not too bad of a view from our hotel's pool

Colin starting out the city wall walk 

View of Dubrovnik harbor from the city walls

The city wall walk was amazing

Dubrovnik cable car up Mount Srd

View of Old Town from Mount Srd

Edinburgh and the British Open

In late July, we took a quick weekend trip to Edinburgh.  Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and is a four and a half hour train ride from London.  We found this to be quite the LONG train ride as we hadn't purchased Colin a separate seat.  Since he refused to sit on our laps, we had to cram him in between our seats.  Not exactly the most comfortable!  We were all happy when we arrived in Edinburgh.  We didn't have much time to see the city since it was such a quick weekend trip so we pretty much left the apartment we had rented for the weekend as soon as we checked in to start seeing the sights.  We were able to do a hop-on, hop-off bus tour of the city and visit the Royal Yacht Britannia, which is Queen Elizabeth's retired yacht, before Colin had enough for the day.  We had tickets to the British Open the following day so we all needed a good night's sleep.

I had given David tickets to the British Open for Valentine's Day this year.  It was one of the things he really wanted to do during our time here in London.  We weren't exactly sure how it would work out with Colin.  Fortunately, I realized that the sitter service we use here in London is UK-wide so was able to reserve a sitter for the day for Colin in Edinburgh.  The sitter came right on time and was awesome with Colin.  They had a great day visiting a museum and playing at the playground while David and I went to the British Open.

The British Open (Open Championship as it is called here) was held at Muirfield Golf Course this year.  It was an easy train and bus ride to get there from Edinburgh.  We spent the day walking the course in reverse and were able to see almost all of the golfers.  David of course loved it, and I actually had a lot of fun as well.  I think we will be going to more golf tournaments in the future!  We had to see Phil Mickelson win from the comfort of our couch on the TV of the rental apartment though as we had to leave before the end to rescue Colin from the sitter.

The next day, we had a bit of time before we needed to catch our train back to London.  We visited the Edinburgh Castle and did some whisky tasting at the Scotch Whisky Experience.  Then, it was time to hop back on the train for another four and a half hour ride.  It was in the high 80s and the air conditioning was broken in our car.  Not the most pleasant end to our trip, but we all agreed that we loved Edinburgh.  Here are some pictures from the trip.

Ready for our day at the British Open!

David wearing his Drake shirt to support fellow golf team member Zach Johnson 

Watching golf was way more fun than I thought it would be.    PGA Championship at Whistling Straits in 2015 here we come!

We toured the Royal Yacht Britannia, which is the Queen's retired royal yacht.  It is also where Prince Charles and Princess Diana honeymooned.

Edinburgh Castle

Edinburgh Castle

Whisky tasting at the Scotch Whisky Experience

Mediterranean Cruise: Port of Palma de Mallorca

We had a much needed relaxing day at sea on Friday spent exploring the areas of the ship we hadn't previously had time for.  Of course, the vast majority of the time was spent at the waterpark where Colin must have went on the kiddie waterslides at least 100 times!  Saturday, our final port was the Spanish island of Palma de Mallorca.

There wasn't anything that we felt we had to see on the island.  The island is known for its resorts and beaches so we decided we would take a taxi to Palma Nova Beach in the morning.  The beach was wonderful; another great sandy beach with crystal clear blue water.  David and I could have spent all day there, but Colin was still refusing to touch his feet to the sand.  David and I took turns swimming in the Mediterranean while Colin lounged on the beach chairs we had rented.

After a few hours at the beach, we decided to head back to the ship for the rest of the day to get our last fix of everything the ship had to offer.  Once again, this meant more time on the waterslides for Colin!  The next morning, we had to get up and disembark the ship.  It was sad to end such an amazing vacation, but we have such great memories.  A cruise was a perfect way to see a lot of Europe with a toddler.  In fact, we decided to do another one in September to Athens and the Greek Islands out of Venice.  We can't wait!

Day at Sea:  Like father like son.  Who is having more fun?

Day at Sea:  My daredevil son going headfirst down the waterside.

Day at Sea:  Dinner with my favorite little man.

Lounging in Palma de Mallorca

Palma Nova Beach in Palma de Mallorca

Nap time!

One last ice cream cone on the ship

Final dinner to end a fabulous cruise

Mediterranean Cruise: Port of Messina

Happy 4th of July from Messina, Italy!  Our port on the 4th of July was Messina, a city on the island of Sicily.  It certainly did not seem like the 4th of July cruising the Mediterranean and spending the day in Sicily.  There didn't seem to be much to do in Messina, and I had a feeling we would be exhausted at this point so I booked a Carnival excursion for this day that involved spending half of the day at the beach.  The other half of the day would be spent in the town of Taormina.

We drove for about an hour before reaching Taormina, which was high up in the mountains of Sicily.  Taormina is a popular tourist destination with pedestrian streets and beach resorts.  Its most well known site is the Teatro Greco ('Greek Theatre').  We headed straight to the Greek Theatre when we arrived.  Another not so stroller friendly tourist destination but a really cool place to see as the ancient theatre is built into a cliff.  After the theatre, we did some window shopping and stopped at a cafe for a panini (for me), beer and cannoli (for David), and gelato (for Colin).  Taormina was such a cute village.  It was more of the Italy I love similar to the villages making up the Amalfi Coast rather than the big cities like Rome.

After our time in Taormina, we drove down the mountains to one of the private beaches on the Ionian Sea.  The beach was beautiful.  The sandy beaches of Sicily were so much better than the rocky beaches we saw in the French Riviera.  We all went for a swim although I must admit I kept my time in the water short after hearing that there were a lot of jelly fish.  The beach lounge chair called my name after that!  Colin liked swimming when David was holding onto him but wanted no part in touching his feet to the sand!

When we got back to the ship, we had a casual dinner at Guy's Burger Joint.  Guy Fieri partnered with Carnival to create a burger restaurant in all of their new ships.  So yummy!  Then, we brought Colin to Camp Carnival and went to the Punchliner Comedy Club to see a comedy show.  We were ready for the following day which would FINALLY be a relaxing day at sea!

Taormina

Greek Theatre 

View from the Greek Theatre

Taking a rest after climbing all the stairs in the Greek Theatre 

Gelato break!

Beach time!  Colin was not a fan of the sand!

Swimming in the Ionian Sea

Mediterranean Cruise: Port of Naples

Our port on Wednesday was probably the one I was most looking forward to.  The port itself was Naples, but we booked another semi-private excursion to take us to Pompeii and the Amalfi Coast for the day.  We shared our van with the same couple from Chicago and mother and daughter from Utah that we had been with during our day in Pisa and Florence.  We had a much better driver than in Rome although once again the van was without the car seat for Colin that we had been promised.  Needless to say, the tour company received a nasty email from me when we got back to London.

Our first stop for the day was Pompeii.  We had a couple of hours on our own to explore the site.  It was pretty amazing to see the whole city preserved in time.  It definitely was not stroller friendly though so David and I were pretty hot and tired at the end of the two hours and were ready for the more relaxing stops of the day.

From Pompeii, we drove to the Amalfi Coast.  The view during the drive was just spectacular.  Our driver stopped a number of times for us to get out and admire the scenery and take photos.  We were given some time to shop in Sorrento where the stores are filled with various lemon related products.  We sampled and purchased some limoncello (a lemon flavored liqueur) and also bought some lemon flavored soaps.  We had lunch at an amazing cliff side cafe in Positano.  It was a family style meal with lots of wine, multiple appetizers, about five different pastas, and at least that many desserts.  Plus, we had some limoncello to cap off the meal.  Yum!  I LOVED the village of Positano.  It was breathtaking.  We finished the excursion with some free time to explore the village of Amalfi (where we sampled some yummy lemon granita) before making the drive back to Naples.  This is definitely a region I want to go back to someday.

We got back to our ship about 5:30 and got some dinner for Colin before dropping him off at Camp Carnival.  David and I had dinner in another one of the specialty restaurants, Ji Ji's, which serves Asian food, before picking Colin up and heading to bed.  This was definitely one of my favorite days of the cruise.  The pictures say it all!

Walking through the streets of Pompeii

Pompeii Amphitheatre

Pompeii Basilica

Mt. Vesuvius 

Admiring the scenery 

Sorrento

Positano = LOVE

Colin liked these stairs more than the scenery

I definitely want to go back to Positano someday

Amalfi

Mediterranean Cruise: Port of Civitavecchia

Our port on Tuesday was Civitavecchia, which is the cruise port for access to Rome.  I wasn't all that excited about this port as I had already seen most of the Rome highlights on a previous visit and remembered the city as being rather dirty, hot, and crowded (I know I am a minority here as most people love Rome).  Still, I felt it would be silly to miss out on seeing the city again, especially since David had never been to Rome.  I didn't want to deal with the overcrowded public transportation with Colin and his stroller so we opted to book another semi-private excursion in Rome.

We got off our ship and met our tour guide.  However, things didn't go as smoothly as they did with our tour in Livorno.  The tour guide did not have any one else to share the excursion with us.  He then made us wait in the hot sun for about 45 minutes until he could convince a British couple and their teenage son to join us.  Needless to say, we were not happy at this point.  We then got to his van and found out there was no car seat for Colin.  The tour company had specifically agreed to provide car seats for Colin on all of our excursions.  We chose to pay full price for Colin with this company (many others give a discount or are free for 2 year olds) because they had guaranteed he would have a car seat.  Needless to say, we weren't off to a good start.

We did end up seeing a lot the rest of the day with stops at Vatican City and St. Peter's Square, Piazza Venezia, Colosseum, Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain, Piazza Navona, and a viewpoint outside the city. We also had lunch at a restaurant that I am certain was owned by friends or family of the driver for which he received some sort of kick-back, but it was at least a decent meal of pasta and beer.

I was glad we made the trip into Rome, but this was definitely my least favorite day of the cruise.  I was happy when we made it back to the ship and had some pool and waterslide time before dinner.  We had dinner and then dropped Colin off at Camp Carnival.  David and I had a drink on the adults only Serenity deck and played a round of mini golf before picking up Colin.  He was tired after not having napped well due to the lack of a car seat.  We all went to bed early as we had a big day ahead of us, the port of Naples and Pompeii and the Amalfi Coast which I was really looking forward to.

St. Peter's Square, Vatican City

David and Colin at the Colosseum

Spanish Steps

Trevi Fountain 

Throwing a coin into the Trevi Fountain

Resting by a fountain in Piazza Navona

Exhausted after a long and hot day in Rome