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Europe 2023

agosto - novembre 2023
  • Steph and Trent Travel
Our 3 month sabbatical in Europe! Leggi altro
  • Steph and Trent Travel
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  • Steph and Trent TravelViaggiatoreEurope 2023

    Prague, Czech Republic (Day 2 & 3)

    9 ottobre 2023, Repubblica Ceca ⋅ 🌧 59 °F

    What we did:
    - Met for breakfast in the hotel to eat and plan the day. A lot of collective time spent googling the horrific Hamas attack on Israel and watching the news coverage. So sad 🙏
    - Headed out to wander the town square and went up to the Black Angels bar rooftop for views overlooking the famous clock tower and city. Grabbed some drinks and talked lakehouse and Christmas plans!
    - Walked around town some more and then grabbed lunch at a delicious meat market! Trent was in heaven.
    - Then headed off to do a 2-3 hour walking tour of the city. Great guide and interesting viewpoints on the locals, history, and buildings. Probably a bit long but all were glad we got a walking tour in.
    - After our little endeavor into learning, we naturally had to try and forget what we learned with a mini pre-dinner bar crawl. Had some more Czech beers at “Pivnice U Kata” and then returned to Black Angels bar to hit the basement bar this time around. Self proclaimed “top ten bar in Europe” we definitely enjoyed the speakeasy ambiance.
    - Headed over to our Celebratory dinner for Sally’s bday and a thank you to both Sally/Doug for making the trek over! Dinner was delicious with great food, vibes and conversation. Going to be hard to go our separate ways.
    - Post-dinner nightcap at a local Irish bar still open! A wannabe Kurt Cobain was shredding the guitar and our ears while a group of wasted college kids tried to dance in the front. Quite the scene but love a good nightcap 🤘
    - Around 11:30 Sally/Doug headed back and Steph/Trent headed to another bar, Hemingway House, to meet Trent’s friends David/Jess for a beer. They were over for Dave’s work and happened to be in Prague so it was nice to catch up for an hour or so! We hadn’t seen Dave since early June due to a series of surgeries, so great to see him doing well!
    - Woke up and enjoyed another hotel breakfast, debriefing further on the trip!
    - Headed out for some coffee recommended by our tour guides rcalled “Kavárna Obecní düm” (how do kids in these countries possibly learn the alphabet?). Great old school cafe by the Powder Gate - old school in architecture but embracing the future with little robots driving around bussing the tables
    - Headed over to the Lennon Wall! Really just a standard wall with a bunch of graffiti and pictures until you read the history. Pretty cool how significant a symbol it was for not just the Czech over the years, but also people all over the world as a symbol to promote freedom, peace and happiness.
    - After the wall we grabbed some final drinks at a river front restaurant “Bricks” overlooking the Charles bridge. Trent asked for a pretzel and the heavily offended waiter scoffed and informed him “this isn’t a pub, sir”. Stephs second hand embarrassment was palpable
    - Absolutely amazing week! We’ve said it a few times in these writeups this week, but we are so fortunate they made the trek over to make some lifetime memories 🙌

    What we ate:
    - Breakfast at the hotel - pretty solid!
    - Lunch at Naše Maso. Absolutely delicious “dry-aged” burgers for Trent/Steph (best of the trip!) and Pastrami sandwiches for Doug/Sally
    - Dinner at La Finestra in Cucina! Truffle pasta appetizers and ribeye/filets for all! Great staff and presentation! They brought out a small scale to weigh the truffle they put in the pasta. They then brought out a large tray with an array of steak cuts to pick from. Then the Somm came in to select a great cabernet pairing. Best steaks of the trip!

    Fun facts
    - Trent had the meat sweats after the onslaught of meat from the day. He ate a dry-aged burger, half of Stephs burger, half of a pastrami sandwhich, his 12oz ribeye, and many bites of Sally/Steph’s filets…. a bit repulsive to type out
    - Prague is nicknamed the town of 100 spires and it certainly lives up to it
    - Prague's astronomical clock is currently rated the #4 most overrated thing in Europe and we have to agree. Mona Lisa in Paris, The mermaid in copenhagen and Manneken Pis in Brussels beat it.
    - The Lennon wall started in 1980 shortly after his murder as a nonviolent protest by the Prague youth against communist oppression as they really embraced his music preaching peace and freedom. The government frequently whitewashed it, installed cameras and guards and yet locals always found a way to creatively paint over it again. The “velvet revolution” of 1989 is when locals nonviolently won against communism and it became a central rallying point for celebrating their new freedom. It’s now been replicated and used symbolically all over to fight for peace.
    - Doug and Sally confirmed that this trip made them much more comfortable with traveling Europe. Let the travelling begin!    Leggi altro

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  • Steph and Trent TravelViaggiatoreEurope 2023

    Dresden, Germany (Days 1 & 2)

    11 ottobre 2023, Germania ⋅ ☁️ 77 °F

    What we did:
    - Took what was supposed to be a 2:30-5pm train from Prague. The train was delayed leaving 30 mins later and then we actually sat for 45 mins or so at the Czech/German border. Cops boarded the train and took multiple guys off the train that were traveling alone, without a passport and appeared of middle eastern descent. Per research, Germany is having issues with all the migrants they took in and are really starting to crack down. A similar thing happened when we crossed from Italy into France.
    - We were tired so just grabbed a quick dinner, checked into the hotel and passed out early.
    - Woke up and took a 45 minute train to the “Saxon-Switzerland” national park, which is actually just a national park in Germany. No idea how they landed on that wildly confusing name! Consistently rated a top 5 national park in Europe, we enjoyed the two-three hour hike through the forests and intricate rock formations. The “Bastei Bridge” is a frequent photo cycled through our Windows laptop screensavers. Definitely worth coming!
    - After the hike we tried to find food at 6 different restaurants in the area, which were all closed or surprisingly very unfriendly to foreign tourists. One entirely ignored us. From Google reviews it seems that all the restaurants in this area essentially refuses foreigners and sometimes get openly hostile. WTF Germany
    - There is a barge that gets you across the 50ft wide river from the train station to the park. They pack it full to its max capacity of 320 people. There is no other way to describe it than this barge is a janky contraption. It has no motor and instead is just tied to a buoy in the river and they use some sort of pulley system with the river flow to move it across. Coming over it was only a 5minute experience, but on the way home they packed all 300+ of us onto it and made us sit there for almost an hour. People were losing it! Almost 80 degree heat in tight quarters - there were some elderly people really starting to struggle. I guess we had to wait for a window in which there were no boats or kayakers anywhere in sight before this floating piece of sh*t could cross. Build a damn bridge Germany! This Huckleberry Finn schtick isn’t cutting it. Starting to really question the “German Enginering” touted in the Volkswagon car commercials now.
    - We got back to Dresden and walked around Old Town and the river. Super cool and underrated city! The palace and old buildings are gorgeous and don’t have the tourist chaos of other areas. We grabbed beers at the “Augustusgarten” riverside biergarten.
    - Grabbed some dinner and headed back to the hotel by 10. Watched the 1st episode of the Netflix Beckham documentary on David and Victoria - definitely recommend!

    Where we ate -
    - Dinner of Poke at Hawaiin restaurant M’oolea. Delicious!
    - Train station coffees and croissants for breakfast. Trent ate a pretzel because hey we’re in Germany after all
    - Lunch at KFC. Yes that KFC - Colonel Sanders is a luxury food item over here.
    - Trent had 1st dinner of a pretzel and brat at biergarten. Brat was delicious and gave us faith in German brats again after the clunkers in Munich. Steph opted out of 1st dinner
    - 2nd dinner of Pho at a local Vietnamese place! Not as traditional as Salzburg but good enough for what we needed.

    Fun Facts -
    - Dresden was the old capitalist of Saxony and is surprisingly full of gorgeous old churches and impressive Palace items.
    - Dresden was basically leveled by the UK/US at the end of WW2. There were actually inquisitions for many years after to determine if they acted incorrectly in doing so as the war was nearly over and there were substantial civilian casualties from the resulting fires. Almost all of those old churches/palaces were damaged/destroyed and had to be refurbished/rebuilt afterwards to try and keep the old town vibes. To the untrained eye you couldn’t tell that they were not naturally so old.    Leggi altro

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  • Steph and Trent TravelViaggiatoreEurope 2023

    Berlin, Germany (Days 1 & 2)

    13 ottobre 2023, Germania ⋅ 🌬 68 °F

    What we did:
    - Train got into town around 11. Stored our bags and headed out! Grabbed some quick healthy lunch and then headed over to the famous Brandenburg gate for our historic walking tour. Had some time to kill so of course - drinks!
    - We did a three hour walking tour that was awesome! Best tour yet. Our guide (from Los Angeles) was a walking textbook, but made it super interesting and come to life. We learned so much as we covered historical germanic times through to WW1, the lead up and events during WW2, and then all the events through the cold war to the fall of the Berlin wall. We had stops at the holocaust museum, old Nazi HQ and Hitlers bunker, Berlin wall, and famous Checkpoint Charlie. We found it all super interesting since most of our childhood history classes stop by 1950 and didn’t really touch on the Cold War and Berlin wall.
    - Now super educated and smart, we grabbed our luggage and checked into the Airbnb. Did some laundry and had a great time calling Helen to catch up and say hey! We talked a big game on our plans to stay out clubbing at the notorious warehouse parties until 6am…
    - Grabbed an amazing ramen dinner in a quaint spot and then headed out to burn down the town. Even made sure we were repping our trendiest all black outfits to hide our Americanism and convince bouncers we were worthy of partying.
    - Started hot around 10:30 with old fashioneds at the swanky BonBon bar in the Mitte neighborhood. We then walked by a more happening bar and panicked at the quantity of people so kept going. Berlin is intimidating, man. The blogs saying bouncers will straight up deny any Americans had some real estate in our heads. Not to be deterred, we kept it going with Absinthe drinks at the “Sharlie Cheen” bar as we worked up the nerves to hit these wild clubs. Well….. around 12:03am a rotation of yawns had us coming to the realization that we wouldn’t know the first thing to do in a club by ourselves, leading us to grab delicious doner kebabs and hit the pillow by 12:30…. At least we made midnight!! We are still cool, hip, and fun and definitely aren’t on the backend of our peak...
    - Woke up at 10 after our wild night out and grabbed our brunch in the trendy Mitte neighborhood - favorite brunch yet!
    - We then walked through the museum /old building district and then hit our 1st museum of the trip. WW2/SS museum that was very well done.
    - After the somber museum we went to a Biergarten! Trent then took a scheduled call with his boss to talk through his new role, new happenings and plans for return - the real world is trying to pull us back! And we don’t like it
    - After drinks we headed back to regroup and opted to grab some takeout food and call it an earlier night. On to Rome and the land of food and wine! Berlin was awesome 🙌

    Where we ate:
    - Day 1 breakfast of coffee/croissants from the Dresden train station
    - Lunch of our future US franchisee, Dean & Davids, as we desperately needed to eat green things. German food is tough
    - Dinner of absolutely delicious Ramen, gyoza and edamame. As soon as Steph gets a whiff of fall, her all-consuming Ramen cravings kick in and Trent is happy to indulge. Again, successfully avoiding German food ✅
    - Day 2 breakfast at Factory Girl. Voted our #1 breakfast of the trip! This place smacks. All very healthy fancy food. Steph had fruit covered Bannana and Tahiti pancakes with a side of spiced cheesy potatoes. Trent had the classiest pile of eggs, cheesy potatoes, avocado, onions, sauces and more. Couple of flat whites to cap it off.
    - Assorted bread platter and dips at Cafe Am Neuen See biergarten
    - Dinner of delicious Mexican burritos in Mitte. Place was absolutely packed so we knew we found a gem. Again successfully avoiding German food ✅

    Fun facts:
    - Berlin has prospered as a mecca for the artsy folks of the world. David Bowie and Iggy Pop among many others lived here. It’s got a grungy, artsy edge to it that you just don’t see anywhere else. As a result it’s nightclub scene is voted the best in the world with countless abandoned warehouses turned into exclusive raves that don’t kick off until 1/2am. If you speak English in line or aren’t dressed edgy enough the bouncers simply won’t let you in
    - Being formerly communist, Berlin is one of the few places with a North Korean embassy. It had two buildings and without Germany's permission started a hostel out of the 2nd one. It became super popular for backpackers because it was located in the city center. Therefore, any backpacker that stayed there was technically “staying in North Korea”. Germany has since shut them down.
    - Germany is very cognizant of its past and has taken lengths to prevent it again. Students learn about the holocaust/atrocities every year starting in kindergarten and by graduation it's a requirement to tour two concentration camps. The new generation is starting to pushback and asking to stop making them feel guilty/embarrassed to be German when it had nothing to do with them.
    - Hitler's notorious bunker is now simply an apartment parking lot. We saw it and they purposely made no museum/recollection for it as to not give a place for anyone to have a sacred spot for Hitler    Leggi altro

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  • Steph and Trent TravelViaggiatoreEurope 2023

    Rome, Italy (Day 1)

    15 ottobre 2023, Italia

    What we did:
    - Early morning in Berlin to catch our flight back to the land of food and wine! We’re very happy we got to dip into Italy three times this trip
    - Checked into our hotel around 2pm and then went to grab some pizza! Delicious coal fired pizzas that came with literally a gallon jug of table wine so really kicked us off right
    - Full and buzzed we headed on a great hour walk through Rome to get to Vatican city. The pope loves chianti right?
    - We were surprised at how impressive we thought the Vatican city was. Maybe the gallon of wine had an impact? Definitely caught it at the right time as the offseason evening crowds were heavily diminished. We wandered the main square and toured St. Peter's Basilica. Apparently tickets for the Sistine chapel sell out months in advance so that was a no go. But hey we’re not museum people anyway. St. Peters ceiling was good enough!
    - Wandered the streets back over to our hotel in the “trendy” Trastevere neighborhood… the town was alive! Every block is packed with restaurants and people just hanging, eating a drinking. Tons of street performers too. Didn’t have the feel of a packed tourist area like other areas in Italy, but just a bunch of locals and some tourists enjoying a great night - loved the vibes! Wouldn’t be back in Italy without fullfilling our gelato addictions so grabbed some on the way home! Desert before dinner? No parents, no rules.
    - Regrouped in the hotel and then headed out for a classic 9:30pm Italian dinner. Hit a delicious spot for pasta recommended by many of our friends and it lived up! Sat outside and enjoyed the buzz of the streets. 2nd desert of taramisu? No parents, no rules!
    - Exhausted from the day we called it by 11 - good to be back in Italy!

    What we ate:
    - Sammies for breakfast and one last German pretzel at the airport!
    - Pizzeria “dar poeta” for lunch. Two pizzas and a gallon of chianti!
    - Dinner at Mimi e Coco. So good! Trent got Carbonara and Steph had cacio e pepe. Prosciutto wrapped melon for apps! And tarimusu for dessert

    Fun facts:
    - Vatican city is the smallest country in the world!
    - The pope has used the Pontifical Swiss Guard since the 1500’s, making it one of oldest militaries still in existence. These gaurds have to be unmarried Swiss nationals between ages of 18-30
    - Trent did not learn his lesson from Sicily and committed another Italian faux pas. Cappuccino before your meal!? Gasp!!!! After Steph kindly reminded Trent that he “likely wanted his cappuccino post-meal”, the waiter told us that the mere statement almost gave him a heart attack.
    - Italian food is tasty. That’s all.    Leggi altro

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  • Steph and Trent TravelViaggiatoreEurope 2023

    Rome, Italy (Day 2)

    15 ottobre 2023, Italia ⋅ ⛅ 79 °F

    What we did -
    - Slept in! We’re getting pretty good at that. Trent went for a quick jog while Steph went to find a cafe. After a few failed attempts at different packed cafes she ended up back at the dinner spot from the night before! Trent met her there after showering and we kicked off our day
    - Grabbed breakfast/lunch? around 12ish to get the notorious pizza pockets and Tuscan wines. See below.
    - Headed across town to be tourists. Walked the spanish steps and threw coins in the fountain at Trevi Fountain! Steph channeled her inner Lizzie McGuire
    - We then headed over to enjoy another highly recommended Gelato place - Frigidarium! Possibly one of our favorite spots of the trip. Trent got his dipped in a coating of chocolate like the good ol’ Dairy Queen days. But like classy and international DQ so i guess not like DQ.
    - Ate our ice cream as we walked over to the Pantheon. Bit of a wait in line but did get in and pretty cool spot! Just impressive how such an old building can possibly have lasted so long.
    - We then walked back across the river over to Giardino Dehli Aranci for sunset. Super cool hillside park/garden that overlooks all of Rome! Wandered around the scenic overlook parks and then headed back to the hotel for dinner.
    - Put our name in for dinner and grabbed wine/charcuterie right in the center of Trastevere and people watched! Another good italian dinner and bottle of wine. There was a large group of musicians there celebrating a bday that sang three beautiful renditions of Italian Tanti Auguri. Capped off dinner and headed to bed full and exhausted! Another great day

    What we ate:
    - Coffees and croissants at Mimi e Coco
    - Lunch at Trapizzino - one of Trents favorite meals of the trip! Got an assortment of their trademarked “pizza pockets” which are cones of dough filled with veggies and meats. Absolutely delicious. We voted the chicken one our favorite. Also tried our first Suppli which are little balls of risotto and cheese (the Roman version of Arancini - the Romans arguably do these better than the Sicilians)
    - Dinner at Da Zi Umberto. Trent had delicious steak and mushrooms with a side of potatoes while Steph had truffle pasta with sausage. Table chianti to top if off!

    Fun facts:
    - The pantheon is the oldest most preserved building from ancient rome. Because it was declared a religious building it was protected and maintained
    - $3000 worth of coins are thrown into the Trevi fountain daily. There used to be thiefs that would come in at night at steal it, but thats been cracked down and is now donated to charity
    - Trappazino’s pizza pocket is an original concept now trademarked. He started with the little street stand in Rome and now has 6 spots across the world, including NYC    Leggi altro

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  • Steph and Trent TravelViaggiatoreEurope 2023

    Rome, Italy (Day 3)

    16 ottobre 2023, Italia ⋅ ☁️ 70 °F

    What we did:
    - Woke up early for our colleseum tour! Quick cafe stop on our way over. You are required to have a tour guide to enter so we were in a group of 30 or so tourists with a super Italian, old man. Probably spent more time bashing other guides than giving facts but he was funny in his little fits of anger. We walked through the Colosseum, Palatine Hill, and the Roman Forum. Pretty impressive to see the historic buildings!
    - Having conquered the last major tourist activity in Rome, we headed back to Trastevere to hunker down from the rain and get back to our wheelhouse of eating and drinking.
    - We stopped for lunch at the notorious Suppli takeout place. See below for a description of this wonderful creation.
    - Then we holed up in a wine bar and over potentially our favorite charcuterie board and Tuscan wines, and revisited our wedding plans. Is Gordon Lodge in Door County right? What if our dates get taken and we miss out? Is it crazy to book without visiting? Eff it we should just elope. No, we shouldn’t elope should we? You know what, no, we want a wedding. After hours of circular discussion and a couple glasses of wine we decided, let’s do it! We got real close to booking while in Croatia and the longer we’ve sat on it the more it just makes sense. Let’s call the Moms tonight and see if we’re crazy.
    - Energized and now with a plan, we decided to initiate a wine bar crawl. After failing to get into two packed ones, we finally holed up in a corner bar and had some Aperol Spritz. Not quite the plan, but hey Aperols are good with us.
    - After drinks we headed back to the hotel to regroup and then went to a casual dinner spot. Another solid meal! We have absolutely loved Rome. Originally intimidated from what we expected to be a super crowded touristy city, the vibes and food in Trastavere made it one of our favorite stops so far in Italy!
    - We headed back to the hotel and called Sally and Helen/Brian to talk wedding plans. After lots of good questions we got complete support to go for it! Excited, we sent a note to Amy at Gordon Lodge that we wanted to lock down our date after a few clarifying questions. Wooooooo!

    What we ate:
    - Breakfast of croissants and coffee at Giselds bakery
    - SUPPLI! So good! Had this for our lunch at “Suppli Roma” and breakfast on our way out of town the next day. It’s like Arancini, but so much better. Little balls of fried risotto and we tried three different types - Classico (red sauce), Cacio e Pepe and Cacio e Pepe with lemon 🔥🔥🔥. Bring these to the USA ASAP.
    - Delicious Italian cold cuts and cheese platter with Tuscan wines as an afternoon snack at Vin Allegro. Also got super fresh prosciutto melon!
    - Dinner at Trattori Del Teo. Steph got carbonara and Trent got seafood linguini. Delicious fried artichokes, a Roman staple, for an app!

    Fun facts:
    - 6M people visit the Colosseum every year.
    - When Mussolini was in power he put a lot of resources into modernizing some of the old buildings to help with bringing back the Roman Empire glory days
    - Back in the day if a building was declared for religious use it was protected from being destroyed/pillaged. If a building was not protected by the church, it was typically destroyed for use in other buildings.
    - Over the thousands of years Romans just kept building on top of other layers of buildings so when they excavated you could see all the different eras stacked up. We found it crazy to think how much is under Rome that they dont even know about    Leggi altro

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  • Steph and Trent TravelViaggiatoreEurope 2023

    Florence, Italy (Days 1 & 2)

    18 ottobre 2023, Italia ⋅ 🌧 63 °F

    What we did:
    - Off to Lindsay and Jenna’s study abroad home! Our train from Rome got in around 1ish. We grabbed a coffee in a square by our Airbnb and then went to the famous Pino’s for sandwiches. Two of Trent’s friends say it’s their all time favorite restaurant in the world! Family run counter serve spot and it was great. Trent amused them by getting in line a 2nd time for round 2. No shame!
    - We then walked around town for a while to enjoy how cool of a city it is! Big fans. Nice views from the Ponte Vecchio bridge and very cool to see the famous Duomo cathedral.
    - We then stopped into the wine bar “Pitti Gola and Cantina” and wow this place was awesome. We each got a flight of three Tuscan wines (Sangiovese grape). The wine guy was a som and gave us so much information. Great vibes and good wine!
    - We then rushed up to the viewpoint at the top of Piazzale Michelangelo. Wow! Stunning views across all of Florence. We bought a big Peroni from a local stand to split while we enjoyed the sunset over the city. Tons of people hanging out on the stairs, musicians playing Italian tunes and great weather. Italy is awesome.
    - Post sunset we headed over to dinner. We got sat in a table between two other couples and immediately felt eyes from our neighbors…. We order our meal and immediately buddy guy pipes up with “So where you guys from?!” Oh no. Abort. Abort. Nightmare scenario. They were 60ish from South Carolina and we were not sure if they were a couple, coworkers, siblings or friends, but man they were weird. We politely answer a few questions and tried to give the obvious cold shoulder. Buddy guy keeps peppering us with questions and ooong and awwing over our wine and steak. “We wish we had the confidence to order red wine. We only order white wine”. WTF? They then tell us a story about how they hated Milan because they got pickpocketed three different times over a few days! What on earth could they be doing? He then made a scene and called the waiter over to tell him that the pasta was way too salty and he can’t believe they’d serve this food. The waiter had no idea what to say (considering that Florence doesn't historically cook with much salt - see saltless bread in fun facts). Finally as we’re nearing the end of our meal they pack up and leave. Good riddance South Carolina, thanks for another brutally cringy interaction with Americans abroad. We grab some gelato at one of Jenna’s favorite “Gelataria La Carraia” and called it a night. So good!
    - We ended up sleeping in pretty late as it was super rainy and gross. We started off by grabbing sandwiches at another local spot - we voted it way better than Pinos actually! We walked around for a while and tried to see the “David” statue but tickets were sold old out. We settled for the replica in the main square.
    - We hit Lindsay’s favorite gelato “Antica Gelateria Florentina”. So good again! Love the creamy Florentine gelato flavors.
    - Sufficiently touristed, we walked to another wine bar, “Le Volpe Y Ulva”, for a glass of Tuscan wine. We then headed back over to the wine bar from the day before “Pitti Gola and Cantina” and got a flight of Chianti’s this time. So good and great vibes!
    - Buzzed and hungry we head to dinner for some more Florentine classic food and chianti. We then headed to bed for our morning wine tour! WE will definitely need to dry out when we get back to the states.

    What we ate:
    - Lunch #1 at Pinos where Trent had two paninis and half of Stephs. Very good!
    - Night #1 dinner at Angolino's of a massive Florentine T-bone and potatoes. They are known for massive steaks that they cook rare. It was a bit rare for us so can’t say we were too impressed.
    - Lunch #2 at Antico Vinaio for more paninis! Love a good Italian sammy.
    - Night #2 dinner at Cucina in Torre where Trent got a redemption steak and Steph got the famous Florentine truffle pasta. Redemption steak was delicious and truffle was unreal!

    Fun facts:
    - In WW2 Germany occupied Florence and upon retreat had destroyed all the bridges except for the Ponte Vecchio. Hitler loved it’s uniqueness so much he forbid it’s destruction
    - Gelato was invented in Florence!
    - Wish we were art and museum people. According to UNESCO, 60% of the world’s most important art is in Italy and half are in Florence. So 1/3 of the world's art is there. And we just drank wine 🤙
    - Florentine bread is traditionally unsalted. “The reigning theory is that salt was taxed too heavily in medieval Florence, so bakers left it out. They never looked back, not even when the tax was lifted, growing affectionately attached to their baked aberration.”    Leggi altro

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  • Steph and Trent TravelViaggiatoreEurope 2023

    Tuscany, Italy

    19 ottobre 2023, Italia ⋅ ☁️ 72 °F

    What we did:
    - Got up early for 9am tour of the Tuscan countryside! Ran through Florence to find our tour company and bus and met our very friendly guide, Leo! We were in a group of about 25, many of who struggled to get to the tour on time due to the public transit strikes happening all over Italy. Took a while to get out to the countryside because of all the cars on the road, far more than normal since a lot of trains and busses weren’t running. No worries though, Leo had lots of great history and personal anecdotes to keep us entertained!
    - After a very scenic drive through the countryside we arrived at our first winery, San Michele A Torr. We had a tour of the grounds, the cellar, and the winemaking process before starting our tasting of olive oil and Chianti wines! Delicious! We met some nice people from Omaha, and figured out that one of them had actually worked with Doc! Leo ended our visit here with a few songs on the guitar.
    - After more beautiful sites of the rolling Tuscan hills, we made a pit stop in the small town of Greve. We walked around the square and had just enough time to get a couple of cappuccinos and delicious prosciutto that came highly recommended from Leo. Back on the bus for our second winery stop!
    - Next winery was Casa Emma! They hosted us in a separate event room high up on one of the hills for our wine tasting and lunch. We sat with two Aussies, two young Americans from Ann Arbor, and two Americans from North Carolina! All very friendly people who had been traveling in similar areas to us, so we were able to get some good takes/recommendations for our next few cities! Although a little toasty, lunch was delicious and wine was great - well on our way to a healthy wine buzz!
    - The scenery just seems to keep getting better! Vineyards everywhere with beautiful cypress trees lining the roads and driveways. We arrived at our final winery Chateau Poggio Torselli. The grounds here were absolutely stunning! The most picturesque Italian estate straight out of a movie. We were given a tour of the estate and the opportunity to try 4 wines. This was the favorite of all three wineries, mainly due to the beautiful setting!
    - We were dropped back at the train station in Florence and tried to figure out what to do with our night. We walked near the river and got gelato at one of Jennas favorite places. We then made our way up to Abbazia di San Miniato Al Monte for a better and less crowded view of the city for sunset! This is where Nick Dolce proposed to Ang a few weeks prior. What a great spot!! Our sunset viewing ended early when we got a message from Amy (the coordinator at Gordon Lodge) letting us know she had time to talk to us in 45 minutes. We rushed home and prepped our questions for Amy. After chatting with the Moms, we decided to move forward with the wedding venue! Woohoo!
    - Headed out to Quattro Leoni for a celebratory dinner. After finishing our late dinner we headed home to get some sleep.
    - Brunch that morning at Rooster Cafe before hopping on the train to Venice!

    What we ate:
    - Croissants and coffees from a coffee shop.
    - Michele a Tor: 3 different red wines. A Chianti, and Chianti Classico Riserva. We also tried some DOP Olive Oil with some classic unsalted Florentine bread!
    - Antica Macelleria Falorni in Greve: Dare I say Trents favorite “sciutto ” of the whole trip?
    - Casa Emma: Tasting of 3 chiantis with charcuterie and pasta with red sauce for lunch.
    - Poggio Torselli; Tasting of 3 chiantis, with the option to try the Blue label Chianti Riserva and the rose.
    - Gelato on the Arno River from Gelateria Santa Trinita.
    - The famous Florentine Pear pasta at Quattro Leoni and a cheesecake to top it all off!
    - Rooster Cafe: Coffees and a skillet for Trent and chicken and waffles for Steph. Nice to find a place with American brunch!

    Fun facts:
    - The Chianti Classico is the most refined variety of the Chianti region. In order to identify if the wine you are drinking is in fact a “Chianti Classico” it must say “Chianti Classico” on the label and also have a black rooster on the neck of the wine label.
    - A lot of the wineries hosted civilians and soldiers in the wine cellars during the Second World War.
    - For Chiantis, if the label includes “Riserva” it means that the bottle was aged at least one additional year in the bottle before being sold.    Leggi altro

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  • Steph and Trent TravelViaggiatoreEurope 2023

    Venice, Italy

    21 ottobre 2023, Italia ⋅ ☁️ 70 °F

    What we did -
    - Our couple hour train got into Venice around 2pm and we were greeted with our first strike of the trip! Lucky to have avoided them so far, it turns out this time the Venice boat taxi’s were striking all weekend. Sooooo we had a super fun 40 minute walk with our backpacks/suitcases through the densely crowded mid-day Venice streets, light spitting rain and 10+ stair covered bridges. That’s one way to see the city! Soaked in sweat/rain when we got to our Air BnB, we showered and regrouped for a bit. Also kicked off our last laundry batch of the trip 🥺
    - We were huuuungry so headed over to a pizza joint nearby. Venice is notorious for not having good food (bummer after Rome and Florence) so we figured pizza was easy. Service was pretty awful but pizza was solid!
    - After 2.5 hour dinner we headed out on the town! It was pouring rain so a bit difficult, but still fun to walk along the canals and bridges. Such a unique city! Pretty dirty and beaten up though. Steph had been before and wasn’t a huge fan for this reason, but since we were so close Trent pushed to see it. This is a city at the top of the “will be impacted by global warming” list so had to see it before it goes under water.
    - We found a cool wine bar, “Retro Wine Bar” which had 1930’s speakeasy vibes. Trent’s now a big wine guy after Tuscany so he enjoyed Steph trying to get him to understand all the Italian wine regions and taste some local ones.
    - Headed home and finished up the last two episodes of the Beckham documentary! Definitely recommend. 2am by the time we went to bed though... not sure how we always do this
    - Slept in until 11am… vacation is the best! Headed over to a cafe for cappuccinos and croissants. By 12:30 when we got there all the croissants were gone and all they had available was pizza… too many damn early birds stealing our worms. We thought this was Italy? Time’s supposed to be an imaginary concept.
    - The sun was out so we wandered around for a few hours just enjoying the famous sights and canals. Despite the crowds, dirtiness, bad food and gangs of pigeons, it is a charming and unique city. We debated doing the touristy gondola ride but at $100 a pop we opted to save our sheckles.
    - A whole swath of the main tourist area was underwater and you could see more water just bubbling up from the drains. Hoards of tourists were buying plastic coverings for their shoes and just wading through it. Some were even sitting at cafe’s with water calf-deep, just enjoying food and drinks. We’d always heard of this so pretty crazy to actually see. Sufficiently grossed out by the dirty water, we opted for dry land and headed to a wine bar for a few drinks.
    - Post drinks we headed to the harbour and saw our favorite sunset of the trip. The insane colors over the harbour with the storm clouds booming in the distance was incredible. Venice looked real nice in this moment 🙌
    - With an early early flight we headed back to the Airbnb, grabbed a takeout pasta dinner and crashed early.
    - Woke up at 3:50am… so pretty close to the time we went to bed the day before. The night before we realized that due to the strike and it being a sunday morning in Italy, no transit was available! Soooo 40 minutes back across Venice it was to catch a mainland bus. Parents time to put on your blinders and skip this paragraph - walking through the dark, empty rat filled alleyways at 4am is not advisable. We we’re ready to get mugged at each meandering dark alleyway turn. Fortunately the rattle of our suitcases scared away most rats and all the drunks were too drunk to pay any mind to us. Not the kinda thing they teach you to do in Travel 101. Thank you striking boat taxis. But hey we made it to our bus and flight safe and sound!
    - Venice you will likely end up as our lowest rated location on the trip, sorry not sorry. Absolutely worth seeing in a lifetime, but no need for more than 24/36hrs! Steph thinks not worth seeing at all - go see Bruges or Amsterdam for a similar vibe but a way better time.

    Where we ate -
    - 1st dinner at 1000 gourmet. Two pizzas and a salad!
    - Breakfast/lunch pizza at Farini cafe
    - Cichetti’s” at La Barrique wine bar. These are little pieces of bread with various toppings. We enjoyed the really good assorted meats, but had to plug our nose on some of the fish based ones
    - 2nd Dinner of takeout at “We love Italy - Fresh pasta to go”. You read that name right. It’s a counter serve pasta place that was honestly delicious.
    - Taramisu from Farini for desert

    Fun facts:
    - Venice has always banned coal ovens for pizza due to fire risk so they were known for not having pizza. Recent electric stove technology has allowed them to actually cook it now
    - All the blogs said restaurants in Venice know almost all customers will never come back so they don’t really care about providing good service or food.
    - The Black Gondola industry is super regulated. Each location is mandated to charge the same price, go for the same 30 minute duration, wear the striped outfit and all are limited to specific regional trips. Kinda nice as this could easily be an industry to swindle unknowing tourists. However it’s still 80 euro a ride…    Leggi altro

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  • Steph and Trent TravelViaggiatoreEurope 2023

    Beaujolais, France

    21 ottobre 2023, Francia

    What we did:
    - Arrived to the Lyon airport VERY early after walking through a very dark, dirty, and rainy Venice at 4am to catch our flight. We got our rental car and were quickly on the road! The French countryside is beautiful with quaint little towns and Medieval villages. We stopped in Val d’Oingt for some coffees and pastries. Known as one of the most beautiful towns in France, we definitely felt like we stepped into a quiet little French town straight out of a movie (especially after leaving the chaos of Italy). We tried our best French to order coffees and stopped at a local Boulangerie. Amazing croissants and quiche!
    - We then drove to the small Medieval village named Ternand. We walked around the town, read up on the history provided by various signs, and hopped back in the car.
    - We drove through beautiful rolling vineyards and hills, the vines and trees all starting to change for the fall. We made a little pit stop in the town of Chiroubles for a quick bite of local French cheeses and meats before heading to our first Beaujolais tasting!
    - Our first tasting was at Christophe Savoy where we learned the basics about the Beaujolais and Burgundy wine regions. We tried 4 different of varieties of red Beaujolais wines - all delicious! Beaujolais wines are a little lighter and fruitier which we figured out isn’t necessarily Trent's favorite kind of wine. He liked the wines that were deeper and more full bodied.
    - We then drove to our next tasting 10 minutes away. The directions were hard to figure out since it was a family run winery run out of their family home. Eventually Matthew, the son, flagged us down and we started on our private tour! Super interesting as the estate has been passed down and run by the family for multiple generations. Matthew is young and will takeover the business and was telling us about some of the new farming strategies and experimentation he is doing with the wine making process and how it paired well with his parents’ and grandparents’ wealth of experience. We tried one white wine, one rose, and three red ones. They also had the sweetest dog named Poppy running around - so cute! Overall super friendly guy, and since it was such a small tour he was happy to answer any and all questions we had. And we had a lot of them!
    - We drove the rest of the way to the town of Beaune where we were staying the next few nights. Again, a beautifully and picturesque French countryside town! We headed to the central square and grabbed some dinner before going to bed early for more wine tasting the next day!

    What we ate:
    - Croissants, quiches, and coffees in Val d’Oingt at Votre Boulangerie
    - Variety of French cheeses and meats at Cafe de Beaujolais
    - Dinner at TOMA Bar a Vin. Trent got a pulled pork sandwich and Steph got beef Bourgogne. Topped it off with some burgundy wine and a molten lava cake! The pastries in France are unmatched. Our waiter had us try essential French Grappa as an after dinner digestive. Steph thought it was gross but Trent kind of liked it.

    Fun facts:
    - Beaujolais is much more regulated than the Burgundy wine region. The “Grande Cru” classification for Beaujolais has been closed for the last 8 years. Meaning that there can be no additional Grande Cru Beaujolais wines other than the ones that already exist. Classifications are all dependent on the soil and plot of land and must meet numerous criteria in order to sell the wine with the classification. Beaujolais wines in particular are capped at producing a maximum amount of wine every year and cannot exceed a specific amount based on the land that is owned and produces grapes.
    - Climate change is impacting these wine regions heavily. Harvesting Beaujolais grapes used to take place in October, but in recent years most harvests have taken place in early September.
    - Most of the wine producers in these regions are organic and focus on organic farming. There is a huge push in the industry for organic wines.
    - The Beaujolais region produces Gamay grapes.    Leggi altro

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