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We Made It Home!

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  After 99 days in Europe, we made it back home. It’s hard to believe that we went to 9 countries since the last time we were here. In September the only countries I had been to were the USA, Canada, Italy, and Portugal. I added England, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany, France, Switzerland, Austria, and Spain on this trip. We spent the least amount of time in Germany, spending only 1 night in Ulm. Even though we weren’t in the country for much more than 24 hours, I still enjoyed it. My favorite thing we did was go to a beer garden in Munich. I wrote about it in one of my earlier blogs, and I still think it was one of the best meals we had. I had currywurst and a giant pretzel, which is very stereotypical German. We spent 2 nights in 3 other countries; Belgium, Netherlands, and Switzerland. Belgium was the first EU country we went to on this trip. We spent all our time there in Brussels, the capital. My favorite thing in Belgium was the Atomium. I wrote about the Atomium in one of m
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France

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  This past Monday we made it to Paris. We were staying for only 3 nights because our 90 days in the EU were almost up. Only my dad had been to Paris before, and it was a long time ago, so this would be a new experience for us.  Our train was from Bordeaux without any stops, so it only took us 2 hours to get there. Our hotel was a little removed from the center, so we had to take the metro to get there. The first thing we did was start heading towards the river to try and get a glimpse of the Eiffel tower.  We wandered on the other side of the river until we got to a bridge near the Louvre. We crossed back over to our side of the river to get our first looks at the Louvre. We had tickets to go on Wednesday morning, so we didn’t go inside yet.  We were all pretty hungry so we got Italian food at a restaurant near the Louvre. This was our 4th Italian dinner on our 5th night in France. The best Italian food in France that we had was at Giulia in Bordeaux where we had pizzas. This meal
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Barcelona and Toulouse

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  Our month in Valencia ended on Wednesday. From there we had 2 weeks left until we will go home. We spent the first day in Barcelona, and the next week we spent traveling in France, and the last week will be in London.  All the trains from Valencia to anywhere in France go through Barcelona, so we decided we would stay a night there instead of taking a really long train. We stayed in a hotel near the train station so we wouldn’t have to carry all of our luggage around the whole city. When we came to Barcelona on the way to Valencia we stayed near La Sagrada Familia, so we were in a completely different neighborhood.  After we checked into the hotel we wandered towards Plaça d'Espanya. The first thing I noticed were 2 tall towers. In between the towers was a road, and if you stand in the middle of the road, you get a great view of the Palau Nacional de Montjuïc and the towers. The Palau Nacional de Montjuïc is the National Art Museum of Catalonia. I tried to take a good pictu
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Oceanogràfic València

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  Oceanogràfic València is one of the biggest aquariums in Europe. Since our month in Valencia is almost over, we decided it was finally the right time to go. We decided that Thursday December 1st would be a good day since it’s a weekday, so the aquarium wouldn’t be that crowded.  We took the bus from our apartment to Oceanogràfic and got there around 10. There was no line to get in, which meant the aquarium wouldn’t be that crowded. The entire aquarium is part indoor, and part outdoor, with tons of different exhibits. We went into the entrance building, which sends you downstairs into a room with lots of shops and a bunch of different animals.  In the center there’s a short pool with some stingrays, turtles, and some smaller sharks and fish. There were some cylinder tanks around the main one that had jellyfish or medusas in Spanish. The jellyfish were all small and not dangerous. The room was very dim, so they sort of glowed which made them look pretty cool though. On one of the w
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Madrid

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  Tuesday was my birthday, and we decided we should go to Madrid to celebrate. It’s about a 2 hour train ride from Valencia to Madrid, so we decided we would have to stay a night or two to make it worth it.  The train left Valencia at 10:40am and we got to Madrid after 12. The first thing I noticed was how big the Madrid train station is. It took us almost 10 minutes to get to the metro from where our train dropped us off. The metro ride was very quick, and we got to our stop within 15 minutes. When we emerged from the ground, the first thing we saw was a giant Christmas tree made of lights.  After we got settled in at our hotel, we went out to go find food. Luckily there was a taco place right near the hotel! I had some chicken tacos and some beef tacos, and they were really good. The tacos were just small tortillas filled with 1 thing, which is much simpler than what I was expecting, but I think the minimalism made the tacos better.  We left the restaurant and started to wand
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The Science Musuem

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       We’ve now been in Valencia for over a week, and we’ve done a lot of things. On Sunday we biked down to the beach, which was fun until my dad got a flat. In the end it still all went well though. There’s one thing that stands out more than the beach in the last week though; the science museum.  The science museum (Museo de las Ciencias) is in the Ciutat de les Arts i les Ciències (Valencian) or the Ciudad de Artes y Ciencias (Spanish), a complex of modern buildings which includes the aquarium and the museum. On Monday we walked almost 5 kilometers to get to the museum. Since it was a Monday, we knew it wasn’t going to be that crowded, but there were still a bunch of school groups. Luckily, we didn’t run into them much while we were inside.  We went into the museum on the ground floor, but the actual exhibits start on the first floor. The first thing we saw when we got to the first floor was a bunch of chicken eggs in glass containers. Some of the eggs had holes, which means t
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European Soccer!

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  The USA has a lot of different professional sports. Basketball, football, baseball, and hockey just to name a few. Unlike the US, there is only one pro sport that stands out in Europe: soccer (football). Almost every country has a soccer league. LaLiga, the top Spanish soccer league, is one of the biggest leagues in the world.  I had wanted to go to a European soccer game ever since we got here. When we were in Florence, we almost went to a Fiorentina game, but we couldn’t get tickets. We decided that we would try and get tickets to a game in Valencia, since we were also going to be there for a month. Valencia CF is the LaLiga team in Valencia, but they only had one game while we were there. We would have to get tickets ahead of time if we wanted to go to a game.  While we were still in Florence, my dad got us 4 tickets to Valencia CF vs Real Betis on November 10. I’d been excited to go ever since then, and it was almost time. The only problem was that I got sick the day before
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