dear david,

paris, brussels, amsterdam, cologne, frankfurt, salzburg, vienna, london
and more to come.
happy 5 year anniversary

today

i miss traveling with david.

almost berlin

even though i almost spent an entire week in potsdam and berlin with david, i hardly took any photos. i think my excuse was that i'd be coming back two more times before heading back home, so i guess i'll try to take more photos then. these two photos are one of the rare occasions where i did bring my camera. we went to a big flea market-esque place in berlin to find david a bike (success). i didn't get anything, but a nice man gave me a sample of scented lavender.

now, onto photos of the uk...

the overnight train

this is what all of the 6-person cabins looked like on our overnight train from vienna to berlin. there was no room to put your luggage except on the floor. yes, that is my gigantic blue luggage. and yes, i slept with it there all night. the next time david and i travel, i think we're going to rethink the overnight train. but still, it was an interesting (possibly fun?....) experience.

our last day

vienna was our last stop before heading to berlin

to begin david's semester abroad in potsdam

we decided to go to the natural history museum

it's enormous- i'm pretty sure that we spent at least 4 hours there.

not really sure why darwin is riding the tortoise

dory and some axolotls

a lion is about to attack him and he doesn't even care

one of my favorites

photography by david

a little break after our many hours of wandering

mozart

stephansdom

the gasthaus that we ate at every night.

it's delicious- soup and schnitzel for 5.80 euro

and then we headed to the westbahnhof for our overnight train

schloß schönbrunn

for our second day in vienna,

we took the metro to schloß schönbrunn,

the habsburg palace

what you see when you first walk through the gates

in the gardens

maze

the back of the palace

each of the squares made a noise when you stepped on it,

so of course i danced all over it

only.. the coolest playground on the face of the planet

you could CLIMB INTO the bird

and there were trick mirrors (:

we went to an apple streusel demonstration

then took our final turn around these gardens before heading back

sometimes i don't know how it's possible

to love being with someone this much

vienna, Tag eins

in the midst of our planning,

david and i realized that we'd have an extra day in vienna

because we were taking an overnight train to berlin the night of our third day.

with that in mind, our first day was very lazy,

but very lovely

Kunsthistorisches Museum

(museum of fine arts)

big statue in the middle of the platz...

and the natural history museum was on the other side

Volksgarten

Spanische Hofreitschule

(spanish riding school)

ADORABLE little dress i saw in a window...

one of the main shopping streets

(this is funny because "garibaldi" is david's last name..)

our first of THREE NIGHTS at Gasthaus Franceschi

david and his delicious schnitzel

me and my very very foamy beer

more of wien to come (:

the hills are allliiiivvveeeee

now.. the REAL reason for going to salzbug:

when i was 6 years old

my eldest sister, marelene, let me borrow her walkman

and her cassette of the sound of music soundtrack.

i listened to it on repeat.

when i finally watched the movie,

i already knew all of the words to the songs.

when i turned sixteen, i was ecstatic that i could finally sing that

i was "sixteen going on seventeen."

i was especially ecstatic when david turned 17 a month before me,

so that i could sing "you are seventeen going on eighteen"

and have the entire song be true to our ages.

now that i am 20 going on 21,

i still love the movie.

so when david and i were planning out our adventure route,

i asked to go to salzburg to fulfill my sound of music movie dreams :)

when we got there i wanted to do the sound of music tour,

but it was 38 euro per person,

and i didn't think it would be fair to make david listen

to the soundtrack on repeat on the bus

so i looked up the sites and found them on my own:

the mirabell gardens,

where maria and the kids sing "do a deer"

the above fountain can be seen here

and the plant arch thing is where they ride their bikes through :)

this is where maria and the kids stand during the same song,

as seen on the second photo of this blog post.

after running through the streets of salzburg from the abbey

to the von trapp mansion,

maria dances and sings along this house's walls

as seen briefly here, with some help

(watch it, it's funny)

there's a scene towards the end where the nazis are looking for the family

and the nuns hide the family in a cemetary.

that was filmed in hollywood...

but some tour guides say that it was filmed here.

nonnberg abbey

after maria leaves, the children go to the

abbey to try to find her.

gretl says, "we're looking for fräulein maria"

to the nun at this gate

i wanted to be liesl so badly!

so i was excited to twirl around in this

and sing "i am sixteen going on seventeen"

but it was locked :(

and i think it's just an imitation...

but it was still so cool to see!

hopefully i'll be able to go back with my family in the future :)