Great Expectations
In and around Buffalo, United States
After nearly a year of planning, my friends and I were excitedly anticipating our spring 2006 trip to select destinations in Europe. We had found a charter group that would take us to four different countries: Italy, Switzerland, France and the United Kingdom. The itinerary featured visits to: Rome, Florence, Venice, Lugano, Lucerne, Paris and London. An awful lot of ground to cover in only 12 days!
It was hard to imagine which city would wind up being my favorite because each place had so many different things to offer. Mike seemed most anxious to see Rome due to his borderline obsession with the Vatican. While Christy, after watching years of "period pieces" produced by the BBC, seemed most excited with the idea of seeing London. Once we finally booked the trip, I think I was mostly thrilled with the idea of visiting Venice. The idea that an entire city could be built on water had fascinated me since I was a child!
Route taken and entries by Real Traveler laurafitz
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1
Stranded in the "In field"...
To save a few dollars, my friends and I decided to fly directly from Toronto, Ontario to Rome, Italy. We left for the airport and allowed ple... Continue reading »
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2
Pay the extra Euros...
Our First Day in Rome: After a rather rough drive from the airport (Rome has the scariest traffic and driving that I've ever seen!... Continue reading »
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3
Digging through Rome's garbage...
Our Second day in Rome: We awoke fairly early in the morning and enjoyed our hotel's buffet breakfast before heading out to see a... Continue reading »
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4
More gelato please...
Our final day in Rome: Our tour director and local guide were primarily responsible for our itinerary on this day. ... Continue reading »
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5
A Renaissance blur
We had to get up extremely early this morning in order to board the bus for our drive to Florence. The bus stopped a few times along the way so we... Continue reading »
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6
A dream come true
Ever since I was a child and first saw a picture of Venice, I had always wanted to go there. The idea of city built completely on water has a... Continue reading »
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7
Wearing shorts in the cold...
We woke up early this morning, ate breakfast and boarded the charter bus with the rest of our group. On our way to Switzerland we passed our... Continue reading »
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8
The most expensive lunch ever!
Today we had big plans on our trip itinerary. Along with the regularly scheduled sights, Christy, Mike and I had also signed up for additiona... Continue reading »
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9
Pouting, "French- style"
In typical fashion, we were persuaded to wake up extremely early so that we could have breakfast at the hotel in Lucerne before leaving for Pa... Continue reading »
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10
Be brave, be rude...smile and push your way through.
The itinerary for today was very full. After eating the best buffet breakfast ever,(see Holiday Inn Republique review) we all boarded th... Continue reading »
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11
Supersonic
Our trip to Europe was coming to an end, in the morning we left Paris for our final destination, London, England. We took one... Continue reading »
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12
A whirlwind visit through London...
For our last day on this trip, we made sure to make some big plans. In the morning, we ate another wonderful buffet breakfast(surprisingly th... Continue reading »
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13
Leaving London
The weather in London was fairly gloomy. It seemed to somewhat match what we were all feeling. We went downstairs for breakfast and bid... Continue reading »
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