June 18, 2011 Dad arrived in Germany and we did some exploring in Wehrheim. We went out for gelatto in the evening.

June 19, 2011 We went with Carol, Reinhard and Emily to a local castle. We had a tour, but it was in German. Reinhart, Carol and Emily translated when they could. The tour guide had us hold the chainmail the knights wore and it was extremely heavy.

June 20, 2011 Left for Paris with the family. The train ride was great. We traveled first class, with reservations. Reinhard had made reservations for us. We had seats facing each other with a table and passed the time playing cards. Luckily, the time went by quickly. We arrived at the hotel. It was very small, and expensive.

First we headed to the Louve. It was short walk and unfortunately there was a huge line. We waited about 20 minutes to get inside. Once inside, we headed straight to the Mona Lisa exhibit. So did everyone else. There was nothing but people. Also, I don't think the French know anything about air circulation. It must have been a hundred degrees in the exhibit hall. After seeing and taking photos of the Mona Lisa, we walked through several other exhibits. However, it was too hot and we decided to leave.

Next we thought we would walk to the Arc de Triumph. It was only a short distance on the map and we could see it in the distance. After several miles, it was like a mirage, always in our sight, but we never seemed to get any closer. Finally, we arrived. It was interesting, but nothing to write home about, oh wait that is what I am doing. The bathrooms here are generally very weird. You have to pay at many of them and they are extremely small.
The weather was beautiful and sunny so we decided to go to the Eiffel Tower and take pictures in the daylight. After a long day, we ate dinner around 7pm and returned to the hotel to rest.

June 21, 2011
The day before we had gone to the information desk and spoke with two young girls who told us that there was an expected strike at the Palace of Versailles the next day. We decided that since we had traveled all the way to Paris, we were going to go there regardless and take pictures of the outside of the structure. When we finally arrived we purchased tickets to see the gardens after being informed that the strike had lasted a few hours that morning , which had backed the line up to a 4 hour wait just to get inside the palace. The gardens were beautiful and vast. We were able to see the fountain display and then went back to downtown Paris to walk around Notre Dame and then eat dinner.

After walking over 12 miles, we went back to the hotel to rest our legs a bit before going to the Eiffel tower once again. Jim (brother) and I went to the top of the Eiffel tower around 9:30pm and took pictures. The view was amazing but the lines were long and there were tons of people. We made our way back down to the ground around 11:15pm and remained in the area until just after midnight. We waited to take pictures of the tower twinkling, which is done every hour.

June 22, 2011
The weather was disappointing, and it rained for the rest of our visit in Paris. We went to the church on the hill and got a nice view of the city.

June 23, 2011- June 28, 2011
We went back to Carol’s house to spend the night and do laundry. The next morning we left for Austria and stopped in Nuremburg on the way. We had a nice tour of the city by some of Carol and Reinhard’s friends and then arrived in Austria around 7pm. The hotel we were staying in was called the Hotel Mozart and it was very cute. The concierge was hilarious. We ate at a little restaurant called the Alter Foch and then went to sleep for the night. The following day we walked around the city and went to the castle. Then it was time to pack up again and make our way (finally) to Florence. In order to get the night train we had to travel through Munich, where Reinhard’s sister lives. She was nice enough to give us a tour of the city with her son. We got on the night train which was definitely an interesting experience, and not one that I would like to have again. It was this really old train and it was extremely difficult to get into my bed on the top bunk and to sleep at night with all the noise. On top of that we had to make sure that the doors were securely locked at night because professional thieves try to get into the cabins (a little unnerving). We finally arrived in Florence at 6am and toured the city before arriving at the Villa Villoresi, which had a swimming pool. The following day (June 26) we went to the Villa that I am staying in for 6 weeks. So far I have had a tour of the grounds, orientation and my first day of class. Everyone seems very friendly and we are in the midst of planning our weekend getaways.