European Adventures

Josh’s job brought us the exciting opportunity of living abroad for a short duration. On September 5th, we packed our bags, the dogs and we were off to Rome. We stayed with Jesus and Diana near the Vatican for the first week and then moved into our own apartment in Trastevere ("tras-TEH-ve-ray"). Amy took Italian classes at Scuola Leonardo da Vinci everyday from 9:00 till noon and unfortunately Josh had to travel every week for work.

Living in Europe proved to be a wonderful opportunity! On weekends and weeks when Josh didn’t have to travel for work, we took off on many wonderful adventures.

Places we visited:
We rented a car and drove down South to Sorrento, Capri and Pompeii. We took a train and went north to Florence, Tuscany and Assisi. We took a 10 day Mediterranean Cruise to Sicily, Athens, Mykonos, Kusadasi (Turkey), Rhodes and Santorini. We also took two weekend trips; one to Barcelona and one to Edinburgh, a week long trip to Rhodes and Amy joined Josh one week to explore Dublin.

And the best part of the trip was both our Mothers were able to come over and visit us together!

Amy's Godmother Barb, Amy's Mother Ruth & Josh's Mother Carol at the Pantheon

Amy, Josh, Willie & Charlie at the Vatican Colosseum

Amy & Josh at the Trevi Fountai

Spanish Steps

Amy & Josh at at Bocca della Verità (The Mouth of Truth)

Amy, Willie & Charlie at Piazza di Santa Maria in Trastevere

Willie at the "House of the Faun" in Pompeii

Grotta Azzurra in Capri

Gaudi's La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, Spain

Ponte Vecchio Bridge over the river Arno, Florance

The whole family in Florence

Amy & Josh in Pisa

Messina (Sicily), Italy

Parthenon on the Acropolis - Athens, Greece

Santorini, Greece

Mykonos, Greece

"Old Town" Medieval Castle - Rhodes, Greece

The Celsus Library - Ephesus, Turkey

Amy in Assis, Italy Guinness Storehouse, Dublin

Edinburgh Castle, Scotland

Dates:

• Trip to Southern Italy: September 27th & 28th, 2008 (Sorrento, Capri and Pompeii)


• Weekend trip to Barcelona: October 3rd - 5th, 2008


• Five day trip to Rhodes, Greece: October, 13th - 17, 2008


• Trip to Firenze & Toscana with family: October 24th & 25th, 2008


• Mediterranean Cruise to Sicily, Athens, Mykonos, Kusadasi (Turkey), Rhodes and Santorini: November 14th - 24th, 2008


• Day trip to Assisi, Italy: November 29th, 2008


• Dublin, Ireland: December 1st - 5th, 2008


• Weekend trip to Edinburgh, Scotland: December 5th - 8th, 2008

Mr & Mrs Smith... 1 Year Later

On August 31st we celebrated our 1st anniversary and went back to Napa/Somoma. We were there from August 29th - September 2nd and an amazing time!

Friday 8/29/08 - Arrived in San Fran. to find that Avis didn't have our car reservation (will never rent from Avis again!). After the prerequisite stop at In-N-Out Burger, we checking into our hotel. After a quick nap and shower, we were off for our first event a wine tasting with Georg Riedel the president of Riedel Crystal stemware. It was an amazing once in lifetime experience! He taught us about wine tasting, what different types of glasses do to help enhance the wine and gave us a set of his Vitis wine tasting glasses. After dinner we had dinner in the Alexander Valley at the home of Rodney Strong Vinyards owner Tom Klein. Dinner was prepared by Chef Josh Silver of Syrah Bistro and Chef Jeff Mall of Zin Restaurant with a "Down home meets Downtown" theme. The food, wine, surrounding and overall experience was amazing and to top it off Georg gave us all the 50th anniversary edition of the Burgundy Grand Cru wine glass.

Saturday 8/30/08 - On Saturday we attended Taste of Sonoma at the historic MacMurray Ranch. Taste of Sonoma features over 100 wineries pouring thousands of wines with over 60 local chefs whipping up tasty pairings. We strolled around sipping wine and noshing on appetizers, but after a few hours we were too full and too hot and had to head out. We stopped at St Clement for wine tastings and some fantastic cheese. After that we went back to the hotel, took another nap and then went to Bistro Don Giovanni's for dinner.

Sunday 9/31/08 - Sunday was our anniversary and we started the day off with breakfast in bed and then went to the Fairmont Mission Inn for a morning of relaxation. We each received hour long massages, followed up by the bathing ritual and then a little nap by the pool. After that we drove up in to the Valley and had lunch and a few wine tastings at Chateau St Jean. We then headed back to Viansa where we got married last year and spent some time reminiscing and again tasting some wine. We finished of the evening with an amazing dinner at our favorite restaurant Etoile at Domaine Chandon.

Monday 9/10/08 - On Monday we took a group wine tour. We were picked up at our hotel and went to four small boutique wineries... of which I can only remember one, Saddleback. On Monday night we had dinner at Bouchon, one of Thomas Keller's "other" restaurants.

Tuesday 9/2/08 - On our way out of town we stopped by two wineries; Peju & Franciscan and of course one more stop for a double double at In-N-Out burger before heading home.