Things I love about Europe

As we continue our journey throughout Europe, I have come up with a little list of items/things I love about the places we have been thus far.

1) Europeans don’t over police the pools/activities. We have been to several Eurocamps/theme parks, and it is so freaking fun to play on the slides. In the states, a dude with a whistle lets each kid go down, one by one. In Europe they are super chill. The kids and I went down together, on our bellies, with rafts, without rafts, backwards and every which way. No kids were seriously injured because it’s just not that dangerous. We also rented a boat on Lake Como and it was a perfect cruising boat. They were like, “Do you know how to drive a boat?” We said, “Sure. We have family that has a boat.” Boom, key to the boat, have fun!!

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2) Driving in Germany. I have expressed this before but must say it again. Way to go Germany on your badass rule following which allows us to drive fast and safe at the same time. It is so fun.

3) We really enjoyed Europa-Park in Germany. This park was very clean, had fun fast rides and really had great themed areas. The lines weren’t bad either. The park basically covers European countries as themes, so the park is very entertaining to walk through.

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4) Events and festivals always seem to be happening everywhere we are at. We happened to be in Europe during the Olympics, so we had to go. When we went to Grasse, France, and they had a perfume festival going on. Grasse is the perfume capital of the world! During the parade, they sprayed Jasmine scented water on the crowd with mosquito sprayers and gave us wine in plastic Walmart cups.

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5) The food! Jeff and I were buying like 3-4 bottles (75cl) of water every dinner and now we order one for the family. We were hypothesizing that while we are walking more and moving around, the food is likely way less salty, causing us to not crave water as badly. The flavors are rockstar, and we both are feeling better in general.

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6) The art and ancient world feel. I love how everything has a deep history, and culture is so thick and rooted. The value system perspectives are so eye-opening once you really submerge yourself in different cultures. It is so interesting being in countries that have conquered the world in days past. It’s almost like they are saying, “Listen, we have already conquered the world and lost it back. The whole point is family, friends, food and shelter. The rest is a bunch of noise.”

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7) My final favorite has to be the people! We have encountered soooo many awesome, kind people on our travels thus far. From the ex-professional basketball player in Italy making pancakes for Owen, to the adorable entrepreneur in Switzerland who fed us on her back porch with the best salad we have ever had in our lives, to the friendly man on the hill who gave us water and helped with directions when we went down a terribly dangerous road. He got a hell of a laugh at us stupid Americans and will likely be telling the story in the bar for years to come. The patience everyone has had with our language barrier has been beyond impressive.

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Traveling absolutely teaches you that most people are kind, loving people who have families and just want to eat, drink and be merry.