"the hills are alive with the sound of music..." ♬

SURPRISE!

We will be adding another country to our list... 

We can't even handle our feels for this unexpected day trip.

Thank the lord for the internet, and for crazy cheap inter-European travel. Kim and I were stalking our favorite day tour website, Viator, about a week ago looking for a decent priced day trip to Neuschwanstein Castle from Munich, Germany. While sifting through the different opportunities and services that Munich had available, we came across a beautiful picture of the Lake District in Austria. This picture led us to glorious news. A day trip to Austria was well within our budget, and would fit (tightly) in our available time in Munich. Via Viator day tour, we will be able to see not only the Lake District, but also Salzburg and some of the Sound of Music sights. The reviews were great and the price was right, so we took the leap and booked ourselves an 11-hour stop in the Mozart's home country.

Kimberly had expressed earlier in our planning that she would KILL to be able to see where the Sound of Music was filmed. Even though we didn't plan to make this happen, we are stoked beyond belief that we get to cross another thing off our bucket lists. 

Expect to see many photos of Kimmy and I frolicking through the Mirabell Gardens singing "Do Re Mi"or twirling like Julie Andrews in the Austrian countryside.

Auf wiedersehen!

♥

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thank goodness for rick steves

Although it would have been much more spontaneous to just book a flight across the Atlantic and go where ever the wind takes us, we decided to reference a travel expert to plan our adventure. We have watched plenty of episodes of Rick Steves' Europe so we figured any resource graced with his name would be reliable.  Europe Through the Back Door 2017 covered everything we needed (and wanted) to know about how to travel Europe. As first time travelers to this part of the world, we felt that we needed to gain a higher understanding of the logistics details. This book of absolute gold includes information on everything from how to order coffee in other languages (one of our largest concerns) to how to stay connected to family and friends while you're away. The most interesting part to read was the "Back Doors" section. These chapters have in depth information about each country including where to eat, where to stay, and what to see. The most helpful pages in this section prioritized the different cities of interest. It rated the destinations in each country on how high they should be on your wishlist, and listed how many days Rick suggests you would need to see the sights. These maps were extremely helpful in identifying what you NEED to see and what you SHOULD see if time permits.
This resource may or may not have been one of three books I have read in nearly two years, but I couldn't put this one down.
There is something about planning a trip of this magnitude that has made Kim and I so thrilled we could burst into tears at any moment, and at the same time, given us anxiety that we can only manage by pinning all of the Europe for Beginners posts on Pinterest and reading the reassuring words of Rick Steves.

If you're considering traveling through Europe, I would highly recommend purchasing this book.

BUY FROM RICK STEVES

Rick Steves, you may have saved our lives.

♥