European Cruise Vacation - Rome Afterwards

The next morning we disembarked in Rome. When Ryan and I were booking our return flights, we thought we got off the boat on a Wednesday, so we booked afternoon flights out. Turns out we actually disembarked on Tuesday. Talk about a happy mistake! We decided it would be more fun to spend the night in and enjoy this beautiful city. We dropped our bags off at the hotel near Piazza Navona and immediately headed out for lunch. We kind of plan a lot of things around food! We found a lovely little cafe where we all enjoyed a delicious pasta lunch. There's really nothing like fresh Italian pasta.

From here, we were quite content to meander around. We've spent time in Rome before, so we were not anxious to feel like we "had" to see something in particular. We did make our way over towards the Pantheon which is such an impressive structure.

We loved seeing so many beautiful cathedrals; some seemed to just appear when you turned a corner. This is the Church of Santa Maria della Pace. We enjoyed visiting inside here for a little bit.

Walking through the piazza.

Such a gorgeous atrium in this building!

We did head over to the Trevi Fountain, and it was unbelievably packed with people!

This is the Church of Saint Agnesia in the Piazza Navona. We walked by here just before they closed it. I'm glad they allowed us to sneak in for a few minutes because it was truly stunning inside.

We didn't even catch the name of this beautiful cathedral, but we realized Mass was going on as we walked in, so we stayed in the very back and left after snapping this picture. I wish we'd been there at a different time because it was really beautiful.

We headed back to our hotel to cool off and rest up for a few minutes before we headed back out for our last planned activity. Ryan had found a pizza making class on Viator; we were excited to give this a try. There were 11 of us in the class. When we all got inside, it was time to take care of first things first - go wash our hands. Then we came back and the sweet instructor walked us through how to make delicious dough. She noted though that it's best to let dough sit for at least 24 hours, if not more, so it can expand before being cooked instead of expanding in our stomachs. Because of that, they had dough prepared for us to use.

We washed our hands again and then we were in the first group that headed into the kitchen. She showed us how to roll out our dough; we are going for a Roman pizza which is thicker than a thin crust but not quite as thick as what I consider "regular" pizza. Next was spreading out the tomato sauce, and this is where we figured out the key is to make sure it's a really thin layer. Mia and I especially love tomato sauce, but she explained how too much will make it where the dough can't cook.

Then we had our choice of toppings: pepperoni, spicy salami, olives, peppers, onions, and a variety of cheeses. Mia actually didn't want any of these (other than the cheese), so the instructor was very sweet to give her fresh tomatoes and basil which she loves. Here's my pizza before it was cooked up.

After we made our pizzas we headed outside where they served complimentary wine, juice, cokes, and water. Each pizza only takes 2-3 minutes in their huge open oven, so they delivered our pizzas pretty quickly after that.

The pizzas were all beautiful, and they tasted fantastic! We all gobbled ours down. They also gave us this delicious and fresh bruschetta which I absolutely loved. The adults were given a little bit of limoncello for dessert which was a great way to wrap up the meal.

Just as we made it back to our room, we received a text that our Stonehaven friends were now in Rome, and they wondered if we'd like to meet up. Of course we would! We headed right back out and walked a few minutes over back to the Pantheon. It was so fun to see them again! We enjoyed hanging out and walking around this area together for an hour or so before it was time for them to head on back.

Our family walked on back to our hotel and enjoyed a good night's sleep. Ryan woke up quite early the next morning, so he could go see the Trevi Fountain and Pantheon with few other visitors which he said was pretty cool. The other three of us slept in a little more. Soon though we all woke up, headed down for an easy buffet breakfast at the hotel, and then our driver was there to pick us up. We breezed through security at the airport and stopped to get our VAT back on a few purchases. We sat down to wait for our flight when suddenly our Stonehaven friends appeared again! I kept track of everyone's bags while they took some time to enjoy a little duty-free shopping. I think we were all delighted that we ended up running in to each other three different times on this trip! Soon though it was time for us to head to our Delta flight; they had just a bit longer to wait for their American flight. The flight home is fairly long at about 9 hours, but it's entirely during the day, so we all enjoyed several meals, movies, podcasts, and books. It was an easy flight home.

Ryan and I have been planning this for nearly two years. It could not have come together any better. We've made memories that will last a lifetime. We saw many incredibly places, had tons of fun experiences both on shore and on the boat, laughed a whole lot, ate quite a bit of delicious food, and truly enjoyed being together. I am so incredibly grateful for this family of mine and the adventures we have together!

European Cruise Vacation - Part 3

 Florence - Day 8:

We were all thrilled to return to Florence, one of our favorite cities in the world! We were more than happy to get a ride from the port to the city from NCL and then have about 5.5 hours on our own. We made a beeline over to the famous All'Antico Vinaio which supposedly has the world's best sandwich. We couldn't wait to try this out. The street outside was absolutely bonkers! There were two lines leading to different shops on both sides of the street. We hopped into the shorter one. We later learned that the shorter one we were in meant you ordered a sandwich as is, no changes allowed, while the other line allowed you to customize. Ryan and I both ordered a prosciutto sandwich with blue cheese and honey on it while the girls had a salami and cheese sandwich. We walked a few streets over and enjoyed eating these on the portico of the Uffizi. We all had to agree, these sandwiches were pretty stinkin' good!

We knew there was only one possible place to go after eating lunch...Perche No for our most favorite gelato!

We were excited to walk in and see all these delicious flavors again. I don't think any of us veered from our favorites though.

After our bellies were all filled up, we decided to enjoy the beautiful day and wander around.

As we were starting out, Lily looked at Snapchat and saw that our friend, Lucy Elrod, posted a picture that Lily was certain was in Florence. She looked her up on Life 360, and sure enough, she was just around the corner! We knew she was traveling with her mom, Julie, and a few other Stonehaven individuals - Melissa Hobson, Leah Colvin, and Mary Preston Harvey. We immediately started to hunt them down! Imagine their surprise when we found them just a few minutes later! That was a very fun reunion. Lucy, Julie, and Leah were together in line buying some chocolates while MP and Melissa were off near the Duomo. We told them we had to take them to get the world's best gelato and they readily agreed. We were too full to enjoy a second cup of gelato right then, but they were happy to, and they agreed it was quite delicious. From here we enjoyed walking around the square and taking some pictures together. It was so fun to catch up and hear about each other's adventures!

Soon, it was time for us to start heading back. We realized though that since it was the first Sunday of the month, admission to the Uffizi was free, so we stood in a brief line and thought "we'll just quickly duck in to see Botticelli's Birth of Venus." Well, I didn't remember until we started that this is not a museum you can quickly run through. It's incredibly huge, and you really kind of need to follow a certain path. We were hustling through and skipping over so many beautiful pieces of artwork. Finally we arrived in the Botticelli area. As soon as we walked in we saw his gorgeous piece called "Spring." Ryan actually teaches about this painting in his 7th grade history class, so we were glad to stop and admire it for a moment.

Then we turned a corner and there was "Birth of Venus." I love classical artwork like this, so it's almost breathtaking to see a piece like this up close. It's truly stunning.

After this we knew we had to hustle along, so we skipped a whole lot of exhibits and started the path out. Just then Lily looked at Life 360 again and saw that MP and Melissa were actually walking into the Uffizi right then! We kept our eyes open and sure enough, we ran into them very close to our exit which is just past their security screening entrance. How great to see two more friends from home!

After visiting with them for just a few minutes, we headed back over the library to meet up with the rest of the NCL group who needed a ride back to the port. This was such a wonderful day!

Nice - Day 9:

Our last day of the cruise took us over to the French Riveira, a place I've dreamed of visiting. It was just as beautiful as I thought it would be! We tendered in to the port, and then we hired an Uber to take us to "Old City" in Nice.

We had to stop and get a crepe to start the day out. How can you be in France and not get a crepe? We opted for a classic sugar crepe, and it was amazingly delicious.

We enjoyed eating the crepe and doing just a tiny amount of sightseeing and shopping before it was time for our class at Molinard which we'd found through Viator.

Molinard is a beautiful and classic perfume shop.

The class we signed up for was to make our own signature perfume. What a fun idea! There were seven of us at a table, and in the middle was a huge lazy susan of scents. In fact, there were 90 scents in all! Our instructor told us a little bit about how perfumes are made. They actually have three different layers to them which is why we were seeing three layers of scents. The ones at the top are called "top notes," and they're on the lighter side. This is the scent that someone may smell if you pass by them. It generally lasts about 30 minutes or so. In the middle section are the "heart notes." These are the ones that are truly your favorite; you'll be the one to smell them more than anyone else. On the bottom outer layer are the "base notes." These are the strongest of the scents, and these are the ones that people you stand near for a bit (as opposed to passing by) will smell; in a way, it's the scent they will begin to associate with you.

After hearing her explanation, the smelling began. We'd start at the very top and simply turn the circle around so everyone had a chance. Every so often, you'd stop and sniff a container of coffee beans to cleanse your smelling pallet. This part was pretty fun as you immediately knew if you really liked a scent or not.

If you liked a scent, you would dip one of these little sticks into the jar, and you'd write the name of the scent on it as a marker. At the end, she asked us to narrow it down to 3-4 scents per layer.

Once we each had our favorite scents written down, she would come around to see what each person had picked out. Using her knowledge, she'd pull together 1-3 from each layer and make a little fan. Then, she's run in the fan in front of you a few times to get your reaction. If it wasn't what you wanted, she could change it up some. For example, I had a lot of fruity scents that I loved, but when she put them together, I felt like I was in the middle of a candy store which was just too much. She took some of the fruits out and substituted in some floral scents and even one called fresh water; again, all of them were scents I had picked out though and I liked them. On this next pass, I absolutely loved the combination. We each had a 50 mL bottle in front of us. She would look at the combination we settled on and write down for you to put in 8 mL of one scent, 3 mL of a second, 11 mL of a third, etc. until it added up to 50 mL. It was really cool how she was able to do this and actually know what worked well! We then used little droppers to put the prescribed amount in to each of our jars. When it was over, we each had our own unique perfume scent to bring home with us!

This was so cool! All four of actually really enjoyed this activity, and we all loved the scent we brought home. I'm pretty sure we've each been using our scent pretty much every day.

Here's what our end result looked like: a beautiful bottle of perfume as well as our diagram which had our chosen scents and measurements on it.

We handed those in to her at the end, and she wrote up (in beautiful penmanship) our certificates. Each of our certificates tells what scents are included on each layer. The best part though is each one is assigned a number which agrees with our diagram. Molinard catalogs each unique perfume that is made, so that at any point in the future, you can call them up and provide the date and id number; they'll make another batch up and send it to you.

When the class was over, we found a cute little sidewalk cafe to enjoy brunch. It was exactly what we'd hoped for. The food was outstanding. Some of us enjoyed homemade lemonade while others enjoyed a rich hot chocolate (hot milk with chocolate pieces in it to stir and melt). Ryan was actually the only one who ordered a croissant. He gave each of us a little bite, and well, yeah, we ordered another. The croissants really are that good here.

I ordered toasted brioche with nutella, chantilly cream, and berries. It was fantastic.

After brunch, we decided to simply walk around and enjoy some sightseeing. It was such a beautiful day, and it really wasn't too crowded, so this was a lot of fun.

Eventually though we knew we had to head on back to the boat. Ryan and I sat out on our balcony for quite awhile afterwards to simply enjoy the view. It was lovely.

We enjoyed a wonderful last night on the boat, including our best dinner in The Haven restaurant. It was hard to believe our incredible cruise was over!