Sunday 12th of October: Berlin walking tour

Today before we continued our humongous trip home we went on a tour of Berlin. Our tour guide name was Taylor. He was an Aussie too. We saw things like the square where Hitler and the Nazis burnt 20,000+ books that they thought disobeyed the Nazi way, the bunker where Hitler hid and Museum Island. Taylor told us The story of how Hitler came to power and the story of how the Berlin Wall fell. Also we saw Checkpoint Charlie and where the Berlin Wall was.

Here is the remainder of the Berlin Wall

 The brick line indicates where the wall was and the writing if you are looking at it upside down you are in the east, if you are looking at it the right way round you are on the west

 

Saturday 11th October: The first leg of the trip home

Today we had to start our journey home. I didn't want to leave but we had to. After saying goodbye to My Granny we hopped on the plane to Germany (Berlin). The five star hotel we were staying in was amazing. The marine tank was incredible. The staff were really nice and caring. After that we went on the 100 bus back and forth its full journey. Oktoberfest was on while we were there and so was the Festival of Lights. It was quite amazing.

 This is the fish tank

 This is an example of the Festival of Lights

This is the Brandenburg gate

 

Friday 10th October: We see Hugo again

Today we went on a public tour with Hugo. It was nice to see him again. We went to the Circus Maximus, a palace bulit by one of the first emperors, the pantheon again, the Palazza Venezia and many other things. This is our last day in Italy before we go to Berlin 😕. 

 Here is Hugo

This is the Vittorio Emanuele monument aka as the Romans refer to it as The Cake or The Toilet.

Piazza Venezia is the second craziest square in Europe. 11 lanes go into 3. Second to the Arc de Triumph in France. Later at night we climbed the Vittorio Emanuele to see the view. It is the second tallest building in Rome (second to the Vatican). No buildings in Rome are allowed to be taller than the Vatican. You could see almost all over Rome from the top of the Vittorio Emanuele.

 That is the view of the Coloseum

Also Hugo told us that the statue of one of the horses on top of the Vittorio Emanuele was so big Mussolini had dinner with 5 other people in it.

Thursday 9th October: Back to Rome

Today I went back to Rome because my amazing trip is going to end in 3 days. On the normal train from Sorrento to Napoli there were so many people I had to sit on my luggage. The other train was way more luxurious. Being back at Rome was pretty nice. Our apartment was very small. It was right next to the Trevi fountain. If you through a coin in to the fountain it means you will come back to Rome.

Me tossing a coin into the fountain

This is the Trevi fountain

Wednesday 8th October: Capri

Today we caught the ever crowded ferry to Capri. Capri is an island near Sorrento that you can swim at, snorkel at, and visit. And for 50 million euro you can buy a house there. First we had a guy named Cristiano take us around Capri on a boat. We stopped to swin and snorkel once and we visited many caves. We even saw orange coral. That trip lasted about two hours. After lunch we took a cable car to a higher point of Capri to get a good view of the island. Capri is 600 metres high. Later on a bus took us to a different part of Capri where my Granny bought a few things. The trip to Capri was incredible.

This is me on the boat

Here is us going through an arc of stone 

 If you look carefully you can see some orange coral

 Me at the beach

 

Tuesday 7th October: Pompeii and Mt Vesuvius

Today we were going to go to Capri but Mum changed it so we went tomorrow. Instead we went to Pompeii and Mt Vesuvius. Pompeii was pretty exciting but since we went to the Herculaneum yesterday we only did an express visit. Mum's phone went out of charge so we only got two photos. In Pompeii we saw dead people preserved in mud and dust. The best bit of Pompeii was the amphitheatre. It was reasonably big but not Colosuem size.

Here is a dead person

Here is the entrance

Climbing Vesuvius was easy enough but the real highlight of the Vesivius trip was the mental driving to get half way up (no photos sorry)

 

Monday 6th October: Herculaneum

On our first day in Sorrento we caught the train to Herculaneum. It is basicially like Pompeii but the difference is Pompeii was covered in lava when Vesivious erupted and the Herculaneum was covered by ash and mud. The museum we were going to go to was closed so instead we went to the Herculaneum itself. We had a nice tour guide who covered everything in Herculaneum in an hour. 

This is the Herculaneum

Here is me and my Granny at Herculaneum

Sunday 5th October: Florence to Sorrento

Today we started our long trip to our next destination, Sorrento. The first leg of the journey was Florence to Napoli. When we arrived at Napoli I got a good view of the city. Unlike all the other cities it was very modern. The reason for this was Napoli was heavily bombed. Napoli is now so popular and so is Sorrento that on the train to Sorrento we sat on our luggage. The view was incredible. Sorrento was a city right next to a beach. On the second leg of the journey I saw Vesuvius since we passed through Pompeii.

This is Mt Vesivious

Saturday 4th October: The Uffizi Gallery and the Galileo Exhibition

,IToday we went to one of the most famous gallery's in the world: The Uffizi Gallery. It was huge. Basically every famous artist in the world had at least a room each for there artwork. It was 3 long hours seeing and listening to information about the artwork above it. There was a room dedicated to Leonardo Da Vinci, Michalangelo, Rafallo and Donatello plus tons of other artists. Later on in the day Mum and I went to the Galileo exhibition. If you don't already know Galileo was the person who figured out that all the planets revolved around the sun, not Earth. There were some amazing things he used and many models of the Solar System.

This is Medusa's head painted on a shield

Here is what people used to think about which planets rotated which way.

On the way back we went on a carousel (which was really old).

Friday 3rd October: Visit to the Santa Croce

Today we went too the Santa Croce church. It contained tombs of famous people such as Michalangelo and Galileo. It was magnificent. The architecture was exquisite. It is near the Palazzo Vecchio (were Percy is. See below).

Here is the Santa Croce

This is Michelangelo's tomb

This is Galileo's tomb

Here is the palazzo Vecchio

Here is Percy (again).

Pinocchio showed up on the streets of Florence.

Thursday 2nd October: Tower climbing

Today we went to the Duomo and the bell tower (campanile) and climbed both of them. Joe and his family came from Lucca to see us and climb the towers. The cupola of the Duomo was 462 steps up and the campanile was 457. In total we climbed 1838 steps up and down. 

You see where all the people are up the top that is where we climbed up to on the duomo

Here is the view from the Duomo

This is the bell tower

This is the view from the bell tower (you can see our street - the one in the middle of this pic, and the Duomo)

This is us at the top

This is Joe and I climbing the bell tower

Wednesday 1st October: Florence

Before we left to go to Florence we went through the walls of Lucca. The path was steep and rocky. On the outside there was a moat around the walls.

We then walked all the way to the train station. The trip was 1 1/2 hours long. Our apartment in Florence was literally 100 meters away from the Duomo. We then unpacked our stuff and walked to the duomo. The patterns on the floors were amazing.

 

Here is the Duomo

Here is a sneak peek of the floor (the floor gets way better).

Here are the double doors

Tuesday 30th September: Pisa and back

Today I went to Pisa to climb the leaning tower of Pisa. It was leaning more than I expected it to lean. I climbed it with Mum, Joe and Joe's Granny. The bus trip there took more than an hour because of a 15 minute hold up at a train line. After we eventually got there we climbed the tower. It was different to climbing a normal tower because it was leaning. The view was amazing.

 

Here is the tower

I'm pushing it over

 

Here is mum and I at the top

 

These are the stairs

After we went to Pisa Joe and I when home and waited for the parents (who took half an hour) to get home. In that time we had hot chips and lemonade. This day was all up really fun.