The Brown Brick Road

Capturing our adventures one photo at a time...

Italy – Venice

Day 2 in Venice! We had the best guide take us all around the city. I don’t think any of us actually knew her name the entire time but she was very informative, interesting, and entertaining! She was also about as tall as Samantha!

We toured all through the Doge’s Palace and St. Mark’s Basilica…

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These guys were lucky they didn’t get permanently locked up for littering!

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Lots of pics from the Palace…

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After lots of touring we had some good pizza and the boys discovered the joys of European Fanta!

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That afternoon we walked around…

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We saw some of our favorite sites…

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and maybe made another stop into Gucci! When in Rome…or Venice, right?!

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We obviously got more gelato too!

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That night we enjoyed a drink at the hotel…

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Unfortunately my drink ended up in my lap! But, I got cleaned up and we still had a nice dinner at Ristorante Principessa…the food was ok but the Fanta was two thumbs up!

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A day well spent in Venice!

Italy

We had an Italian summer adventure and it was a DREAM! 10 days of perfecto! We traveled to Venice, Florence, Lake Como, and Milan – each stop was better than the last! Well, Lake Como was better than all of them but every place was magical. I took well over 1k photos so get ready for several days of trip photos! 🙂

Our adventure began on Thursday night flying out of Atlanta to Venice…

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We arrived to Venice around 11am and took a car and then a water taxi to our hotel, Londra Palace.

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Our hotel was perfection! Great location, excellent room setup, and so nice!

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I didn’t even get a picture of our incredible balcony with the best view! We got freshened up and went out to explore!

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We stopped in shops, got some pizza (which the kids insisted was their favorite for the rest of the trip) and pasta, and walked all over Venice!

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We even stopped in Gucci which Samantha loved…

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Late afternoon we took a gondola ride and then headed to dinner…

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After dinner came gelato…of course!

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An excellent start to the trip!

Telluride day 4

Last day, best day! We started bright and early on another bluebird day!

Maxwell wanted to try and land a jump he had unintentionally done the day before…he gave it a good effort!

But no luck.

We then tackled some moguls…well, they tackled some!

Maxwell tried the jump one more time…and gave it a great effort…but crash.

It was a great day on the mountain! We thankfully got a few clouds in the afternoon that kept the snow from getting too slushy so we got a full day in!

That afternoon the kids went to the park area and all got some good jumps in!

This was also the first year that Spencer and Samantha skied with poles…and both of them managed to drop a pole from the lift! ha!

Thankfully both poles were fairly easily retrieved! We skied until late afternoon and made it back to the condo happy and injury free!

That night we had dinner in town at Smuggler’s at the recommendation of our friend, Ashley. It was excellent!

We had an uneventful flight home on Thursday. Thankful for an amazing week away with my favorite people!

Telluride day 3

Tuesday we got up and out the door ready for a full day!

Someone was sinking fast mid-morning but all she needed was a little snack at the top of the mountain!

The sun was shining but the snow was also pretty slushy. We all decided to skip lunch and ski until mid-afternoon and call it quits a little early. The boys went off on their own to do a few runs and head back while Robert and I took Samantha to hit up some more blues – she wasn’t ready to call it quits quite yet!

Samantha took on the moguls of the double blues with no problem! Sammy Shredder for sure!

We then headed back to the condo to meet up with the boys and headed into town for a late lunch, early dinner in Telluride. We finally got the Brown Dog Pizza we couldn’t get the other night!

We then shopped around Telluride a bit…

We then headed back to the condo where I fought off a migraine all night. No fun. A lazy end to a good day!

Telluride day 2

On Monday we were up and ready to hit the slopes!

We had another bluebird day! Sun shining, warm temps, perfect day!

Doesn’t get any better than this!

I went down a few moguls but quickly learned my knee did not like them! I was happy to take the long way around and wait for the experts at the bottom of the double blues!

We stopped in Mountain Village for lunch…

By the afternoon, the snow was slushy and the grownup legs were tired! We parked ourselves in some comfortable chairs and let the kids do a few runs on their own….

We were happy to see these three skiers come down the run!

That night we took the gondola to Allred’s for dinner…

While the view was great, the overall experience was meh.

But still a great day on the slopes!