My last day Carissa and I went to Luxembourg for...Her hubby Austin had to work, boo...I really, really loved Luxembourg. I have no idea who this statue is of, but I always have to take silly statue pictures. That's also Carissa's thumb in the corner...oops.
We also went to the Notre Dame Cathedral...the front of the cathedral was hard to get a picture of because of all the scaffolding, and we went in a side door, so I didn't bother with picture of the whole cathedral. I thought this was a cool picture of the spires with the fluffy clouds in the background..
The inside was beautiful too, as with most cathedrals in Europe. It was made in 1613 and began as a Jesuit church...it is now a Roman Catholic church. This is a view looking down to the altar.
A stained glass window of the three kings meeting Baby Jesus. I thought it was a really beautiful picture..
This is the Grand Duke's Palace...for some reason a lot of people call it Disneyland. I can kind of see it with the spires...but I don't know. The two small blue box looking things at the far end of the picture are where the guards stand.
This building front was all mosaic, I thought it was really cool...
Street scene in Luxembourg...
The weather was starting to get rainy so Carissa and I stopped for lunch. We had hawaiian toast (which isn't ever actually plain toast)...it was toast, ham, and swiss cheese, and french fries of course! I also asked for white wine and it was served to me in that brown bottle that looked like beer. I was slightly skeptical, but it was actually really good wine!
After lunch the weather continued to go downhill, so we decided to check out the Casemates du Bock. They are a series of underground tunnels and crypts that you can explore it..it was so cool! They were built as an underground line of defense for a castle that was built by Count Siegfried in 963..that was when Luxembourg really began to develop. They are still considered one of the best defense networks for a castle ever...
Exploring!
This is right at the beginning of the trail to go through all the tunnels, I was peeking over what looked like a crypt...
Each little section was lettered off and you could read about that room or hall. I was playing guide in this picture...
There were a lot of tunnels and ledges and steps and other precarious footing situations..Carissa had some issues picking up her feet lol...I think she turned her ankle twice =/
We got back in the evening around 18:30 and just had a relaxing evening at home. We watched at least 3 New Girl episodes, then Austin and Carissa headed to bed around 9:30. Austin had work the next day, and Carissa and I had to get up at 4am to leave for the airport at 4:30. I decided to stay up and watch the second Sherlock Holmes, as well as work on some homework for my online class. I was definitely in denial about leaving...I didn't even start packing until 1 am and didn't make it to bed until after 2! After a couple hour nap, I was up again to head to the airport. We watched a beautiful sunrise on the way there...I loved the windmills in this picture, they are all over Germany..
I left Frankfurt at 7:30 to fly to London Heathrow. I was praying to the Lord that my suitcase wasn't overweight to go back...at Carissa's it weighed in at 53 lbs so I stuffed some things in my carry on and hoped for the best. I didn't have any issues though! I got to London and had to go through a heck of a lot of security. I made it to my gate about 30 minutes before boarding, and of course made friends with some military guys that were heading back to the states for a week long assignment (and yes, of course a few of them were attractive, and no wedding rings, I checked). They were all enlisted Air Force guys stationed at Lakenheath in England (where Ness was stationed). We had a good chat about the military and travels and all of that, then didn't sit near each other on the plane. They were good company before the flight though :) The 8 hour flight actually went by really easily. Everyone closed their shades and they dimmed the lights, so I watched a couple movies (This Means War and 21 Jump Street) and took a nap. When I woke up, there was only a little over an hour left! It really went well. This is a picture of the Chicago coastline on Lake Michigan...it looks like Florida!
I had less than 2 hours before my flight to Indy, so I got this bright orange express pass that allowed me to skip all the lines...customs, security, luggage check, everything! It made it super easy to get through everything. It worked out well for me, because I was trying to sneak through customs with 2 bottles of alcohol when I'm underage...but I made it! To clarify, one was a bottle of Carlsburg beer for Dad for his birthday, and the other was a bottle of wine. The second flight was a little puddle jumper to Indy, and when I got on and went to my seat, it was broken and had a "do not occupy" strap across it, so that was cool. I had to wait out in the gangway until they sorted it out, and I finally got on the flight.That is a picture of my broken seat...cool story bro.
I actually landed twenty minutes early, so by the time I got my luggage and went outside, I had to wait 5 minutes for Dad to get there. He was there right on time, and we headed back to New Castle. I planned it to come back on his birthday, and I am really glad I didn't miss it. We had Ming's for dinner and I got a 32 oz Dr Pepper from McDonalds. I will have to admit, it was a great first meal back. I got to hang out with my sis Emily and see my family. Dad and I stayed up to watch Thor, and I went to bed around 12:30 (27 hours of being up) and slept in until 11am today. It was glorious. Today I went to McDonalds for a sweet tea, Taco Bell for a quesadilla, and Walmart for who knows what. It was a very American day.
I can't believe my Italian adventure is over! It is truly a bittersweet feeling. I am really happy to see my family again- I definitely had been missing them. But honestly, I could have stayed over there for the rest of the summer easily. I loved Italy and Germany, and just Europe in general. I work hard to play hard, and I had simply ran out of money! It was time to head home when my bank account hit $0! I am already making plans for returning, hopefully to live with my sister in Germany next summer and intern at Ramstein AFB- how cool would that be?! For all my friends I met through CIMBA, thank you. I had an incredible time studying abroad, but more than the experiences I will remember all the amazing relationships I made. Unaiza-I miss our shared looks about our British professor and patching you up on that first day...instant best friends. I promise I will come to WV! Jeff...we're getting married, so I won't get too sentimental about our time at CIMBA ;) To Ashley, Emily, Janani and Abbey...thanks for so many wonderful memories. We bonded so much in those few days before the program. Em- I can't wait to roadtrip and see you and Maddie in September! And the Iowa people + me will be headed to Kansas in October! A CIMBA reunion will have to happen. There are a thousand and one things I could say about the last 5 weeks of my life. They were full of laughter, late nights, reading, papers, wine & pizza. I made more memories than I can keep track of, so thank goodness I blogged! The perfect ending to a perfect journey would be this...
La Dolce Vita.
Ciao tutti,
Ellie
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