In June I took a trip to Denver Colorado. I tried to find the quickest non-stop flight from South Florida, so I booked on Orbitz. I got a direct flight to go there on Continental and a direct flight coming back on Frontier Airlines. They flights were uneventful. For the first time though I was on a flight with my own personal TV were I had to pay to watch it. It was an $8 fee I think. I though the price was good, but I didn’t like the TV show options they had. So I watched movies on my iPod Touch half the time and slept the other half.

The Hotel I booked directly on the Marriott website. I booked the Residence Inn Denver Downtown and got a suite with a loft. The room was great and came with free buffet breakfast. I didn’t consider downtown though, because it wasn’t close enough to walk anywhere. The hotel had a free shuttle though that will take you anywhere in a 3 mile radius, which was very nice.

The Car-Rental we booked was with Budget-Rent-A-Car. They gave us a Chevy Malibu as a full-size car. It looked mid-size to me, wasn’t that happy about that. Also, I had to spend 30 minutes having the budget salesperson at the airport try to make me upgrade every little thing. She even try to make me upgrade to XM-Radio. Which by the way worked free in the car. She tried to make me do a bunch of pre-paid gas upgrades, a $40/day car upgrade, then a $20/day car upgrade, then a $8/day car upgrade. It took forever to get out of there. Also when we had to wait for the Budget-Rent-A-Car shuttle at the airport it took like 30 minutes to come. The shuttles for the other car-rental companies came much more often. So, bottom-line, I wouldn’t recommend the Budget-Rent-A-Car at the Denver Airport.

When we got to the Hotel, the electricity was out, so we went to the supermarket to pick up some drinks and snacks for the week. Then we headed back to the hotel for some sleep.

Our first full day there we went to the Cave of the Winds. We took a 45 minutes guided trip. It was decent, not the best. They had a cool rope course there though that hung off the cliff. I have to say I thought it would be easy, but walking on a rope over a cliff did get to me, it’s a lot different than having something solid under you. I enjoyed it better than the caves.

From there we went to the Garden of the Gods, which was very close. The had some awesome rock formations, but it was annoying to go to a rock and see a hundred people standing by it. So we just did a hike instead. The hiking there is great. 4 miles feels like 8 miles with all the ups and downs.

That night we went to the Buckhorn Exchange. While the prices are high, it was worth it with all the new meats that I never had before. That night I tasted buffalo, elk, yack, quail and duck. There was a consensus of what we all like. We all loved the buffalo and quail. The yack and duck were also good. The elk is not a good tasting meat.

The next day we took a drive to Mount Evens. I’ve been up a few mountains, but this was the best. Mt. Evens is the highest paved road in North America, and the drive is awesome. There’s no railing here, you can always look down and see that you can drive right off it. Once you get to the top you can do a very short hike to the tippy top. We got some great photos up there.

After Mount Evens we did a scenic drive to Central City and BlackHawk which are gambling towns. Then we heading to get some dinner. We went to Steubens in Denver which my friend saw on the TV show Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives , I got the lobster roll. I liked it, had bad French fries though. All the French fries I had in Colorado where soggy and nasty for some reason.

The following day we went White Water Rafting on the Clear Creek with Raft Masters. The water lever was high and man the River was moving faster than any River I’ve been on. We did a full-day intermediate trip, since I had my nephew and didn’t want to bring him on advanced. The river was non-stop, it had no edys. It was a great time. The trip was short though for a full day. Total time was like 3 and a half hours. On a side note this rafting company has the best lunch. They get their food from the BBQ place next door and I had a great pulled-pork sandwich.

For dinner that night we ate at Pagliacci’s Italian Restaurant. I got the Italian Variety Dinner, and the manicotti was awesome.

Well that was it. The trip was only 3 full days, but we did a lot and had a lot of fun.

I wanted to do some white water kayaking lessons for my first trip of 2011. Whenever I went white water rafting I seen them bring kayakers along and it seemed more fun than rafting. I also did a tandem kayak in New Zealand which was awesome, so I really wanted to take some classes.

I googled “white water kayaking lessons” and found a nice looking place in West Virginia to take the classes. The place was called Ace Adventure Resort. So after looking through their website I was ready to book. I booked a starter class starting at 6pm the first day. Then all-day water kayaking lessons the following 2 days. I found out the closest city to fly into was Charleston West Virginia, and for me the cheapest airline was Spirit. So, I booked my hotel and car on Spirit Vacations.

When we arrived at Charleston West Virginia, we picked up our car rental and head out. Ace Adventure Resort is about 45 minutes away so you will need a car. It was pretty easy to find though. When we arrived at Ace we checked in and got told where our Cabin Tent was. We wanted to rough it a little, so we got this Cabin Tent which is pretty much a big tent with 2 beds inside on a wooded platform and also a wooden top. The bathrooms are shared and a very short walk. I was surprised how clean the toilet was, the only thing dirty were some bugs inside.

Our first night of kayaking we learned very fast how hard white water kayaking actually was. It took the trainer 3-weeks to learn how to roll properly themselves, but the classes were very fun and their staff is awesome.

The second day we got up early and hopped on their bus and they took us to the New River. We went over some details from the night before then started heading down the river. Our first rapid was a class 3, and I have no idea how I got through it without flipping, but I did and was very confident after that. The day went on and we learned about eddys and how to get in and out. It was a lot more work than I thought, my legs kept getting numb and I was exhausted from paddling. I only flipped once, but my friend flipped 10 times, so he had a rough day. By the end of the day we decided we wanted to do something a little more easier the next day.

So, on our 3rd day we decided to go on some duckies. Duckies are inflatable kayaks. They are a lot eaiser because when you fall out , you just flip them over and jump on top. In the real kayaks, you have to drain them and then put the skirt back on and it takes a while. You also would have to swim more, since you couldn’t just jump right back on top. We did the duckies on the Mid-Gauley River.

The Gauley may be the best river I’ve been on. It was lots of Class 4 and 5 rapids, and they were back to back, just constant rapids. The day was lots of fun. It was a big group and 8 people were on regular duckies, but they gave me and my friend the high performance ones. Which turn easier, but man they flipped a lot easier. The flipping made it fun though, watching the other person fall out is the best.
That night we just met up with the people we kayaked with the first day. We went to the bar at Ace and had some beer, then had some shots, listened to some live music and had a great time.

Then next day we slept late then when to Charleston to eat before the flight back home. I highly recommend Ace Adventure Resort. They offer a lot more that we didn’t get a chance to do like Rock Climbing, Rappelling, Paintball, Mountain Biking and more. By the way, the kayaing pictures I took with a WATERPROOF digital camera a bought right before the trip. It worked great, because we did get tossed in the river a few times. Here’s a link to the camera.

Here is my detailed review of everything I did to book and go on my New Zealand and Australia trip. First, I decided which cities to visit. I like doing adventure stuff, so I saw the best city to be in was Rotorua which is about 3-4 hours from Auckland the capital city. So, I decided I would fly into Auckland, drive to Rotorua right away stay a few days. Then I would go to Auckland 2 nights, fly from there to Sydney, Australia, stay there 2 nights. Then fly back home.

I usually book my flights on Orbitz, because they usually have the best deals. But this time I found booking directly from Hotels.com. Note: I found a few weeks after I booked that the price for one of my hotels when down, so I called and they gave be a refund for the difference, because they have a price match guarantee.

After making all my bookings I started deciding what to bring. I never check-in luggage, because I don’t like dealing with airlines losing it, nor do I like to carry a lot. Usually I just bring a big backpack, but this time I couldn’t fit everything I needed, so I decided to bring 1 rolling carry-on as my luggage and that is it. I also purchased these awesome 11 pocket cargo pants, and this 17 pocket windbreaker that folds into a small packet. I like a lot of pockets when I travel to hold my maps and water.

Beginning of my trip… My flight from MIA to LAX was very smooth, no problems. When I got to LAX though I had a 5.5 hour layover. So, I decided to check out the reLAX Lounge in the Tom Bradley International Terminal. It’s open to the public, has low rates & good free snacks. If you have a long layover it’s a nice stop. I sat on one other their nice chairs, read a book , and then went to my next flight. The flight from Los Angeles to Auckland was 13.5 hours. So, I made sure my iPod Touch & this no-plug battery charger I bought were both fully charged.

Even though the flight was 13.5 hours it wasn’t that bad. The seats had decent leg room and reclined pretty far. Qantas have free wine or beer & the food wasn’t bad at all. Everyone had their own TV and half the time I would watch movies & the other half I would put on my iPod and go to sleep.

When I got to Auckland I purchased a SIM card at the airport for an unlocked blackberry phone I had. This was very useful, because we used the phone several time to book activities. We then went to get our car rental, we booked through Jucy.

Driving on the left took about 5 minutes to get use to, then it was just normal. The only thing that kept throwing me off was that the turn switch was on the opposite side. We had asked the car rental agent for the scenic route from Auckland to Rotorua. The scenic route was not worth it. We took the 2 and we just saw hundreds of farms and cows, nothing more.

Whenever I travel I always stop at the supermarket now and load up on water and a few snacks, so I don’t have to pay tourist prices. So, we did this during our long drive.

Rotorua is nicknamed the sulfur city, and when we got to our Hotel right away we smelled the sulfur. It smells like rotting eggs and the smell gets better and worse throughout the day. We booked at the Sudima Hotel. It was a very nice hotel, our room was pretty big, I was expecting a tiny European type room. I would stay in this hotel again.

That night we ate at The Shed and I had an awesome burger that had on it a steak, a patty, and really good thick bacon. We ended up eating at The Shed a few times. Rotorua doesn’t have a big restaurant selection. Many places in NZ have you order at the bar and the bring it to your table, weather it be food or drinks, the waitress don’t take order. Also, I have to say the local NZ beer is Export Gold and it is excellent.

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After our big meal it was only 7pm, but we were tired and went to sleep right away. We ended up sleeping 12 hours and awoke at 7:30am. Something about NZ gave me the best sleep of my life everyday. We woke up ate a breakfast bar we bought at the supermarket and put on our
UnderArmor Cold Weather Gear, because we were going white water rafting and that water is cold! We booked our Rafting with RaftAbout and it was a great choice. They have a good photographer and the person on kayak also does video. We went on the Kaituna river which has the tallest commercial waterfall in the world (7 meters). It was an awesome ride, it rained hard the day before so the water was high, it was actually at the highest allowed for rafting. The only bad part of the Kaituna River is how short the rafting trip is. It only lasted 45 minutes.

After our rafting trip we drove to Off Road NZ. Where we drove some Go carts in the rain on their outdoor track which was fun as hell. Then we did the 4WD Bush Safari. Which allowed us to drive there 4×4 vehicle on a crazy course through water and very steel slopes. It was a great time. We were supposed to do Zorb, but then a local talked us out of it and said it only lasted like 10 seconds. After all the fun we went back and ate at The Shed. The meal was okay the ribs had a huge portion but not so good barbeque sauce. After dinner we went back to the hotel at slept 11 hours this time from 8pm to 7am. While we were in New Zealand we really just are 1 meal a day. We made it a huge meal, but I guess we were distracted from all the activities.

The following morning we were going on the Kaituna River again, but this time we were doing it kayaking and it was way more fun. We booked with Kaituna Kayaks. We each had a tandem kayak with our guide in the back, because if we kayaked by ourselves we would die, since we have zero experience. Kayaking have us way more control on the river, and I now have a new hobby.

After the kayaking we went back to Off Road NZ and did the did the 4WD Bush Safari again, because we had a lot of fun and really didn’t know what else to do. After that we ate at Fat Dog, where I had this huge burger that was a foot and a half tall. I also tried the Mata Beer which I didn’t like so much. We headed back to the hotel and went to sleep even earlier because we were getting up at 4am to drive to some caves that were 3 hours away. Alas we only slept 10 hours that night.

We drove to Waitomo Caves and booked on Rap, Raft ‘n’
Rock. They offer a combo tour of black water rafting, glow worms, caving, abseiling, and rock climbing. This was worth the ride.First we abseiled into a huge chasm. Again we had the highest allowed water levels and we walked through a very strong river current into a completely black cave. The only light we had was the light on our helmets. It was a hard walk. Sometime we had to go against a strong current and sometimes trying to not fall off the rocks on the side. There are no stupid railing here. This is legit and natural. After that we got on our tubes and went down the river in the caves. Looked at a cave of glow worms in the pitch black. Then we rock climbed up. It was a very fun trip.

After the caves we drove like 3 hours to Auckland. We reserved a hotel at Kingsgate Hotel Parnell. The heat in our room wasn’t working right, so I wouldn’t stay there again. We ate dinner and went to the Minus 4 Bar. They provide jackets and gloves, since it’s minus 5 degrees in there. They have a very since staff, but we were the only ones in there so we took some photos with the ice sculptures had 2 drinks and left quick. The next day we went to the Sky Tower. I was thinking of doing the sky jump, but locals said you went down a little slow and it wasn’t exciting, so I was going to the the Sky Walk instead. But then they said I couldn’t even take pictures I have to buy their 1 $50 picture, so I just left.

We then took a ferry to Waiheke Island and did some wine tasting. My favorite was all the wine at Cable Bay Vineyards. After the tastings we took the ferry back and had some dinner by the bay then went back to the Hotel for some sleep.

The following day we flew to Sydney, Australia. We picked up our car rental and made our way to our hotel, the Quality Hotel Cambridge. It was a very nice hotel, but it had one of those switches where you have to put your door key in to make the electricity work. Well, that decided to stop working at night, so they upgraded us to a 3 bedroom. Again the hotel is very nice, but like many big city hotels they charge a lot for parking, $25 per night.

We decided to go to the Taronga Zoo. We got there a little late so the only show left was the bird show. The bird show was cool, but we went to a better zoo the next day. That night we ate at Churrasco. We had to wait for the table, but it was worth the wait. We didn’t get a menu, waiters and waitresses kept coming all night with different meats, potatoes, and pineapple and you told them if you wanted some or not. We loved this meal, but man was it fatty meat.

The next day we went to
Featherdale Wildlife Park. This zoo was awesome, kangaroos come right up to you and you feed them. You can also touch a koala and take a photo for free. The other zoo charged $20 to do that and it was only during certain hours. After the zoo we took a trip to Blue Mountain for some sight seeing. We went to the Three Sisters rock formation. I wouldn’t recommend driving all the way up there for it, there wasn’t much to see at Blue Mountain.

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At night we ate at the I’m Angus Steakhouse in Darling Harbor. They had the best garlic bread I ever ate in my life. It was soft, tons of flavor & zero grease. I also tried kangaroo meat for the first time. It had good flavor, but it is a very chewy meat. I had it cooked medium. After that we got some gelato and walked back to the hotel. Our vacation was over.

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Well, that is it. So in closing all I have to say is if you like adventure sports on your vacations, go to Rotorua, New Zealand!

I decided go to Seattle Washington in the beginning of May to see what it had to offer. I booked my flight on Orbitz again, they had the cheapest rate. The airline was Alaska Airlines. I was hoping for the best since it’s a 7 hour flight. I thought for such a long flight I would get one of the bigger planes with extra leg room and seats that recline pretty far. I was wrong, the plane was pretty small and all the seats had that annoying built in headrest that sticks out way to far, so far that it’s impossible to use the comfortable inflatable travel pillow I brought with me. Other than the annoying headrest, I had no other problems with Alaska Airlines.

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When we arrived we picked up the car rental at Hertz. We paid to upgrade to the Cadillac SUV. It was a nice car, but man the GPS that Hertz installed in it was the worst ever. I never had a GPS that got me lost so many times. This thing constantly gave wrong directions.

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We then went to the Residence inn Marriott, which was a great hotel. With a very good free breakfast every morning. We were hungry so we walked across the street and ate at Duke’s Chowder House for lunch. I had the Clam Chowder and Fish which was very good. We then just went down to Pioneer Square and walked around, it’s a very nice area. After hanging around there a few hours we were very tired and drove back to our hotel. We then walked across the street again and tried to eat at Joey’s Lake Union, but the wait was to long so we ate at Duke’s Chowder House again. This time I got the Lobster Chowder, and it wasn’t very good.

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The next day we tried going to the Ape Caves, but our GPS got us way to lost. So, we just went to see the views and walk around Mount St Helens. The weather in Seattle was kind to us. It only rained 1 day we were there, and it was sunny most of the time. So, we got some great photos at Mount Saint Helens. The hiking paths around there weren’t marked that great. We were on a trail that was supposed to about 3 miles long, and we kept going for 4 miles and saw no end, so decided to walk back the way we started. We were exhausted from all the walking and the jetlag, so we didn’t do much else that day. We just stop at Cabela’s to but some cold weather gear for the white water rafting the next day, and then ate at Ruby Tuesday.

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The next day we headed to the Skykomish River to do some white water rafting. We booked with Alpine Adventures. Our guide for the trip was pretty good. Unlike the guide I had for my last trip in San Francisco, this one made a point of taking us to the hardest part of each rapid and making us paddle through it. Also, after we passed though a rapid we would go back and do stunts on it like surf. This was my 6th time white water rafting and it was the first time ever fell off the boat, but it wasn’t just me. We all fell off, because we flipped it while doing a wheelie stunt. Man that was water cold!!! The beginning of May is a great time to go white water rafting because the water is high, but bring you cold weather gear. I was very happy I bought under armor long johns and under armor undershirts the day before.

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On the forth and fifth day we bought tickets on the grayline double decker bus for 2 days. I’m not sure it was worth it since they stop running early, but the guides on it did give great tips on where to go. On those days we did things like go to the Seattle Center. I didn’t go up th Space Needle, cause I’ve been up many tall towers and I know it’s a waste of time. Views lookineg out on the city are not nice. View’s looking into the city are nice. To take a nice photo of Seattle, go on a water taxi, and you will get great pictures. At the Seattle center we also want to the Science Fiction Museum and the Experience Music Project. I though the Experience Music Project was pretty cool.

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Food. Pike Place Market maybe the coolest thing in Seattle. Lots of food around there and lots of hand-made shops. One place you should stop in is Crepe de France. We got both a mozzarella crepe and a nutella crepe, both were great, but if you never had a nutella crepe before then you gotta get one! There are 2 more places I highly recommend eating at. One is Joey’s Lake Union, we went there on a weekday, since the first time we couldn’t get a table fast enough. The food there was superb. I got the Shrimp & Pesto Pizza Appetizer, the Grilled Chicken Souvlaki, and the Molten Lava Chocolate Soufflé, all of it was awesome.

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The second place I would recommend is The Crab Pot. The Crab Pot has a great atmosphere. They don’t give you a fork, a knife, or a plate. You just get a bib, an wooden board, and a mallet. They then dump a huge load of Fresh Seafood on the table for your group to share. You have to try this place.

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The only other thing we did was drove out to go on a Winery tour. We went to Chateau Ste. Michelle, which gave us a very nice tour and free wine tasting. This is the only good winery tour we found. There are many place out there that say they have wine tasting, but when we drove to them they were in industrial parks, so we didn’t bother going inside.

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Well, those are my Seattle recommendations. Have a great trip!

Last Halloween I was watching the Travel and they had the top 10 haunted Halloween houses in the US and Philadelphia had like 3 in the top 10. I love haunted houses, they are really funny to me and I like to go with people who scream. So, I went to Philly and was planning on going to 4 of them. I wanted to go to:

Eastern State Penitentiary – Terror Behind the Walls
Fright Factory
Field of Screams
The Bates Motel

Unfortunately I found out when I got there that none of them were open on Wednesday and Thursday, so I could only go to 2 of them. So, I decided to go to Eastern State Penitentiary and Fright Factory. I went to Eastern State Penitentiary first. I bought my tickets online and went early so I didn’t have to wait in much of a line. And there was big line I saw when I got out. Eastern State Penitentiary is the best Haunted House I’ve been to. It took me about 35 minutes to walk though and took some other people that I knew that went 24 minutes. Most of it is a prison theme obviously and they have a lot of great actors working there. There’s a section called Night Watch where the only light is a flashlight they give you. I was disappointed with that section because everyone had a flashlight and it made it way to bright in there. The section in there that stands out is the 3-D Experiment which was flat out awesome. It had wicked colors and was very cool. I don’t believe in ghosts but many people believe that Eastern State Penitentiary is haunted. As early as the 1940s, officers and inmates reported mysterious visions and eerie experiences in the ancient prison. And the ghost sightings have only increased since Eastern State was abandoned in 1971. It really is a great attraction to go to.

Saturday I went to Fright Factory. I bought my tickets online which was more expensive than buying in person since they have coupons that you can print out. I was glad I bought online though because there was a long line. Fright Factory wasn’t as good as Eastern State Penitentiary, but it still was lots of fun. It took me like 25-30 minutes to walk through. Fright Factory has a few themes: mines, asylum & vampires. I was crazy about the mines, it was nice and dark, but was mostly just black curtains. The asylum was my favorite part. They had some great actors in there, they just need more of them. Then the vampires section had some actors that made my friends jump the most.

Bottom line is both were a great time and I recommend you going to all the haunted houses you can because they are fun!

Update: The Bates Motel Review

I went on a 9 day Europe trip. I did 6 cities in 9 days because I enjoy walking around all day and like to see as much as possible in a short amount of time. The places I visited were London England, Prague Czech Republic, Verona Italy, Bologna Italy, Rome Italy and Geneva Switzerland.

I obviously started by booking my airline tickets. I found the best price this time on CheapoAir and got a $10 off coupon for them on Juicy Coupons. I had a problem where there were no direct flights out of South Florida, and the fastest flight was going backwards and doing a connection in Houston. So, I had no choice and had to do a really long flight. I then booked some of my Hotels, not all because I thought I may change plans on which Italy cities I was going to visit. I also got a Eurail Pass for Italy to be able to just jump on the train whenever I wanted, which was very useful. The last tickets I bought for the trip where additional plane tickets within Europe. I bought tickets on Easyjet, some of the flights were only like $80 and instead of having 18 hours of train travel I’d have a 2 hour flight for cheaper.

My flight to Europe was going to have over 20 hours of travel time so I realized I needed to buy something to keep me entertained. I bought a 16gig iPod Touch. It was a smart move, it has a bigger screen than regular iPods so I could watch movies, and also I downloaded Skype to it and was able to call back home while I was over there. If you buy one I’d recommend you get this case which is also a stand, and also this charger which allows you to charge it back up with regular AA batteries on the plane. Two other things I bought for the trip were this North Face backpack and also these cargo pants where you can zip off the bottom and make them shorts. I already had a hidden wallet, which is important with all the pick pocketers over there. I lived in Rome for several months I know how slick the pick pocketers are over there.


Now whenever I go to Europe I only take a backpack, and I only go with other people with backpacks. If you are going with someone and they want to check in luggage talk them out of it. It would suck if your luggage was lost and you aren’t going to be in the city where you landed very long.

Day 1: The flight was pretty smooth, I slept a decent amount and watched 2 movies on my iPod Touch. I got in London England at 10:30am about a hour late. I met a friend who was departing from Philly. We booked the flight so they would arrive at similar times, and we came in a half hour apart. The London wi-fi wasn’t working and we were planning to call each other on skype, so we had to use our backup plan and tried using the walkie talkies we brought. There were no problems we found each other fast. We took the train right to the hotel, I booked at the Orchard Hotel. Out of all the hotels I stayed in it was the worst. It had a tiny TV that did not work at all, when I called the front desk about it at night they said they would tell the manager about it when he comes and I never heard back about it. Honestly though, I just wanted to sleep so as long as there are no bugs in the room that is all I care about. The breakfast at the hotel was a traditional English breakfast of eggs and beans. No matter what Hotel made eggs and beans I wouldn’t like it.

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The day I arrived in London was the only day I had to look around the city. So, I went to all the biggest site like the London Eye which is the is the largest Ferris wheel in Europe and gives you great photo opps.

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Also, we took photos of Big Ben which is right across from the London Eye. Big Ben is the nickname for the great bell of the clock at the north-eastern end of the Palace of Westminster. I tried going to Buckingham Palace but they closed by the time I got there. London is a nice city with very polite people but I actually saw everything in that 1 day that I want to see.

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Day 2: We went to the London Stansted Airport, which is an hour train ride. That airport is like a mall, it’s real nice. I then found out that the seats on Easyjet were first come first serve, and since we checked in early we got seats up front.

I arrived in Prague, Czech Republic and went to the hotel I booked, La Boutique Hotel, which was very inexpensive, but very nice, and had a good breakfast included. The location was not great, there was nothing around that area the you wanted to look at, but it’s right next to the Metro so it easy access to the better areas. I always heard everything was real cheap in Prague, that is not the case in tourist areas, there you will find $5 bottles of water and overpriced food. After I paid for my first $5 bottle of water the first thing I did in every city was asked were the supermarket was located. So, I could buy water at normal prices.

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The first day in Prague we just went out to eat.  I ate bull tounge for the first time and it was delicious. Then we relaxed then went to sleep.

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Day 3: I had a full day in Prague, so first we went to Prague Castle and bought tickets to do some tours inside. Prague Castle is one of the biggest castles in the world (according to Guinness Book of Records the biggest ancient castle). We also went to Old Town Square and Old Town and saw most of the city. Prague has some awesome architecture and has a lot to see.

Old Town Square features various architectural styles including the gothic Týn Cathedral and baroque St. Nicholas Church. The Astronomical Clock is also there with special mechanisms and dials to display astronomical information, such as the relative positions of the sun, moon, zodiacal constellations, and sometimes major planets.

Prague also had some great food. The outdoors marketplace had people grilling sausages on baguettes which smelled awesome and had huge lines. Every where in the tourist areas of Prague just looked cool and you could point your camera anywhere and take a great photo.

Day 4: I flew to Milan, Milan is an awesome city, but I have been there before, so I jumped on a train right away and went to Verona. We arrived in Verona at night, I didn’t book a Hotel and had no idea where to go. So, I just looked at the bus schedule and picked the piazza with the most stops and went there. While taking the bus there I was a little apprehensive, because the city seemed dead with nothing to look at, but once I got there I was at ease.

First we had to find a Hotel which was a little hard at night. We ended finding the Hotel Cavour which was a good average Hotel (breakfast was not included). I actually liked that the person at the front desk didn’t speak English and had no idea what I was talking about, that’s more fun to me. None of the waiters we had in Verona spoke English either.

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Verona is a very beautiful city with not many tourist. At night the streets were dead which made for awesome picture taking. Verona looked like a mini Rome, with is Arena and Piazzas.

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Day 5: I continued to explore Verona, but this time in the day. Again Verona is beautiful, I’m surprised I never heard of it, I only went there because I was it was a city close to Milan on the map.

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We jumped on the train in the afternoon and went to Bologna. Again I didn’t book a Hotel and didn’t know were to stay, so I found the Hotel Internazionale. The the Hotel Internazionale was extremely nice(good breakfast too),but it should be for the price. I was actually lucky that I paid for a nicer Hotel than usual because compared to other Italy cities Bologna is pretty awful.

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I went to the Torre degli Asinelli and Palazzo Comunale and there wasn’t much more of interest. So I went back to the Hotel and got some much needed rest.

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Day 6: We got up early and took the train to Rome. Like I said I lived in Rome for several months. Rome is my favorite city to visit in the world. When we got there I knew I want to stay in Spagna. The Piazza di Spagna contains the Spanish Steps and is a beautiful area. I also like being right at the metro stop. We found the Condotti Hotel. It was an average Hotel, but again I liked the location. Also they gave us free wi-fi which I didn’t get in any other Italian hotels.

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After revisting my past like my old college campus and attempting to go to my favorite pizza places that were now closed, I went on a night time site seeing tour. I visited some on the larger places like the Colosseum, then went on whatever site was on the way to the Drunkin Ship. The Drunkin Ship is an American bar in Campo de’ Fiori, with American waitresses and bartenders. Usually I don’t like going to American places when I travel, but I went more for the college memories.

Day 7: I went around Rome to famous spots like the Pantheon which was a building built by Marcus Agrippa as a temple to all the gods.

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Then the Trevi Fountain which is the the largest Baroque fountain in the city. Also, the Vatican City which has some nice gift shops surrounding it. Then the Piazza Navona which has 3 nice fountains and built on the site of the ancient Stadium of Diocletion where chariot races took place. Then the Piazza del Popolo which is “the piazza of the people” and is famous as a meeting place for large rallies.

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The main thing I like to eat in Rome is their Rustic Pizza, Prosciutto Panini, and their Gelato. I think most of the Gelato place in Rome are better than any ice cream place in the US, but Della Palma Gelato di Roma is the best of the best. You’ll walk in the place and see over a hundred flavors of the best looking Gelato you ever seen. It’s truly unbelievable how good this place is.

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Day 8. Flew into Geneva Switzerland, turns out making Geneva my last stop worked out great, since I go to relax since there isn’t much to see. I wouldn’t really recommend going to Geneva for site seeing; they have the Jet d’Eau, which is a large water fountain, and not much else.

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I stayed at the Hotel Kipling which was very nice and also have us free wi-fi, and a free bus pass too.

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At night we ate at Les Brasseurs where I had an authentic Swiss dinner of Sausage and Potatoes which was pretty good. I also had a 5 beer sample which looked real good but unfortunately didn’t taste very good.

Day 9 I headed for home in the morning and was once again thankful I had my iPod touch to help me pass the time by watching movies on it. I actually watched a bunch of episodes of It’s always Sunny in Philadelphia, I love that show.