Babymoon Series: Cambridge, England

Part two of our babymoon adventure kept us in England. We ventured to Cambridge with our friends, Lucy and Simon, and we had a blast. It was so much fun walking around the campuses and checking out each individual college - even from outside. They were so gorgeous, and the weather was pretty great that day!

We wandered around, eventually finding lunch with Lucy's parents. It was awesome, and Dan was in heaven with the 'real' English pints! After lunch, the four of us went punting - which was so strange to me! It was a lot of fun, though! And no one fell in!

When we were finished punting, we checked out a really neat RAF (Royal Air Force) bar that was covered in patch stickers from the USAF as well - and Dan LOVED that. And finally, we headed out for a really fancy afternoon tea at a hotel... and it did not disappoint. It was my first time doing a traditional tea like that, and let me just tell you - it was amazing. I wish I could do tea EVERY afternoon. That would be the life... but I would gain SO much weight!

I'll just let the photos speak for themselves now...

While we were in Cambridge, we stopped at a really cute (huge) bookstore... and decided to buy Baby Cookie her very first book and stuffed bear! We didn't know she was a girl yet, and we decided on Paddington... can't get much more British than that! 

Have you visited Cambridge?

Have you ever gone punting? 

    

Babymoon Series: London, England

Remember when Dan and I went on our epic honeymoon across Europe last summer? Well, it was amazing, but it was cut short due to a family emergency. We never made it to England or Poland... both of which were high on our list. We are so thankful for Dan's accommodating schedule, as we were able to head back to Europe in March to finish our honeymoon - except this time around, we called it a babymoon - and it was so much fun!

We started out in London. Okay, that's a lie. We started out in Ramstein, Germany, but that's another story for another day. I promise I will eventually chronicle our Space A adventures. But for now... we begin in London.

Dan and I had London on our list for two reasons: 1) he went there for some Air Force training in 2012 (during the Summer Olympics, might I add - JEALOUS!!!)... so he was planning on showing me around since I'd never been... and 2) We have great friends who live there! Actually, they don't just live there... they are from there, and we affectionately call them "the Brits". You may remember my post about Lucy from when they visited us in Colorado in 2013... so we just HAD to go see them!

During our time in London, our friends had to work... so we played tourist around the city during the days and hung out with them in the evenings. We had a lot of fun and saw so many cool things! I wouldn't say that London is a favorite of mine... I prefer Paris, Rome, and Athens to it... but it was awesome being able to see a new place!

Also, don't mind our jet-lagged faces in these photos... we were TIRED after all that traveling.

Overall, we had a great time exploring the city and spending time with our friends - and they will actually make an appearance in the Cambridge photos... I promise! 

Have you ever been to London?

What's your favorite thing to do there?

    

Babymoon Adventures

As I shared in a couple of my (pre-scheduled) posts last week, I was out of town. Not just anywhere out of town, but Dan and I traveled to Europe for a little Babymoon!

Really, we needed to hit a couple more stops from our honeymoon journey last summer that was cut short due to a family emergency... so when Dan had a two week break from his graduate school classes, we decided, "why not?"

We followed Space A Terminal Facebook pages. Actually, we stalked them. And it worked! We were able to fly to and from Europe for exactly $46 total... but more to come on that in another post later this month.

*Note: that amount does not reflect what we paid once we were in Europe to travel between the three countries we visited.

That right there? That's a C-17... which was our very first ride. We flew from Wright-Patterson AFB (where Dan is stationed) to Naval Station Norfolk on a C-17, and it was pretty cool! There was only one other couple on the flight, and we had ALL that space to roam around in.

The flight we were planning on taking out of Norfolk to Spain was delayed 24 hours, and we didn't want to wait... so we rented a car and drove four hours to Baltimore because they had a Space A flight going out that night to Germany... which actually ended up being a better starting location than Spain, so it was a win/win.

From Ramstein Air Base, Germany, we took a train to Baden-Baden, Germany, where we flew to London Stansted airport and stayed with our British friends for a few days. We explored the city and even went to Cambridge, where we went punting and had afternoon tea. It was a blast!

From London, we flew to Warsaw, Poland (because it was cheapest) and then took a train from Warsaw to Krakow that evening since Krakow is actually the city we wanted to spend time in. I have dreamed of visiting Krakow since I was in 7th grade and first became interested in learning about the atrocity known as the Holocaust. It was a goal of mine to go to Auschwitz, and when we didn't make it there last summer, my heart was broken. Not anymore! We went, and it was everything I expected it to be and more.

From Krakow, we flew to Frankfurt and took a train back to Ramstein Air Base, where we were able to get on a C-5 to return to the USA. We made it to Dover Air Force Base and took a cab to Philadelphia, where we were able to redeem airline points for a flight back to Dayton!

If you ave Space A privileges (military) and haven't used it yet, you should! It's an amazing benefit we have, but like I mentioned, I plan on writing a comprehensive guide to Space A travel later... so be on the lookout for that!

I will follow up with separate posts for London, Cambridge, Krakow, and Auschwitz later this month because we took way too many pictures to display here alone.

Have you ever been to England?
What's your favorite thing there?
Have you visited Poland?