Europe I.

I left Australia on the 14th December 2015 to begin my six month journey in Europe. I don't think I'd ever felt as nervous as I did in the hour before leaving for the airport that day. I travelled around Europe with Tom, Myky, Sinead and Katie for about a month before heading over to Dublin to begin my exchange. Since it was quite a long time ago, I'll just include some photos from the trip and keep the text to a minimum.

Finland

The journey from Brisbane to Helsinki ended up taking us 40 hours with stopovers in Singapore and Frankfurt in Germany. As soon as we landed in Helsinki, we caught a train from the airport to Central Station to meet with Sinead and Tom who had both arrived that morning. We spent three days in Helsinki and explored the city centre and Suomenlinna Island (which was probably the coldest I've ever felt). 

Estonia & Russia 

Our next big destination was St Petersburg in Russia. We took a ferry from Helsinki to Tallin, Estonia where we spent a good portion of our night. Before boarding our bus to St Petersburg from Tallin, we explored the city a bit, looked at the Christmas markets and had dinner. The ride from Estonia to Russia was interesting to say the least. It took us a good 9-ish hours overnight and every time I woke up and looked outside the window, everything looked so eerie and post-apocalyptic. The roads seemed to be endless and the sides of the road were covered in tall leafless trees. It didn't help that it was a night bus either.

We spent three days in St Petersburg, took an overnight train on the last night to Moscow and spent a further two days in Moscow. There was so much I loved about Russia and I can't wait to revisit it again sometime!

Italy

On the morning of Christmas Eve, Tom, Myky and I made our way to the airport to catch a flight from Moscow to Rome! We met up with Katie in Rome and travelled with her until the end of our trip. I actually fell in love with Rome though. Every single sight we visited was a real-life dream come true and I finally got to see the Trevi Fountain and visit the Lizzie McGuire sites.

We spent Christmas Day in Vatican City which was definitely a highlight of my trip. After three days in Rome, we caught a train to Florence where we spent two days and then another train to Venice where we spent another two days. One of the most unforgettable moments in Florence was when we walked to the top of Piazzale Michelangelo. The view that greeted us was a sea of red roofs and the blue sky and I just felt so at peace and aware of how lucky I was.

Spain 

On New Years Eve, the four of us headed to Barcelona from Venice to meet up with Will Want, Sinead and Will Kowalski for New Years. In the three days we spent there, we probably covered less than 30% of what the city had to offer. So many regrets from not trying to fit in Sagrada Familia :( 

Morocco (& Spain again)

On the third of January, we said bye to Sinead and Will Want and the five of us headed to Marrakech in Morocco! Marrakech was by far the craziest place we visited. It was loud, colourful and so so crowded. Despite coming across a lot of people who tried to scam us, I highly recommend Marrakech and definitely want to revisit it.

On the sixth of January, we headed back to Spain but flew to Madrid this time. We only spent two days in Madrid and for some reason I have no photos :(

Portugal

We headed over to Lisbon on an overnight train from Madrid and spent two days in the capital before spending three days in Porto. Although we didn't hit up that many attractions in Portugal, it quickly became one of my favourite countries. By that point in the trip, I had become quite tired from the constant packing up, moving around and feeling cold all the time (haha sorry I am weak), but Portugal had just the right vibes for me to finish off the trip on a good note. It is so beautiful, quiet and peaceful and definitely a lot less touristy than the other places we visited. 

France

The very last place we went to before Dublin was Paris where the four of us met up with Tom's friend Antonia! Honestly, I didn't end up loving Paris as much as I thought I would've. It was definitely very beautiful and we were quite lucky with the weather but compared to everywhere else, it lacked personality. On the 17th, Katie, Tom and Antonia left us to continue their travelling and Myky and I left Paris on the 18th to head over to Dublin to begin our exchange!!

I really hope to revisit Paris one day so I can make a day trip out to the Palace of Versaille and I definitely want to visit other cities in France. During my exchange I did end up coming back to France to visit Strasbourg thought. Right now, I am really itching to see Colmar and Annecy as well as the French Riviera.

That's a quick summary of my first month in Europe. I did quite a bit of travelling during my exchange as well as afterwards and I'll probably post about those soon.