Europe Round 3: The Graduation Tour

Welcome back, fans. The time has come for the third edition of Becca and Andrew doing Europe, and we couldn't be more excited to share our experiences of the food, accents, people, carbo loading, sites, sounds, borderline kidnappings and scams we fall victim too. The bar has been set impossibly high in previous experiences, but still going into this with clear eyes, full hearts (can't lose!). 

Part 1 (2012): The Euro-romp a.k.a. Operation Get a Girlfriend. I was a desperate young pup with a craving for debauchery planning a trip with 6 other decidedly drunken college grads. Following a moderately depressing move from Boston College back to Omaha, I resolved to basically kidnap Becca from Omaha in order to get her to the streets of Rome, Florence, Venice, Vienna, Prague and Frankfurt, where she surely wouldn’t turn me down as a boyfriend. Bulletproof plan.../was my only hope, and Operation Get a Girlfriend was successful. 

Part 2 (2016): The Victory Lap. I asked Becca to marry me 2 days after my board exams and we left for Europe 2 days after that. As you can tell, I am a wizard of a planner with the self-restraint of a 4th grader.

Part 3 (2018): The Graduation Tour. 

Becca is now my wife, so I’m going back to thank Europe for the help. Additionally, having graduated as a doctor two days ago, the third adventure will serve as my way of completely ducking the reality of residency starting in less than a month, and living lavishly off the remainder of student loans like a boss. 

The plan:

May 15-17th: Vienna, Austria. Eat schnitzel, catch some Opera, act rich.

May 17th-19th: Salzburg, Austria. More schnitzel, hang out with Mozart’s ancestors

May 18th-20th: Lake Bled. College roommate Jackson Shuttleworth aka Jesus Shuttlesworth aka Jackson Shuttlecock aka Mr. Worldwide and his FIANCE aka his better half aka his better 7/8ths pick us up in Salzburg en route to Lake Bled, Slovenia. Expecting some glorious hiking in Triglav National Park, though Jackson’s definition of 'hiking' is actually 'walking a short distance to a casino' most of the time

May 20th-21st: Ljubljana, Slovenia. Planning on spending most of the time figuring out how to pronounce it. 

May 21st: Overnight train from Ljubljana to Split, Croatia. Probably will deserve a blog post on its own. 

May 22nd-25th: Split, Croatia. Otherwise known as Mereen, for Game of Thrones fans. Will be Dragon hunting for most of this leg. 

May 25th-29th: Dubrovnik, Croatia. Otherwise known as King’s Landing for Game of Thrones fans…so hoping to avoid the public shaming walk while townspeople throw vegetables at our naked selves (SHAME, SHAME). Cersei Lannister deserved it though.

May 29th-31st: Barcelona, Spain. In order to lock in a $620 multi-city flight, this little pit stop was needed (FareBoom.com, for those interested in an absurdly cheap round trip flight such as this). Forecast predicts sunny skies, 100% chance of Sangria by the mediterranean, 200% chance I vomit from eating too many tapas. 

May 31st-June 3rd: Chicago, IL. Classmates Greg “Raise the" Rufener and Christina “Make It” Rei are getting hitched. A grand finale of sorts. 

June 3rd: Omaha. Collapse helplessly upon arrival. 

If you have any recommendations, travel tips, general commentary, or just opinions on life, feel free to share them on the blog or Facebook page. We look forward to providing the best updates and photojournalism we can!