Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Trip Start-up

Our trip will cover Romania, the Crimea in the Ukraine, and Istanbul in Turkey -- all countries we have never visited.  But first, we begin our adventure in Munich.  We had a chance to break up our flights with one night here, and we couldn't pass up the opportunity to knock back a couple giant steins of beer at our favorite beer hall, the Hofbrauhaus! 

From Munich, we head to Romania for two weeks to check out a peasant culture that has changed little in the last 100 years and (of course) to explore Dracula's Transylvania.  Next, it's on to Istanbul for exotic sights like the Topkapi Palace for the magnificent emeralds and the Grand Bazaar for some major haggling.  We will also spend a day in Gallipoli learning about the infamous WW1 battle that was fought there.

Then, we are off to the Crimea where we will spend a week checking out WWII history in Yalta and learning about life after the Soviet Union (including a visit to a secret Russian submarine factory).  Finally, we make a return visit to Istanbul for a couple days and head for home.

We will post our trip reports and pictures as we go.  We always love to hear from you, so please feel free to add comments.

до свидания! (pronounced das-vi-dan-niye -- means goodbye in Russian),

Anne & Frank