The Ziemer Family

We hired a personal tour guide to give us a much more meaningful insight into the rich history of Normandy and 3 famous sites: Pointe du Hoc, Utah & Omaha beach. It was well worth the investment. **Whenever you have the chance yAll should read This Flag May Fade, Yet These Colors Don't Run. Kinda puts everything into perspective.** It was such a humbling experience to be able to stand on the same beaches where hundreds of brave soldiers gave their lives for the freedom that we still enjoy today. You've heard it said before, "freedom isn't free" and on those beaches and at the Normandy American Cemetary and Memorial, I saw for myself the price thousands were willing to pay. The ultimate sacrifice of love.. Men laying down their lives for their parents, wives, children, future generations..YOU and I today. In my opinion Every American needs to experience this. Maybe people would think twice before joining brainless "challenges" like the Eric Shepperd one. If you haven't heard of it , look it up.

This exibit is at the Caen memorial for a few months

A German bunker.

Pointe du hawk

There were these large craters all over the land due to heavy bombing.
Another German bunker. Pretty impressive.

The Rangers landed at the wrong site and had to sneak from the farthest point you see in the pic to the point du hoc. Much respect to the American Rangers for paving the way.
It was insanely cold for these Arizona natives!!
At the American Memorial in Normandy

Rows and rows of crosses. Unbelievable.

A mosaic on the dome of the chapel depicts American blessing the soldiers as they go off to war(Left) and America welcoming her soldiers home when they die (right)

And I'm proud to be an American
Where at least I know I'm free
And I won't forget the men who died
Who gave that right to me
And I'd gladly stand up next to you
And defend Her still today
Cause there ain't no doubt
I love this land
God bless the U.S.A.

Le Uribe's, Cody and I had been planning a trip to Europe for about 9 months. The months seemed to crawl by as we counted down the days to April 15. And then all too soon it was over! I'm still having withdrawals from Belgian waffles, French macarons, fresh food, pain au chocolat... Oh I could go on and on about all the good stuff! Mm.... So we left April 15 at 5 a.m. And flew out to Atlanta where we met up with Amanda and DJ. After a loooong 8 hour flight, we arrived in Brussels!

Turn your head sideways lol

We arrived at 8a.m. Their time. Bro & sis Uribe picked us up from the airport and took us weary travelers home to rest for a bit. Their house was very unique! It was 4 stories high. The first floor was the garage and some storage space. Then you climbed stairs to get to the living room, dining and kitchen area. The 3rd story was 3 bedrooms and a bathroom and the 4th floor had 2 more bedrooms and a bathroom also.

Day 1- Thursday

Spent the day seeing the highlights of Brussels

THIS is how you eat a waffle!

Gorgeous flowers everywhere!

Beautiful views

Day 2: Paris, France- Friday

The Arc de Triomphe, a historical monument honoring those who fought and died in the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars.

This is the cafe section in the McDonalds on the Champs Élysées. Fanciest Mcds I have ever seen!! And they had security guards in suits (whaaat whaat?! Weird huh!)

The sun doesn't set until 8/9 at night so our days were long! We'd wake up around 7ish and not go back to sleep until 1ish in the morning! Talk about exausting! But I guess you don't spend thousands of dollars to sleep in Europe!

Day 3- Saturday in Paris

The gates at the Palace of Versailles

These guys were serious about getting the perfect pics.. That pose tho!! Lol

The next few pics are of the Palace of Versailles. This is where the center of political power was when King Louis XIV reigned. Basically the French Royals loved to live their lives as one big ongoing lavish party.

Where the King, Queen, and royal children & grandchildren would sit for their meals

And here we have acres and acres of fields, fountains, gardens, and secret gardens. In the palaces Prime days,I believe there were somewhere around 1500 fountains and today there is a mere 300. It would take days to fully explore the palace and the expansive grounds out back. So it's No wonder the French Revolution happened...while people were starving on the dirty streets of France the Royal family were living in some extreme luxuriousness.

Next stop was lunch! We were constantly on our feet walking, walking, walking, so we all looked forward to meals so we could sit lol.

This crepe had ham, potatoes, onion, and an egg. It was great!

Amanda ordered a regular Coke and I ordered the French version of Coke. Surprisingly, mine tasted much more like the American version of Coke than hers did.

And here we have a dessert crepe with salted caramel sauce and salted caramel ice cream with almonds. Divine!

Our next adventure was checking out Napoleons tomb inside this church.

His tomb. Kinda gross to think it's been sitting here for ages!

Ok how in the world were men able to build such amazing projects back then without the modern conveniences of today?? Unbelievable.

The World Famous Eiffel Tower! We can now cross that off our bucket list ✔️ what a sight to behold! It looks deceptively close but we still had to walk about 15 more minutes to get to the base.

Lol!! a perfect photobomb ladies and gents!